How to start a computer remotely - generic Q

I have done this using "Remote Wake on Lan" and
www.dslreports.com/wakeup.
THis is what you need 

1) Your motherboard needs to support wake-on-lan. 
It should have a small connector for WOL.
2) You need a LAN Card with wake-on-lan support.
(Normally it is clearly mentioned on the outer box).
3) Thirdly you need to be behind a router on a private LAN
(NAT).
If you connect your m/c directly to the DSL/Cable/Dial-up
then 
you can't do this.
4) Your router needs to support dyn dns.

Most modern PCs support WOL, if your LAN card doesn't
support WOL,
then it's a 15$ investment in another LAN card. If your
bios has
options to enable disable WOL, then you need to enable them.

router requirement is a bit tricky, not every one is behind
a router,
and not all routers support dyn dns. So you should consider
investing
in a router that does this. 

Now here is what you need to do.
1) Connect your LAN cards WOL cable to the WOL port on the
motherboard.
2) Setup dyn-dns on your router.
3) Setup your router to forward any traffic on UDP port 9 to
broadcast
on your NAT subnet.If you are using 192.168.X.X/24, it would
be 192.168.x.255
(Note:- Some routers don't support broadcasting of packets,
i.e. they won't
allow the destination to be like X.X.X.255, so a clever
trick
is to split your subnet and set the destination
X.X.X.127/255.255.255.128
The router thinks it is forwarding it to a specific IP, but
in fact it is a
broadcast.
).  

Now to actually turn your PC on, go to http://www.dslreport
s.com/wakeup and
input the dyn-dns host name of your router. and the MAC
address of your
machine's LAN Card (not the routers). and click send, your
m/c will wake up
on receiving the WOL packet.

Notes:-
This is a bit of a complicated setup, so first try to get
the local 'WOL'
working. there are some nice GUI clients for that.
Spliting of subnet is required when the router won't
forward a packet to a
broadcast address.
Some basic knowledge of networking concepts is required to
trouble shoot.
And google is your friend 

all the best 
bhaskar

--- Arun Mallikarjunan <arunmarjungmail.com> wrote:

> Hi All,
>     I was watching the program "Global warming -
what you need to
> know" on discovery channel yesterday and learned
that TV's, and other
> electronics use almost 40% of their normal wattage even
when switched
> off which came as a real surprise to me and these
appliances can
> result to a whopping more than 1/2 ton of Co2 annually.
Well, I do my
> part by riding my bike to work and taking the public
transportation
> whenever possible which in DC is really well organised.
>     the thing is thats when I thought about the
possibility of
> remotely starting my PC from anywhere. currently i
leave it running
> for the possibility of me having to access it every now
and then but
> would love to hear suggestions as to how to put this
together.
> 
> Thanks in Advance,
> Arun
> > _______________________________________________
> dclug mailing list
> dclugtux.org
> http://www.
tux.org/mailman/listinfo/dclug
> 


best regards
bhaskar
http://www.bhaskarvk.info

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Arun Mallikarjunan wrote:

> Hi All,
>     I was watching the program "Global warming -
what you need to
> know" on discovery channel yesterday and learned
that TV's, and other
> electronics use almost 40% of their normal wattage even
when switched
> off 


I dont' believe that for one second.  My laptop battery
lasts about 3 
hours when I'm using it.  When my laptop is in standby, it
uses about 1% 
of the battery in 3 hours, if that much.  Stand-by mode is
insanely 
efficient.  I can't believe that TV's and other
electronics are much 
different.
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On Mon, Jul 17, 2006 at 12:55:35PM -0400, Angelo Bertolli
wrote:
> Arun Mallikarjunan wrote:
> 
> > Hi All,
> >     I was watching the program "Global
warming - what you need to
> > know" on discovery channel yesterday and
learned that TV's, and other
> > electronics use almost 40% of their normal wattage
even when switched
> > off 
> 
> I dont' believe that for one second.  My laptop
battery lasts about 3 
> hours when I'm using it.  When my laptop is in
standby, it uses about 1% 
> of the battery in 3 hours, if that much.  Stand-by mode
is insanely 
> efficient.  I can't believe that TV's and other
electronics are much 
> different.


Your laptop has an LCD screen.  CRTs take a good deal of
current to keep
warm, as they need to be to turn on instantly.


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On Mon, Jul 17, 2006 at 08:45:57AM -0700, bhaskar
karambelkar wrote:
> I have done this using "Remote Wake on Lan"
and www.dslreports.com/wakeup.
...


This rather defeats the whole purpose of getting the current
draw down
to as close to 0% when off as possible.

I will say, though, that if you turn off the CRT monitor,
you are saving
a LOT of power, and you don't need that at all for remote
access.  THAT
takes up almost all of any "hot standby" power.

LCD screens, as someone noted, take a lot less power,
especially when
off.


