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Small office/home office network hardware vendor Buffalo Technology (USA) has announced a security router with a clever mix of remote access and PC remote control capabilities that could lure away some of Citrix Systems GoToMyPC's 150,000 users and help Buffalo increase its current 7 percent share of the U.S. market.

Standard features on the Buffalo Wireless Secure Remote Gateway (WRZ-RS-G54) include a four-port switch, SPI firewall, intrusion detection, and an 802.11g wireless access point.

Other secure routers in its class typically include an IPSec VPN client, which means you need a box on each end of the connection to create a secure tunnel. In contrast, the Buffalo router includes a Point-to-Point Tunneling Protocol VPN server, which means any remote client with the PPTP client (and permission) can set up a VPN tunnel to a network. Microsoft's original IP tunneling protocol, PPTP, is supported by most client platforms, including Windows, Macintosh, Linux, Pocket PC OS, and Symbian. Most PPTP clients are free; the Palm OS client costs about $30.

Once you make the PPTP connection to a router, a portal page gives you access to all resources on your home network, such as servers and printers, and control over individual PCs, as you get with GoToMyPC.

Desktop Access

To access the desktop, the Buffalo router uses a variant of the open source Virtual Network Computing standard, TightVNC. VNC is widely used by the tech community; its only flaw is lack of security. But Buffalo has secured VNC by running it inside the 40- or 128-bit encrypted PPTP tunnel. Buffalo also uses a Java-based control application, so you can run the Web-based remote control session using any browser, including Opera and Safari. GoToMyPC, in contrast, only works with Internet Explorer and Netscape Navigator, and Windows (95 and up) host machines. However, the GoToMyPC Universal Viewer and PocketView let you connect using an array of client.

Two key features are support for Wake-on-LAN and Dynamic DNS. One of the big downsides of remote PC control products is the need to keep the host PC running all the time. This can be inconvenient (if you turn off the machine and no one is home to turn it back on), a security risk and waste of electricity. The average monthly cost for running one PC and monitor 24/7 is about $15, experts say.

With Wake-on-LAN, a router user can keep his systems turned off while away and simply click the activation button on the portal page to remotely instruct the PC's network card to boot up the host system.

Dynamic DNS solves the problem of remotely connecting to PCs with dynamic IP addresses. A number of dynamic DNS services keep track of PCs' IP addresses each time they change, so remote users can find them - a task remote-control services handle on their servers. The Buffalo router includes client utilities from TZO and DynDNS. The former ranges in cost from about $30 to $60 per year, depending on whether you use the TZO domain name or your own. The latter is free.

Additional Features

In addition to gaining access to applications, data, and network resources from anywhere, the Buffalo router lets you do new things like drag files to the Web portal to print on a remote printer; stream audio and video files, and save photos from any client device to a network-attached storage device such as the Buffalo LinkStation; and wake up and access your home PC with your cell phone or PDA.

To ease the router's network and wireless configuration, Buffalo uses its AirStation One-Touch Security System (AOSS), which automatically sets up a secure wireless network with the push of a button. AOSS detects and configures other AOSS-enabled devices on the network and creates a secure connection based on the highest level of security all devices support.

Scheduled to ship in December, the Buffalo Wireless Secure Remote Gateway lets you remotely access any number of PCs and devices for a one-time cost of $199. In contrast, a one-PC host subscription to GoToMyPC costs about $20 per month or $179 per year. Two PCs cost $30 per month or about $270 per year. Additional PCs are about $15 per month or $135 per year.