With the Wake-on-LAN option, you can turn on a computer via the wired internet connection. This way you don’t have to walk to your PC or laptop on the first floor to activate it manually if you want to quickly arrange something from the living room. For example, you can turn on your PC remotely using an Ethernet cable.
If you want to use Wake-on-LAN, your network card must support this. Virtually all modern cards with cable ports support the feature, but wireless adapters actually almost don’t. To find out if your PC offers the option, take a look at the information in the manual or BIOS. If you can’t find anything about Wake-on-LAN, you can’t.
Furthermore, you should remember that the function only works on a local network and not over the internet (ergo: you can only activate a computer in your own network and not outside or outside it).
Activate Wake on LAN
To enable Wake-on-LAN at the hardware level, enter your BIOS when your computer boots up or restarts. Usually this can be done via the Delete or F2 button; it should be in the picture. After that it can get tricky. What the function falls under differs per provider of network cards. Usually it’s somewhere under sleep and wake options, otherwise you’ll have to look for the PCIe card settings. Please note: with you this may fall under something else.
Once this is successful, go to Device Manager (open Start and type ‘device’). Then follow the next steps.
- Go to Network adapters
- Right-click on your Ethernet adapter and select Properties
- Look up the option of awakening via a magic packet and activate it
- Now go the tab Power management and tick both the squares
- Now click OK
In principle, we do not need to adjust much further. If you run into any problems, check the settings at the System Configuration. Make sure that the computer boots normally and not accelerated.
Waking up with the right app
Now your computer is almost ready. All we need is a proper app to wake it up. If you want to wake up a Windows computer from another Windows computer, you can use the app WakeMeOnLan use. This program scans your network and remembers the devices, so you don’t have to arrange this manually. Choose the computer you want to wake up from sleep mode and press the wake up button.
Options are also available for Android and iOS. This is how you download respectively Wake On Lan or Mocha WOL. These apps work the same as WakeMeOnLan and thus take some work off your hands. You can also choose to add the IP and MAC addresses manually, if you wish.
If everything went well and you press the wake-up button, your PC will switch on remotely over your local network. If not, you may need to check your BIOS settings or System Configuration again.
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