Reading PC User magazine for January 2012, I found a cool tool called "Mouse Without Borders".
If you are like me, when you've got multiple computers running you often find yourself typing on one keyboard and expecting things to happen on another machine altogether.
MWB solves this frustration intuitively.
It allows you to control multiple computers on your local network amazingly easily.
Once the software is installed on all PCs, your mouse can simply move from one screen of one PC to the next (as if
you had a multiple monitor set up) and all keyboard input automatically
goes to the other machine.
So if you have more than one computer
running side by side, you can now eliminate extra keyboards, mice and
unreliable KVM switches from your cluttered working space.
A window shows what computers are connected and you can rearrange the connections so that the physically monitor layout is reproduced on MWB (so that when your mouse slides off the edge of one monitor screen it shows up on the one next to it :-)
It works both ways automatically too i.e. you can use computer A's mouse and keyboard to drive computer B and vice versa. It just depends which one is being used and where the mouse pointer has been dragged to.
I love it :-)
Watch a small video about it here...
4 comments:
Here is a Mac mouse and keyboard sharing solution. I have not tried it (don't have a Mac yet) so can't vouch for it.
In theory it should be better because it works across platforms i.e. you can do the magic across your PC and Mac :-)
"Share Mouse and Keyboard with multiple Computers
www.keyboard-and-mouse-sharing.com
Mouse and Keyboard Sharing to control a Windows or Mac PC with the mouse and keyboard of any other PC."
The best and most recommended software of this type is Synergy
http://synergy-foss.org/
Open Source of course
If you have cross platform computers Win/Mac/Linux it is excellent.
If you only have Windows machines I find Mouse Without Borders just slightly less fiddly
Thanks again Matt. Good to know people are reading my posts, even better when they expand them :-)
Email feedback I've received, reproduced with permission and requested edits:
"I am loathed to make recommendations, particularly in the kind of areas KVMs live so consider this an observation you may like to take into consideration if you ever decide to have another crack at them.
I have 3 KVMs or, more precisely 2 KVMs and a piece of crap that lives up the back of a cupboard somewhere.
The first one is an old Serverlink Infinity 4 port desktop model (ps2 only) which has been running non-stop for 9 years without missing a beat.
Image quality is excellent and the hot key functionality intuitive. It is unpowered (gets power from the host connections).
The second is a domestic grade 2 port which was bought while out on an installation on the basis if “this will do, how bad can it be”.
The answer to those questions was “no it won’t” and “very” respectively.
It had all the problems you mention with the addition of appalling video clarity (full res but blurry).
The third is Serverlink Altitude which I got last year, this time 8 ports, powered, rack mount (or can be desktop), and with intelligent mix and match of ps2/usb both incoming and outgoing.
The hot-key arrangement is not quite as intuitive (to me at least) but otherwise it has been pretty much the same as the first one.
http://www.comsol.com.au/Products-by-Category/8-Port/SL-871-P
"
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