The iTwin makes secure transfer of data practical

Installation and Remote Access

Just plug the iTwin with both halves connected together into a USB port on the desktop (hosting) PC and make sure you are connected to the Internet.  iTwin is plug and play.

As you can see, it needs to download and install the latest version of its files.

During installation you are prompted to register it and receive a disable code in case one half of your iTwin is ever lost.  You can always do this later but it is very wise to do it now!  iTwin is rather small and as easy to lose as a flash drive.

Now we see the new iTwin folder which is created on the home desktop PC that we will attempt to access with our notebook’s Wi-Fi using the library’s public connection.

Now we simply drag and drop files that we wish to access to the iTwin folder.  You can drag the entire document library or even the contents of an entire hard drive or drives into it.  It is instantaneous – no waiting.

Now that we have the home PC configured and left on while connected to the Internet, let’s head for the library with our notebook and one-half of the iTwin and we will use their public broadband connection.

At the Public Library

At the library we connect to the Internet using their super-fast 10MBs/second connection using our notebook’s Wi-Fi.  Immediately the half of the iTwin that we took with us, installs itself on the notebook as soon as we plug it in.  Of course, we left our desktop PC on and online at home with the other half of the iTwin still installed on it.

As you can see, the half of the iTwin at the library also needs to download and install files.

Next, the iTwin looks for it’s “other half”, its twin, which is the office desktop PC online at home.  It begins connecting.

Our connection is made!

Now the connection is secured by the iTwin’s hardware and the remote files on the online home desktop PC appear in the notebook’s local iTwin files at the library.

Of course, we want to see if we can actually securely download these files to our notebook PC in the public library.

We got our files – securely, and only limited by the slow upload speeds of our home PC over Satellite Internet.

We got our file!  Quickly (well, for Satellite Internet) and securely!

Possible Issues with the iTwin

We also decided to see if we could access our home PC’s iTwin files using the public library’s computers.

As you can see, you have to have administrator privileges to install iTwin and this is a fail at the library  And the first time we brought our own notebook we had an issue with Proxy Settings with our WildBlue Satellite ISP connection at home.

We had to visit our Internet Options in the Windows 7 Control Panel in our PC at home and uncheck some LAN settings. Evidently you cannot use an automatic configuration script as WildBlue requests.

Simply uncheck the boxes and iTwin can now transfer files between PCs. “Automatically detect settings” may be checked if necessary.

iTwin support was very helpful in tracking down our proxy issues in no time at all.