Back in May, we reported on the availability of a beta version of LogMeIn Ignition for Android phones. With LogMeIn Ignition, you can remotely (and securely) access your home computer, using your smartphone and a data connection.
Once your phone connects to your PC, you get full access to your desktop, and can use your touchscreen to control your operating system, just as easily as sitting behind it. For travelers, this means you can start programs, view documents, send emails and more. I’ve been using LogMeIn for several months now, and it really has helped me several times when I forgot to do something important before leaving.
LogMeIn works over almost any connection, but the faster the connection, the nicer the experience will be of course. On a stable 3G connection, things are very efficient, and scrolling around the screen is very fast. If the connection drops to EDGE, you’ll naturally need to be a bit more patient.
LogMeIn on Android works the same as on the iPhone version we reviewed back in February – move the screen around with your fingers, and whatever the mouse pointer is on is what you’ll click on when you tap on the screen. You can double tap with two taps, and right-click when you press the mouse button on the toolbar. Zooming is done through the toolbar zoom button or with pinch-to-zoom on multi-touch devices.
The application has a whole host of features, including quality, color and resolution settings. On home setups with more than one monitor, you can easily switch to any of the screens, or display all screens in one session.
When you connect to your home PC, the LogMeIn client lets you know someone is running a remote session, so anyone not on your trip won’t be alarmed when things start moving around.
One other feature you can use LogMeIn for is for providing tech support – if you have someone in your family that is less-than-savvy with their computer, you can make help them out no matter where you are.
LogMeIn Ignition for Android costs $29.95 and is available in the Android Marketplace.- search for LogMeIn, or scan the QR code on the right. This price may seem steep, but there are no other monthly fees involved, making the investment much easier to accept.
Downsides to the application are that you need to keep your PC on or tweak your settings to allow for “wake on lan”, in which case your PC will wake from its sleep if it receives a request for a connection.
All in all, a very well designed application. It arrived out of beta without a single bug (that I could find) and connections are speedy and reliable enough to access my PC wherever I am.
Of course, with LogMeIn on your computer, you are not limited to your smartphone – you can still access it using the web or a remote LogMeIn client.