Question Wake-on-LAN not working from far away??

[thomasst]

Hello,

I've been setting up a new PC in my new office and I've encountered a strange problem.

Namely, I've been trying to set up remote connection through Anydesk and TeamViewer, with Wake-on-LAN enabled so I can keep my PC in sleep when I'm not using it, and wake it up remotely. My office Internet is provided by a Speedport Plus router connected to the PC via an Ethernet cable. The motherboard is AsRock B550 Phantom Gaming 4.

Now, I've managed to make it work - when I'm there, in my office. With my laptop in the room I can wake the PC and connect to it remotely without problems. Then I go home and try to wake it up the same way - doesn't work. Anydesk just gets stuck "trying..." and gives up, while on TeamViewer I just keep clicking "Wake up" with no success.

First I figured it was either a power management or a network issue. But when I returned to the office and tried to connect again, it worked, even though the PC was off for hours previously. And my friend who came to assist me managed to wake the PC up with his own laptop, even though he didn't connect it to my office WiFi network beforehand.

So what could be the cause of this issue? It just doesn't make sense to me...

Thanks in advance for any help!

 

[punkncat]

Wake on Local Area Network is exactly that. What you are trying appears to be WAN. Not the same.

To use Team Viewer (which I haven't in a while) you need to leave the PC on. I am not sure if they require any authorization on the (being dialed into) machine or not. I know at one point they did but not sure now since I quit using it some time ago.

 

[thomasst]

Wake on Local Area Network is exactly that. What you are trying appears to be WAN. Not the same.

To use Team Viewer (which I haven't in a while) you need to leave the PC on. I am not sure if they require any authorization on the (being dialed into) machine or not. I know at one point they did but not sure now since I quit using it some time ago.

Hmm... But I remember, when I worked at my previous employer, we used Anydesk to work from home and I managed to wake up my office PC from my home PC every time. Anydesk would use the term "Trying to wake it by Wake-on-LAN", that's why I used this term. But I know there must be a way to make it work, because it did so for me in the past.

I'm not all that familiar with TeamViewer either, but they now have this feature of waking up a host PC remotely. Whether both computers have to be in the same network, I don't know.

 

[punkncat]

Is your office large enough to have an IT dept? They would be the ones to ask since having such easy access is a security risk.

 

[thomasst]

Is your office large enough to have an IT dept? They would be the ones to ask since having such easy access is a security risk.

No no, I'm self-employed right now, I rented a small office space for myself so I can meet clients, store paperwork etc.

I set up AnyDesk so it only permits remote access to computers I list on its security page. I only gave permission to my friend temporarily, usually my laptop and home PC are the only ones allowed. Same for TeamViewer - only my laptop can connect remotely. And even after that, Windows password needs to be entered to gain access to the computer. So I hope this is secure enough, I was keeping it in mind.

 

[bill001g]

There is no such things as wake on WAN. Something needs to be running on your lan to send the message to the PC.

Since you must leave your router on all the time the simplest way is to have a router that can send the wake on lan packet on your behalf. I know most asus routers have this ability. You would remotely access the router and then ask it to send the packet.

Your previous company likely used a vpn. When you are using vpn then you are on the LAN and can send wake on lan packets. If your router supports VPN you likely can also do this.

You are better off just leaving the pc in one of the microsoft low power modes. There is almost no difference in power usage.

If nothing else buy one of those plugs that let you remotely turn it on and off. Most pc you can set the bios to boot as soon as power is restored.

 

[punkncat]

Discussing this with a buddy of mine and his comment was that most likely you will have to check with your ISP to see if they have those features blocked or not. It not a common thing to be in use anymore.

 

[thomasst]

Your previous company likely used a vpn. When you are using vpn then you are on the LAN and can send wake on lan packets. If your router supports VPN you likely can also do this.

You're right! I forgot about this - yes, they had a VPN, and a static IP address.
I will check if my router supports VPN, I believe it should.
In any case, I think I'm stuck with this router because it was provided to me by my ISP, but this is something I'd have to check with them.

You are better off just leaving the pc in one of the microsoft low power modes. There is almost no difference in power usage.

If nothing else buy one of those plugs that let you remotely turn it on and off. Most pc you can set the bios to boot as soon as power is restored.

I'm not really concerned about power usage, I just don't feel comfortable with all the PC fans and coolers running 24/7, I'd rather have them hibernate when not in use.

So instead of sleep I should use some other function? How to toggle it?

In any case, thanks both for responding. 😉