Don’t spend money on KVMs (Keyboard, Video and Mouse), what you need is Synergy, which is a great free open source application that let you share your mouse and keyboard with multiple computers through local network; and it is also cross platform, so you are not only are going to be able to use this program in Windows but also in Mac and Linux.
After Synergy is installed and configured in each device, you will see how easy is to work with it, just move the mouse to the edged of the monitor and seamlessly the mouse pointer will appear in the next monitor, at which point you can also start using keyboard.
These are Synergy most important features:
- No hardware required, just an ethernet connection.
- Seamlessly move the mouse between computers.
- No need to press any buttons, unlike when using KVM.
- Support copy and paste between computers.
- Lock the mouse to one monitor screen.
- You will still have the ability to use multiple monitors on the same computer.
To avoid confusion there are somethings to clear up, Synergy+ and Synergy are now the same, they have merged. The Synergy project was originally created by Chris Schoeneman, but suddenly in 2006 the development stopped, and after so many people requesting an updated version, Sorin Sbârnea and Nick Bolton picked up the Synergy+ project to provide bug fixes and support while waiting for Synergy version 2, which will bring more stability for modern operating systems.
To wrap up Synergy is a great program that multi-taskers are going to enjoy and get many benefits from it, like not spending money on KVMs, no need to have a set of mouse and keyboard for each computer; Windows XP, Vista, Windows 7 (x86/x64), Linux (x86/x64) and Mac are supported, and much more.
Useful Links
- Download Synergy
