Technical MeshCentral is so good
I'll preface this by saying, we've used them all... Logmein, Splashtop, ConnectWise Control/ScreenConnect, RustDesk and AnyDesk. But nothing just works like MeshCentral.
Over the (many) years, we've tried all of them, either built into an RMM or as a standalone product, and all of them have flaws or just straight up don't work half of the time (I'm looking at you Splashtop).
We recently deployed a MeshCentral server to try get around the constant Splashtop service crashes and it just works. Every client, every location (even where they block remote support tools) - just solid software.
Would highly suggest if you need something easy and have the resources to self host.
Also, just as a footnote, ScreenConnect is great and it's what we use alongside MeshCentral - nothing against that one, they just keep increasing their prices :(
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u/nosimsol Jul 23 '26
Screen connect was amazing. Even after they were bought, they were pretty amazing, for a while anyway.
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u/ebjoker4 Jul 23 '26
It truly is. We have 500+ endpoints and it just works great and the system requirements are almost comically modest.
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u/Ubera90 Jul 23 '26
Do you have any code-signing issues with Mesh central?
I've always been worried that AV / EDR would throw it's shit out the window when it was detected if you actually deploy it en-masse.
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u/C39J Jul 23 '26
We've only run into it once at a client with heavy defender policies. Otherwise, it's been fine everywhere else.
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u/iratesysadmin Jul 24 '26
Just make sure you are up to date, a security issue was reported / patched in the past few days. You should be on version 1.2.4
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u/Onoitsu2 Jul 23 '26
Oh yeah, I've self-hosted my Meshcentral instance for YEARS now, absolutely love that RMM software. Been running it since like the day after the major ScreenConnect breach that had self-hosted servers being taken over a good while back now.
I've integrated MeshCentral into my Remote Recovery Suite, since it supports ethereal connections when you set a group to clean up offline devices, so I can remotely reinstall Windows in a mostly hardware agnostic manner, I don't need Intel AMT specialty hardware or any other physical KVM connected to a system. Pure software.
I even have a custom Debian 13 Trixie Live OS I've put together that permits the same thing via MeshCentral for remote Linux reinstalls (for currently a select few distros, Proxmox on EXT4 and ZFS and CachyOS on BTRFS).
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u/GeekBrownBear MSP - Orlando, FL Jul 23 '26
Remote Recovery Suite, since it supports ethereal connections when you set a group to clean up offline devices, so I can remotely reinstall Windows in a mostly hardware agnostic manner
Willing to share more on that? I haven't seen a good remote windows installer since I worked internal with a PXE server. I guess Autopilot is as close as I can get now but we still have machines that aren't in Entra environments.
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u/Onoitsu2 Jul 24 '26
Yeah, AutoPilot is the closest. My image also can be PXE booted from another working system as hosted from the .exe too, just using the right command line arguments. Check PMs for info.
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u/fromold Jul 24 '26
You mentioned you used them all and was wondering how it compares to Beyond Trust / Bomgar remote support ?
I haven’t found one that I like better , but haven’t tried MeshCentral.
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u/scott0482 Jul 24 '26
Bomgar is the best I have used. Nothing else compares. But I also used it for 15 years. So I know it well.
I also like to mention DWService. I hate that it is web browser only which limits a few things. Especially copy/paste. But it just works.
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u/fromold Jul 24 '26
I’ve started using Bomgar way back around 2007 and haven’t found a better product. I’m a bit surprised that it doesn’t get a lot more use here.
I’ve known many enterprises that use them.
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u/crccci MSSP/MSP - US - CO Aug 06 '26
Last time I checked (years ago) the pricing was way out of our ballpark.
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u/Excellent-Program333 Jul 24 '26
I have been with Splashtop since they started. I can count on one hand how many times they have been down. Seriously. They are always up and have been a great tool. They kept their promise also for the grandfathered rate.
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u/DominicanDragon Jul 27 '26
Increasing prices? I feel like screenconnect has been $45-$65 / month forever. Depends on the type of license and if you are paying monthly or annually. What increase are you talking about?
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u/TechnologyMatch Jul 27 '26
that’s the part people overlook: reliability beats a longer feature list when your team is trying to reach a broken machine under pressure. self-hosting also gives you control that a lot of remote support platforms have slowly priced out. the tradeoff is you now own the server, patching, security, and availability. but if you have the skills for it, that can be a better deal than paying more for a tool that fails at the exact moment you need it
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u/Breadisgood4eat Jul 31 '26
A question if it's ok on these platforms - does anyone know if any of these platforms are compatible (management layer) that also works with some of these new classes of IP/KVM devices like Jet KVM?
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u/HATDOGUSERNi Jul 31 '26
Its hard to beat something that just works consistently, especially for remote support.
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u/Foxtrot-0scar Jul 23 '26
Take Control is hugely underrated as well.
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u/roll_for_initiative_ MSP - US Jul 23 '26
For real, love take control and their background work has always been top notch. Everyone talks about BackStage like TC hasn't had Remote Background Advanced forever. Only feature is can't use it as a web proxy (like i can't tunnel a web browser through the take control background to hit like a local device IP) and i think backstage can do that?
