Splashtop remote access FROM linux (workaround)

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I’ve been keeping a windows machine around just to run splashtop viewer for remote clients for awhile now, figured I’d finally get around to fixing the issue. The viewer runs OK with wine in linux, you just have to forward everything from the browser to it before it does anything.

Steps are as follows.

I used the wine PPA, version 6. No idea how well this will work with older versions.

Install your RMM splashtop viewer app with wine as you normally would anything else (I used a 32 bit prefix in the default location, edit as needed). In your editor of choice, make a file called splashtop-viewer.desktop

In the file, paste the following, replacing USERNAME with your home directory:

[Desktop Entry]
Name=Splashtop Viewer
Exec=bash -c 'echo "%u" | sed "s#st-rmm://##g" | xargs wine "/home/USERNAME/.wine/drive_c/Program Files/Splashtop/Splashtop Remote/Client for RMM/clientoobe.exe" "-a"'
Type=Application
Terminal=false
MimeType=x-scheme-handler/st-rmm;

Save the file. Add it to your programs list with:

xdg-desktop-menu install /path/to/splashtop-viewer.desktop

register it as your default handler for st-rmm protocol links:

xdg-mime default splashtop-viewer.desktop x-scheme-handler/st-rmm

Chrome and related programs should just open it when you click the “Remote Access” button now, Firefox may need a little prodding by going to about:config setting a boolean for network.protocol-handler.expose.st-rmm to false, then manually selecting the “Splashtop Viewer” option in the “choose application” popup that you see when you click the link.

Seems to work ok, with what I’ve done with it for the last two days.

Since syncro says “you can’t do this from Linux” I figured a solution might be appreciated by some folks.

Edit: it’s a good idea to install corefonts using winetricks. Some of the text may be missing without it.

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2

That’s awesome! I’ll have to try this. Honestly, Syncro/Splashtop is one of the only reasons why I’m not using Linux currently.

4

I tried this with a VM and didn’t seem to work.

5

Thanks so much for this, I was able to get this working great within my Debian based system.

6

This worked for me, Thanks!

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7

Got this working on Ubuntu 22.04 with wine64 from stock repository! Thank you so much!

8

I know this thread is old but the solution does not seem to work for me on Linux Mint with Ciinnamon desktop.

As a rather casual Linux user for decades I’v decided I had enough with Windows but I still want to support Windows users. My journey shouldn’t be too hard except for this part.

There is couple of gaps in this great solution for rookies like me :slight_smile:

Anybody wants to pitch in and elaborate how they’ve done it ? That would be awesome !

Thanks to all

9

I got it working.

You may have to modify Program Files to Program Files (x86) depending on your environment.

10

It worked for me after following the instructions from this page, and as second step had to open the Splashtop app and change the running environment to Windows XP instead of the default (Windows 8).

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Just so everyone know… I was able to finally get this working after a bit of fiddling. I am new to Linux. I am trying to get away from the constant hassles with Windows and after hearing that Windows 12 might be removing the start menu all together I decided enough is enough. Here are the steps I followed.

  1. I did a fresh install of Linux Mint. Not that I already had it installed, that was just the flavor I decided to go with.
  2. Installed the latest version of wine from https://www.winehq.org/. I heard there was issues with the version that comes with the Software center in Mint so I just followed the instructions on the WineHQ site.
  3. Installed corefonts using this site as reference. How to Install Microsoft Fonts on Ubuntu Linux [Easy Way].
  4. I created a directory in my $HOME folder called working and that is where I created and saved the splashtop-viewer.desktop file.
  5. Downloaded the Splashtop installer to the downloads folder.
  6. Opened a terminal window and navigated to the downloads folder.
  7. Installed Splashtop with the following command: wine Splashtop_RMM_Win_INSTALLER_v3.5.8.2.exe
  8. After install was completed I verified the path to the install in the .wine folder for Splashtop. For me I changed the splashtop-viewer.desktop to $HOME/.wine/drive_c/Program Files (x86)/Splashtop/Splashtop Remote/clientoobe.exe
  9. In the terminal I navigated to my working folder I created previously
  10. I ran the following commands to register the app.
    xdg-desktop-menu install splashtop-viewer.desktop
    xdg-mime default splashtop-viewer.desktop x-scheme-handler/st-rmm

Once this was done I was able to get the app to open in Firefox. I did not have to change anything in the about:config part of firefox. I did however had to open the app with the shortcut under the start button and wine folder to get to the options of the app and change the Video Rendering Options to SDL with YUV. Thie if found on the advanced tab-Advanced Setting.

I really hope this helps anyone else trying to get this to work… and if there are any Linux gurus that can see any issues with my method please let me know. I am not by any means a Linux expert.

