Remote Desktop Does Not Work Outside of Home Network

Hello, nice to meet you all.

I have a home network http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Home_network with a Linksys Boradband Router WRT54G http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linksys_WRT54G_series . I have 3 PCs in my home within my network. It seems i can't remote connect from any of the wireless PCs to my main one where the router is connected to (the one with my local non-wireless connection) . I get no error messages. I simply click CONNECT and it comes back IMMEDIATELY to the "connect" screen.

For example, i launch Remote Desktop from a wireless PC, input the IP of the main local PC and click "Connect", but it keeps coming back immediately to the very same screen, as if nothing ever happened.

This wasn't a problem in the past. One day i reimaged my OS and suddenly it's never worked again. I later decided to do a clean install of Windows, and still have the same problem.

I wonder if there's a setting in my router OR deep within Windows im missing?

I already checked some of the obvious settings such as allowing access to Remote Desktop through my router, windows firewall http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Firewall , enabling incomng connections via the "Remote tab" under Control Panel, etc.

I have:
Win XP SP3, Intel Core http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Core Quad 2.8, 4 GB RAM.

Any suggestions? Thanks!

 

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/951607

 

Thanks for your prompt replies.
TerryNet, this is the IP i am using (the one provided by the router, as you suggested).

Shadow, your link seems interesting. However, it suggests that i go to Internet Explorer>Tools>Manage Add-ons and search for two items that i dont have for some reason: The "Microsoft Terminal Services Client Control ActiveX control" or the "Microsoft RDP client Control ActiveX control."

Im also questioning the validity of that workaround, since step #2 of their solution says "Visit the Web site that is causing this problem" but in my case, im not doing anything from a site, but from Remote Desktop software instead.

So, i've reached a dead end with their suggestions...
Any others?

Thanks a lot guys.

 

EDIT: I was making further testing, and it seems i can't even remote connect from my other PCs within my home network. I get no error messages. I simply click CONNECT and it comes back IMMEDIATELY to the "connect" screen.

Any thoughts?

 

Can you ping the other machines by name?

 

When you reimaged, you remembered to turn Remote Desktop back on, right?

 

Yeah i did. I went to "Control Panel, System, Remote tab and enabled the feature to allow users to remotely connect", etc.

This is the weirdest issue. From Remote Desktop I type in the destination IP and/or computer name, and it does nothing with no error messages... even after a clean install.

If the clean install didn't fix the issue, i wonder if there is a setting in my router i need to play with (i already opened port 3389 for remote desktop).