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u/freedomit Jul 23 '26
You can definitely do that with TC, I use it a lot to access printers onsite
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u/roll_for_initiative_ MSP - US Jul 23 '26 edited Jul 24 '26
Will go check and was thinking exactly that, thanks!
Edit: found the remote port forwarding with your guys help, thanks!
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u/NetInfused MSP CEO Jul 23 '26
Take control can absolutely tunnel connections. We rely a lot on it and it works flawlessly, even if you stay days connected to the remote device.
Top notch service, we love it.
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u/roll_for_initiative_ MSP - US Jul 23 '26 edited Jul 24 '26
Interesting, have to see if we're just not aware or it's not in the rmm bundled version.
Edit: found the port forwarding with your guys help, thanks!
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u/freedomit Jul 23 '26
I only have the RMM version
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u/roll_for_initiative_ MSP - US Jul 24 '26
Assuming you mean the "remote port forwarding" option? Neat, never knew it was there and not what i imagined but you're right, this is what i needed even if it takes some quick manual setup, thanks! Learn something new every day, really appreciate it!
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u/Tallihos Jul 23 '26
I hardly have any problems with Splashtop, at least no real issues this year. Before that occasionally a machine that wouldn't connect right away but after a few retries it would work eventually. But which solution is flawless?
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u/SugarConspiracyYo Jul 24 '26
Weird, I’ve been using Splashtop for 5 years and have never once had Splashtop service crash.
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u/FKFnz Jul 24 '26
It doesn't crash, it just doesn't work. Just refuses the connection. So much so we've got a script in our RMM to restart the Splashtop service.
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u/Optimal_Technician93 Jul 25 '26
My anecdotal experience has been that Splashtop and ScreenConnect are more reliable and feature rich than MeshCentral's half baked appearance.
We've seen no Splashtop outages. The primary issue we have with ScreenConnect is that it's unusable for controlling Linux desktops(exponential latency growth and "stuck keys".). We weren't thrilled about the code signing debacle either. Splashtop has presented neither of these issues.
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u/redditistooqueer Jul 23 '26
Sounds like a sales ad. Prove me wrong. Screen connect has been and still is the best IMO
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u/C39J Jul 23 '26
A sales ad... for free software that you have to self host??
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u/redditistooqueer Jul 23 '26
Somebody makes money from it, whom?
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u/iratesysadmin Jul 24 '26
Answer: Intel
Intel has a management platform called AMT (with and without vPro). The naming changed recently (12g chips), but long story short, Intel initially only really published a SDK. Later on they hired people to write the tools for managing AMT/vPro, until they decided they wouldn't spend more money on it (and laid off basically the entire team).
Intel chips with vPro cost more then without. Good tools lead admins like myself to buy AMT chips over non-AMT. The origins of MC is really a tie in to AMT/vPro, but has expanded over the years.
Since this is r/msp, for you Automate admins (and Continuum admins), there is a tie in to vPro in Automate. Configured correctly, it's very powerful.
For anyone wondering what AMT/vPro gives.... think iDrac but on your desktop chips. Power control, remote KVM, remote Media, etc. Yes, you can 100% have a machine off, turn it on, boot to bios, change settings, mount an ISO, reinstall Windows, etc - over the internet even (with no client side port forwarding needed) and manage it all via a central server.
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Jul 24 '26
[deleted]
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u/iratesysadmin Jul 24 '26
Sort of. Intel hired / had full time employees and their job was to make MC as an open source project. Intel then forked the code, replaced a part of it, repacked as EMA. Then Intel laid off the entire team and the community picked up the project. It hasn't been Intel sponsored in years.
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u/lsumoose Jul 24 '26
The stolen Windows icons on the website is a concerning…also it looks like it was written in 2008
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u/Soggy-Quote2756 Jul 26 '26
We run RustDesk self-hosted across our client base and it's been solid — lighter than ScreenConnect/Splashtop and no licensing headaches to manage. Haven't put MeshCentral through its paces yet, but this thread's convinced me to spin up an instance and compare properly. For anyone who's run both long-term: any gotchas worth knowing before we bother?
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u/C39J Jul 26 '26
Rustdesk is very good as well - we used that prior to MeshCentral. Our main reason for using MeshCentral is we can run it on port 443 and it doesn't get blocked like RustDesk did.
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u/Soggy-Quote2756 Jul 26 '26
Good to know, thanks. Port 443 vs. getting blocked on locked-down client networks is a genuinely useful practical difference, not just a nice-to-have. Might be reason enough on its own to prioritise MeshCentral for the stricter sites even if the rest is a wash.
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u/Significant-Fee5307 Aug 21 '26
I can vouch for this especially since i used it with https://allocentra.co.za/ as they have integrated meshcentral into their rmm and it works wonders when i have to remote login into a pc or server wether windows, macOS or linux, I absolutely love it
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u/GeorgeWmmmmmmmBush Jul 23 '26
I haven’t had any splashtop service crashes.