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Hi All- running ubuntu 22.04 and attempting to get the splashtop viewer working with wine. I do have the latest wine, 9.0, added 32bit compatibility on the install and followed chazs’ instructions. Seems to work, but I get a white flash on the screen, then a wine error dialog that contains the following here pastebin

if anyone has a clue, would appreciate the assistance.

thanks!

13

I had a similar issue on Linux Mint 22, and I think it’s related to the propriety nvidia drivers. To get it working, I followed the steps here on a Windows machine…

Then, I exported the ‘Computer\HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Splashtop Inc.\Splashtop Remote Client for RMM’ on the windows machine to a .reg file. I then imported the .reg file to wine using winetricks, and after that I was able to remotely control machines from Syncro.

14

I know this is super late, but I wanted to say thank you! You guys should get a cut of the subscription I am paying to Syncro since this is the reason I decided to go through with it.

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15

I cannot seem to get this to work on my Arch Linux install. Chrome asks me if i want to open it and when i do nothing seems to happen.
I am sure i missed something but went back through and thought i corrected any errors.
any guidance is appreciated.

16

evans trick fixed my “Failed to initialize video device”. The difference was that I didn’t do it on a windows machine. I ran the desktop icon, Splashtop for RMM, with wine and let the window open and selected options and applied the settings directly instead of copying the registry from a windows machine. The settings change was to go to the Advanced tab then make sure Use Legacy compatible mode is checked then click Detailed setup and change Video Rendering Options from Direct3D with YUV (Default) to Software. I tried to remote into a few machines a couple times and seems to be working fine so far. Thank you all for all the really helpful advice!

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17

I’ve tried this on a couple different systems, both running Zorin 18. All of the commands complete successfully, and I’ve updated the path to the install location of the clientoob.exe. When I try to connect to a machine from Chrome, I get a Open With… popup, and it says there are no apps installed to open the file extension. I’ve also tried running the xdg-mime default command with the full file path to the splashtop-viewer.desktop file.

Edit: I just tried this again in Brave browser, and it works fine there. Appears to only be Chrome that isn’t happy for some stupid reason.

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18

Finally got this all working. The issue turned out to be the Chrome flatpak version. Full install direct from Google works flawless.

19

Updated guide for Splashtop Viewer on Linux (2026)

Big thanks to the OP for the original guide — got me 90% of the way there. Just spent an afternoon getting this working on Ubuntu with a current version of clientoobe.exe and the Syncro web app, and a couple things have changed since the original post. Posting an updated version in case it helps anyone else.

What’s different in 2026:

  1. Modern clientoobe.exe wants the full st-rmm://... URL passed as a single argument with the -a flag — not the stripped-prefix version from the original guide.

  2. The desktop entry spec mangles the URL when expanding %u directly into a wine command, so a tiny bash wrapper is needed to pass the URL cleanly as a single quoted argument.

  3. Splashtop installs to Program Files (x86) on a 64-bit wine prefix now, not Program Files.

Steps:

Install Splashtop Streamer for RMM in wine as you normally would. Then create a wrapper script at ~/.local/bin/splashtop-viewer.sh:

bash

#!/bin/bash
exec wine "/home/USERNAME/.wine/drive_c/Program Files (x86)/Splashtop/Splashtop Remote/Client for RMM/clientoobe.exe" -a "$1"

Replace USERNAME with your home directory name. Make it executable:

bash

chmod +x ~/.local/bin/splashtop-viewer.sh

Then create splashtop-viewer.desktop somewhere (Documents, Downloads, wherever):

[Desktop Entry]
Name=Splashtop Viewer
Exec=/home/USERNAME/.local/bin/splashtop-viewer.sh %u
Type=Application
Terminal=false
MimeType=x-scheme-handler/st-rmm;

Install and register it as the default handler:

bash

xdg-desktop-menu install --novendor /path/to/splashtop-viewer.desktop
xdg-mime default splashtop-viewer.desktop x-scheme-handler/st-rmm
update-desktop-database ~/.local/share/applications/

Verify the registration took:

bash

xdg-mime query default x-scheme-handler/st-rmm

Should return splashtop-viewer.desktop.

Click the Remote button in Syncro and you should be in.

Recommended extras:

  • sudo apt install winbind — clears NTLM auth warnings.

  • winetricks corefonts — fixes missing text in the viewer (also from the original guide).

Debugging tip if it doesn’t work:

Temporarily replace the script’s exec line with echo "$1" >> /tmp/st-rmm-debug.log to see exactly what URL is being passed. If the log stays empty when you click Remote, the protocol handler isn’t registered. If it captures the URL but the session won’t start, the issue is in the wine command — try running it manually with the captured URL to see what clientoobe.exe says.

Works great so far on Ubuntu with a current wine. Cheers! (This may or my not have been done with a lot of help from Claude :stuck_out_tongue: )

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