How to Install and Use PuTTY to Connect to a Remote Computer

PuTTY is extremely useful for the purpose of remotely handling the server, that a user wants, such as Ubuntu, CentOS, Windows, etc. It is able to do so, with the help of Telnet, SSH, Rlogin, Raw socket protocols. In fact, it behaves like a client to establish a connection with the server, that you wish to access.

For an instance, you want to connect to a remote computer, suppose Ubuntu through your Windows system using the TELNET. Then, you”ll find PuTTY as a vital open-source emulator. I have prepared this article, keeping in mind, all the essential steps required to learn, how to Install and use PuTTY to connect to a remote computer. This article will show you the installation process of PuTTY in Windows 7 and then how you can connect to Ubuntu system using it.

Don’t get confused guys, I will do this using TELNET protocol that uses port 23 to perform this task. TELNET is an eminent TCP/IP protocol through which we can access the remote computer. For more information, refer to TELNET.

Meanwhile, you just focus on the steps illustrated with its practical implementation. At last, I would like to say that you must know the Username and password of the remote machine to which you are going to connect. PuTTY will provide you a console and then it’s up to you whatever you wish to do, you can. It’s just a medium to connect to the server (remote) machine, anything you write in the console of PuTTY will be sent to the server and the data retrieved will be passed to you at the Console. Now, let’s start doing it.

Steps to Install and Use PuTTY to Connect to a Remote Computer

Step 1: To download PuTTY, type “download PuTTY” on the google search. You may see thousands of results, but it’s better to download it from the official Download page of Putty, so that no other add-ons get installed with this software.

Step 2: Now when you are at the Download page, click on “.exe” file, i.e. putty-0.64-installer as I did, thus no need to extract it as in the case of the zip file.

Step 3: Once you click on it, you would be asked to “Save File”, click on it.

Step 4: When downloading is complete, go to “Downloads” section and open that “.exe” file. After opening it, you have to click on “Run”.

Step 5: Once you hit on “Run” then the various dialog box will appear, you just need to click on “Next”. Then you are required to click on “Install” as shown in the figure below.

Step 6: Switch on to “Ubuntu” machine to check the IP Address of it. For that, open the “Terminal” and type: “ifconfig” command and press enter.

Step 7: As my system is hot-wired with the router, so I will be able to see the IP address under “eth0” section as highlighted in the figure. Copy the IP address in the Notepad, which be beneficial for you at time, when entering in PuTTY to connect to Ubuntu system.

Step 8: Now come back to “Windows” and open up the “Command Prompt”. Type “ping ipaddress”. In my case, the command looks like “ping 192.168.137.128”. Here I have used the IP address of the Ubuntu system to check whether there is a connection between the two i.e. Windows and Ubuntu or not.

To ensure, that there is connection, you can notice the Statistics of ping, it shows the number of Packets sent and received are same, it means you have a connection.

Step 9: It’s time to use Putty, let’s click on “Start” button, then you may see “PuTTY” over here. Right-click on it and click on “Run as administrator”.

Step 10: You”ll be navigated to the “PuTTY Configuration”. In the space provided for the IP Address, copy here the address of the machine that you wish to access.

I will copy the address of my Ubuntu Machine and then choose “Telnet” thereby “Port” will automatically get changed. Click on “Open” to proceed.

Step 11: “PuTTY Console” will appear, from here you can play with your Ubuntu system. First of all, you are required to provide the “Username” of your remote machine, and then press enter.

Step 12: After that, enter the “Password” to access remotely the Ubuntu machine. A Welcome message will be shown to you. Now, whatever commands you”ll enter all of them will be redirected to Ubuntu and fetched data will be visible to you. It will work as Ubuntu actually works when you personally log in to it.

Step 13: To check it, type “ls” which is used to list all directories in Ubuntu. The output will be on your screen. Do whatever you want, no worries wherever you are.