Hello selfhosters, I’ve been using different remote desktop apps to support few friends and family members with their Windows or Linux desktop machines. Sometimes I also use phone (Android) when I’m away from home.
I tried 3 services so far:
- TeamViewer - its amazing, but it recognized me as non-private user and asking for money…
- AnyDesk - even better experience than TeamViewer. It also started with non-private use and messages to buy a license (after creating account it stopped doing that). It works perfectly fine, but sometimes it gets super slow and it tends to reduce stream quality by too much
- RustDesk - finally found open source solution and it has the same features like others I tried. The problem with RustDesk is simmilar to AnyDesk, sometimes its super slow, laggy and with reduced stream quality and sometimes connection breaks. It has permanent message on the bottom:
Ready, For faster connection, please set up your own server.
Sounds like a perfect task for my server on fiber network.
I checked self hosted RustDesk service, but it requires opening ports. I have open wireguard port to my home server to connect to home network when needed. I don’t like idea of opening more ports just because it doesn’t feel safe in my hands, but maybe I’m wrong. Am I missing something? What do you use for remote desktop? Do you have the same experience with any service I mentioned here? Is anyone selfhosting RustDesk server? Are there better (free or affordable) alternatives available? I prefer selfhosted if possible. 10$ a month is kinda steep for me and my needs. I don’t need super high quality stream, but would be nice to have simple solution that just works
All tips are welcome
i use Tailscale on everything these days (or use Headscale if you want to self host the control plane). with the free plan you get up to 100 devices on a “tailnet”, just set the right ACLs to only allow the remote connection ports of choice, pair it with self hosted RustDesk, and you should be good to go. the NAT traversal of Tailscale is pretty good from what i’ve observed, but sometimes you might get stuck on a relay (called a DERP) if it can’t get across the firewall(s).
I know about tailscale as alternative to bare metal wireguard server, but the rest is new to me. Ill read more about that thx