Windows XP Home Network

Greetings,

I am trying to set up a home network from my Cable modem. My main machine is running Windows XP and has a 2 Port NIC installed. My laptop is running Windows 2000 with PCMCIA card installed. The network settings for the Windows XP machine show 3 connections.

1. 1394 Net Adapter (Enabled)
2. Port 1 of 2 Port NIC from Cable Modem (Enabled)
3. Port 2 of 2 Port NIC out to Laptop (Cable Unplugged)

My Windows 2000 Laptop shows 1 connection.

1. PCMCIA card (Cable Unplugged)

All drivers have been installed and state that they are functioning correctly. I have tried using a patch cable and a cross-over cable between the two and neither one seems to work. I have also tried the Windows XP Home network setup wizard which setup ICS.

Is this in the hardware or is this in the TCP/IP settings. Should I use a Patch cable or a Cross-over cable?

Thanks,
Tate

 

First, if your setting up a home network, without question you shouldn't even bother with the setup your trying to do, you need to have a router, linksys BEFSR41 is a no brainer to configure and does the internet sharing and firewall protection, and is also your swtich for networking the computers, they down to like 60-70 bucks for the 4 port one.

But if you did try and do your set up, its sounds like you want laptop to plug directly in to 2nd port on main machine, if thats the cass the cable between machines would have to be a cross over, since your not having a hub/switch inbetween.

But go for the router, protect your pc's and utilize the 4 port switch and NAT/DHCP it has.

 

Thank you for your response, I had a feeling I would end up needing a router. I tried to run the setup because nothing else seemed to work. Thanks again.

 

I completely agree a router/switch is easier and more fun but what you have should certainly work.

- crossover cable for sure. Any time you hook "like" devices to each other (PC<>PC or switch<>switch or whatever) you must use crossover. Unlike devices (PC<>switch) calls for a normal patch cable.

- the "cable unplugged" simply means neither NIC sees a device at the other end. Possibly a problem with the NIC or setup but most likely a speed mis-match.

Try from each PC
.. start~run~cmd and then
.. ping 127.0.0.1
and if that works, both NICs are set up properly and communicating with the PC as they should. If not, you gotta get the NIC(s) working.

With them both able to ping localhost (the 127.0.0.1 which is their own back end) go into the settings for each and set the speed to 10Mbps and the duplexing to half-duplex. Then plug in the crossover cable, reboot both PCs and see if things are working.

If they are, then you can try 100Mbps full-duplex for speed if you want. The internet is way slower than even the 10Mbps half-duplex but file sharing or printer sharing will run faster.

If they are not, then do the following from each PC and post the contents of the text files that will be generated.

- start~run~cmd
- ipconfig /all > c:\ipcfg.txt

 

Thanks for that information. I'll will try that. I bought a router online, but I want to try your suggestion out of curiousity anyway.

 

With ICS set up, the above should work fine. Just watch out for ICF (internet connection firewall) as you could easily block the PCs from talking to each other without meaning to.

When you get your router/switch, just disable ICS and use normal patch cables and you should be able to plug and play.

 

Setting up a Windows network