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On Mon, Jul 17, 2006 at 05:46:30PM -0400, Joseph S D Yao
wrote:
> On Mon, Jul 17, 2006 at 12:55:35PM -0400, Angelo
Bertolli wrote:
> > Arun Mallikarjunan wrote:
> > 
> > > Hi All,
> > >     I was watching the program "Global
warming - what you need to
> > > know" on discovery channel yesterday
and learned that TV's, and other
> > > electronics use almost 40% of their normal
wattage even when switched
> > > off 
> > 
> > I dont' believe that for one second.  My laptop
battery lasts about 3 
> > hours when I'm using it.  When my laptop is in
standby, it uses about 1% 
> > of the battery in 3 hours, if that much.  Stand-by
mode is insanely 
> > efficient.  I can't believe that TV's and other
electronics are much 
> > different.
> 
> 
> Your laptop has an LCD screen.  CRTs take a good deal
of current to keep
> warm, as they need to be to turn on instantly.

What is the TV doing, then?

-kpd
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   I will say, though, that if you turn off the CRT monitor,
you are saving
   a LOT of power, and you don't need that at all for
remote access.  THAT
   takes up almost all of any "hot standby"
power.

My sony 17" trinitron uses a standby mode on a
'no-signal' condition,
where it is quite cool to the touch, and takes few dozen
seconds to show 
a picture after I move the mouse.

So, if you want to save power, turn off the blasted
screensavers: it'll help
the CPU and the monitor because most video cards will turn
the signal off when
they aren't written to for a while.
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Joseph S D Yao wrote:
> On Mon, Jul 17, 2006 at 12:55:35PM -0400, Angelo
Bertolli wrote:
> 
>>Arun Mallikarjunan wrote:

>>>    I was watching the program "Global
warming - what you need to
>>>know" on discovery channel yesterday and
learned that TV's, and other
>>>electronics use almost 40% of their normal
wattage even when switched
>>>off 
>>
>>I dont' believe that for one second.  My laptop
battery lasts about 3 

40% of regular power draw when *off*? I'm skeptical, too.

I've seen a 40% increase in power usage of a PC at peak
activity (100%
CPU, disk activity) compared with idle (but still up and
running), but I
haven't seen anything like that fraction of power draw when
"off".

>>hours when I'm using it.  When my laptop is in
standby, it uses about 1% 
>>of the battery in 3 hours, if that much.  Stand-by
mode is insanely 

> Your laptop has an LCD screen.  CRTs take a good deal
of current to keep
> warm, as they need to be to turn on instantly.

Quantitative measurements would be nice here. The following
are from a
Kill-A-Watt device.[1] These are Watts, not Volt-Amps.

My Linksys Wifi access point uses 7-8 watts.
My 19" LCD monitor uses about 30 watts
"on", 2 watts idle/"off".
My 24" CRT TV uses about 65 watts "on" and
less than 1 watt "off".[0]
My 32" LCD TV uses about 150 watts "on"
and 1 watt "off".
My Athlon64 MythTV system and its UPS use about 130 watts
when idling.
My 1st generation iMac peaks around 110 watts, idles (OS X)
around 102
watts, "sleeps" around 24 watts, and uses about
1 watt when "off".

All this sort of thing should be in the Ecology HOWTO, but I
have not
looked at it in a long time: http://tldp.org/
HOWTO/Ecology-HOWTO/

-Peter

[0] "less than 1 watt" means the meter stayed at
0 watts; note there was
a brief spike of about 180 watts when the TV powered on.

[1]
http://www.the-gadgeteer.com/review
/kill_a_watt_electric_usage_monitor_review
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On Mon, Jul 17, 2006 at 05:48:58PM -0400, Joseph S D Yao
wrote:
>This rather defeats the whole purpose of getting the
current draw down
>to as close to 0% when off as possible.

There's a big difference between the <5W of the solid
state router and 
a whole desktop computer.

Mike Stone
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Apparently "what you need to know" is not based
on "available data". Whether 
or not this amounts to disinformation, I don't know. The
feds have a whole 
program on standby power. This link:

http://oah
u.lbl.gov/cgi-bin/search_data.pl

lets you search for monitors with low standby power. It
shows many CRT models 
with less than ONE watt of standby power consumption. You
can also search for 
PCs etc.

Larry

On Monday 17 July 2006 09:49, Arun Mallikarjunan wrote:
> Hi All,
>     I was watching the program "Global warming -
what you need to
> know" on discovery channel yesterday and learned
that TV's, and other
> electronics use almost 40% of their normal wattage even
when switched
> off which came as a real surprise to me and these
appliances can
> result to a whopping more than 1/2 ton of Co2 annually.
Well, I do my
> part by riding my bike to work and taking the public
transportation
> whenever possible which in DC is really well organised.
>     the thing is thats when I thought about the
possibility of
> remotely starting my PC from anywhere. currently i
leave it running
> for the possibility of me having to access it every now
and then but
> would love to hear suggestions as to how to put this
together.
>
> Thanks in Advance,
> Arun
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