tech support call - windows networking
Once again I am trying to puzzle out how to set up a home network using Windows XP. Previous attempts have ended in my giving up because the benefits were not worth the trouble; the times when mshea or iralith and I needed to share files or printers were infrequent enough that it was worthwhile to just temporarily disable firewalls and such and use trial and error to locate the shared folder on the other computer.
But now that I have a laptop, I imagine I'm much more likely to want to share files and printing between the lappy and teh r0xxy. And I need to set up the network so I can do that easily.
Note - I really don't know anything about networking computers. So if at any point it sounds like I don't have any idea what I'm talking about here, that's because I don't.
That said...
The problems, as I see them, are twofold. First, we've got three different computers running different personal firewall programs. Second, we've got a router distributing internet to the three PCs instead of having a dedicated PC running as a server/router/whatever.
Now from my limited experimenting and even more limited attemts at RTFM, it seems that were it not for those two things, it'd be pretty simple to set up a LAN under XP. But right now I'm stuck.
Part of the problem with the router is that while it does it's job - routing internet traffic - particularly well, it's hardwired to do just that, and can't really run any kind of network administration software.
The other problem with the router is that while it has a firewall, it's firewall is, as I understand it, not as fully-featured as the personal firewalls such as ZoneAlarm that are available for PCs. So there is an apparent need to have redundant firewalls. Meaning our computers can access the Internet more easily than they can access each other.
So I'm looking for help.
The equipment we've got:
* D-Link broadband router/wireless access point (brand new).
* Roxxy - my desktop, running XP professional SP2 and ZoneAlarm
* Lappy - running XP professional SP2 and McAffee's "Dell Security Center" firewall
* iralith's deck, running XP (unknown version/service pack) and unknown firewall software (but I think he's got two firewalls, one that he uses as a firewall, and one that is part of his antivirus)
Also, not currently on the network, we have:
* old Linksys broadband router (technically property of mshea)
* old IBM laptop (it's Y2K compliant!) running windows 98 and no firewall.
So any ideas about how to configure everything - or at least how to configure my own computers - so that they can easily talk to each other without having to mess with configurations and whatnot every time I want to move a file or print a document, would be very welcome.
It should be noted that leaving my desktop on all the time and setting it up as a newtork administration machine under XP is a suboptimal solution as it a) has multiple noisy case fans, b) glows blue, c) is located in the room where I sleep.
But now that I have a laptop, I imagine I'm much more likely to want to share files and printing between the lappy and teh r0xxy. And I need to set up the network so I can do that easily.
Note - I really don't know anything about networking computers. So if at any point it sounds like I don't have any idea what I'm talking about here, that's because I don't.
That said...
The problems, as I see them, are twofold. First, we've got three different computers running different personal firewall programs. Second, we've got a router distributing internet to the three PCs instead of having a dedicated PC running as a server/router/whatever.
Now from my limited experimenting and even more limited attemts at RTFM, it seems that were it not for those two things, it'd be pretty simple to set up a LAN under XP. But right now I'm stuck.
Part of the problem with the router is that while it does it's job - routing internet traffic - particularly well, it's hardwired to do just that, and can't really run any kind of network administration software.
The other problem with the router is that while it has a firewall, it's firewall is, as I understand it, not as fully-featured as the personal firewalls such as ZoneAlarm that are available for PCs. So there is an apparent need to have redundant firewalls. Meaning our computers can access the Internet more easily than they can access each other.
So I'm looking for help.
The equipment we've got:
* D-Link broadband router/wireless access point (brand new).
* Roxxy - my desktop, running XP professional SP2 and ZoneAlarm
* Lappy - running XP professional SP2 and McAffee's "Dell Security Center" firewall
* iralith's deck, running XP (unknown version/service pack) and unknown firewall software (but I think he's got two firewalls, one that he uses as a firewall, and one that is part of his antivirus)
Also, not currently on the network, we have:
* old Linksys broadband router (technically property of mshea)
* old IBM laptop (it's Y2K compliant!) running windows 98 and no firewall.
So any ideas about how to configure everything - or at least how to configure my own computers - so that they can easily talk to each other without having to mess with configurations and whatnot every time I want to move a file or print a document, would be very welcome.
It should be noted that leaving my desktop on all the time and setting it up as a newtork administration machine under XP is a suboptimal solution as it a) has multiple noisy case fans, b) glows blue, c) is located in the room where I sleep.