Spud
cross-platform remote control, optimised for gaming
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Over the last few weeks I've been working on Spud, an application that allows you to control a remote computer that you can see. For example, if you have a gaming PC connected to you TV, Spud lets you use a laptop as input.It's optimised for low-latency, as it's intended for gaming. There are even a few parameters you can tune in the application. I built this mainly for myself, to solve a particular problem I had, but I hope that others find it useful too!
HN · launched May 18, 2026 · 6 upvotes (top 69%) · 0 views
Niche: remote desktop and control software · 120 launches, 22 in the last 7 days ▲ +69% · Explore this niche →
Category and tags
- Horizontal
- Hardware & robotics
- B2C
- Not AI
- Commercial product
Visit website ↗ Source listing ↗
More like this: all 120 launches in remote desktop and control software →
Could you build this?
Partial Writing a basic input forwarder is simple, but achieving low-latency, cross-platform remote control tailored for gaming requires kernel/OS-level virtual input drivers and ultra-low-latency networking.
What it would actually take: The architecture requires a lightweight client/server setup using raw UDP/WebRTC or custom packet serialization to stream controller and mouse/keyboard states. The critical bottleneck is synthesizing virtual gamepad (XInput/ViGEm) and mouse inputs at the OS driver level with sub-frame input lag on Windows, Linux, and macOS without triggering anti-cheat software. This requires low-level systems programming in C/C++ or Rust and OS input stack expertise.
Discussion
4 comments analyzed.
Competitors mentioned: Steam Connect, VirtualHere
Concerns raised: Connection drops and crashes after extended use, No latency measurement figures provided, No gamepad support mentioned
Feature requests: Gamepad and peripheral support, Latency measurement documentation
Competitors
Other products that read as similar to this one : 105 launches clear the similarity bar, closest 8 shown.
Attention rank: #91 of 106 (itself plus its competitors, highest first, normalized so YC and Product Hunt are compared fairly).
Launched 152 days after the earliest competitor.
- stream-machine · github · 2026-10-29 · 26 upvotes · similarity 0.49
- Remip · ph · 2026-11-15 · 1 upvotes · similarity 0.45
- skyPC · ph · 2026-11-03 · 1 upvotes · similarity 0.42
- Best Cloud Gaming Platforms · ph · 2026-11-03 · 1 upvotes · similarity 0.42
- Rein · ph · 2026-10-25 · 1 upvotes · similarity 0.41
- ScreenSharePro · ph · 2026-10-22 · 1 upvotes · similarity 0.41
- Gaming Couch · hn · 2025-12-21 · 437 upvotes · similarity 0.41
- GFNxcloudController · ph · 2026-09-10 · 1 upvotes · similarity 0.40
The niche, labels, vibe code rating and competitor comparison on this page are analysis by Nicheloom. If you use them, please credit nicheloom.com. How you may use our data.