Remote Viewing Software?

[avg1joe]

Recently I've been asked by a number of friends and family to help them with their computer questions. Usually these are pretty simple questions but its sometimes brutal trying to figure out what is going on on there computer screens over the phone. For example I tried to help someone with minimal computer skills sign up to pay her bills online earlier today. At one point she asked should I click Continue, Register, or both. I told her to press Register and she said that it didn't work. 10 minutes later as I'm trying to figure out what went wrong without ever having seen this website she finally admitted she clicked on both buttons because that seemed more logical to her.

It would be very helpful in situations like this to see what is going on on the other person's screen. I don't really need remote control.

I was looking at pc anywhere and team viewer. Are there programs out there that are free or low cost and easy for me and my friends to install and run that will allow me to see what happens on their screen?

I am running Vista Home Premium. They are running Vista or XP Home.

 

[Jared Twomey]

its not free but I use gotoassist.com and it is awesome.
For free options I would try to work something out with one of these... kinda depends on how much control you have over the other person's pc... if you can install software, or want a webbased service.
My first option would be to try Dimdim: Web conferencing that just works. Dimdim provides easy, open, affordable collaboration. Use for online meetings, eLearning, desktop sharing, training, distance education, unified collaboration, webinar, free web meetings and more., there is a free option that would work for what you want to do, but the person you are trying to help would have to start the meeting so they could show their desktop, i think.
Or you could try something like VNC if you can install software on their machine

 

[bhawley]

Logmein, but they have to download and install.

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

I second LogMeIn.COM as well, its free and is secure and runs well.

 

[StevenD]

Logmein rocks! I require my family members to install it and make me a secondary admin before I will help them with anything.

 

[Cegarrett]

I fourth the Logmein Suggestion. I'm the Volunteer Computer Tech at the Church so I require everyone to let me have a user on thier computer and I use a generic email and password so they can get into their own computer or any other computers at the church that they have accounts on.

 

[avg1joe]

Thank you for the suggestions.