Best remote shutdown for home network?

My PC in the barn has more stuff. So on cold winter nights I get in to it om my home LAN with the warmth of my house PC. Before I go to bed I would like to turn on the PC in the barn, but I don't want to walk 100 yards in my pajamas. What would be a sure way to shut it off from in the house. (No I won't throw the circus breaker. I mean shut it down the right way.)
Searching this forum the shutdown command seems to not always work. Why?
Any suggestions? You can remote shutdown a computer on the same lan quite easily - windows XP has a built in app for that.

click start > run
type in shutdown /i
click ADD and then type in the name of the computer that you wish to shut down.
you can find this out my going start > my network places > view workgroup computers.
then click OK, set your options and OK again
Your other computer is now shutting down
Thank you. It almost works.
It did not shut on the remote XP PC on the LAN.
But no problem on either PC directly.
There maybe a SECURITY issue.
I will play with is some more.OK

This usually works for me, but it may be because at some POINT I changed something.
The other method I know is a longer one, it requires the account on the other end to have a password on an administrative account. not the administrator account, just an account with administrative rights.

This method is using remote desktop to access it and trigger the shutdown command.

First go to your barn machine and right click my computer on the start menu and select properties.

Click the remote tab and make sure the "allow remote connections to this computer" is ticked.

click OK then go back to your main computer.

Now this is set up, you only ever have to go out to the barn to turn it on

when you want to shut it down, simply go:

Start > all programs > accessories > remote desktop connection (this is on XP SP3)

OR

Start > all programs > accessories > communication > remote desktop connection (this is for versions of XP under SP3)

type in the name of the computer in the barn you used for the shutdown command, and push connect.

You should now be presented with a login box.

Type in the user name and password of the user account on the barn computer.

once logged in, you cannot directly use the "shut down" button, it says DISCONNECT instead.

instead click start > windows security (which just opens the task manager)

then you can simply just select 'Turn Off' from the shut down menu

Hope this one works this time, It seems harder but it isn't really



OK. Thanks for the help. I plan to try that this weekend.Okay will keep watch.