How do I connect my Laptop to Desktop?

I know that sounds easy enough and I am usually good
at these things but for some reason I can't get my head around it!
PLEASE help me! :roll:
All I want to do is to be able to transfer files from one to the other.

What I have:
Latitude Laptop with Wi Fi Card
Dimension Desktop connected to a ZyXel modem and a
Belkin wireless router connected to that to get BB on the Laptop.

I've gone thru the whole set up network wizard in both pc's
but still no joy.

I'd be happy to just stchik an 'auld cable from one into the other if
thats possible!

Cheers.

You should have your router connected to the internet and set up as a DHCP server. All your machines on the network should be set to get their IP address dynamically via DHCP. If you're not running firewalls internally then the machines should see each other just fine.

If you want to 'just connect the machines together with a cable' then you need a 'crossover cable'. This is a normal network cable one side of which has been wired backwards. This has the effect of connecting the output from one machine to the input of the other.

You then need to manually set an IP address on both ends of the connection. You should use private IPs like 192.168.1.1 and 192.168.1.2 with a netmask of 255.255.255.0.

Good luck!

Bart.

Hi Bart.
Thanks but I dont understand a few things.

''You should have your router connected to the internet and set up as a DHCP server''
How do I check / Do this?

''All your machines on the network should be set to get their IP address dynamically via DHCP''
I have the laptop connect wirelessly to the router (is this already a 'network' then?)

''running firewalls internally''
I have Macafee on each. What do you mean by Internally?

''a 'crossover cable'.''
I'm assuming this is not a standard LAN cable?

''You then need to manually set an IP address on both ends of the connection. ''
Again , sorry , How?

Sorry for this but it's really getting on my nerves!

Apologies, I pitched my reply quite high because you said "you were usually quite good at this stuff" which I interpreted to mean you knew about networking .... I'll try to be a bit less technical this time

Hi Bart.
Thanks but I dont understand a few things.

''You should have your router connected to the internet and set up as a DHCP server''
How do I check / Do this?

This depends on the router so you'll have to RTFM (read the fine manual). Generally routers come with a CD that you stick into a machine which will find your router and let you configure it.

There should be settings in there for DHCP, make sure they are turned on.

In order for machines to communicate across a TCP/IP network (i.e. a regular LAN and the internet) the machines must have an IP address which uniquely identifies them on the network. Broadband routers do something called NAT which stands for "network address translation" and what that basically does is translate all your internal machines so they appear on the internet as one single IP address. So, you can run an entire network behind the router that is private and appears to the outside world as just being your router. The important thing here is that the TCP/IP specification defines a range of addresses that should be used in private networks. If you use addresses outside of that range you will have problems connecting to the internet and basically badness will ensue.

There are a few private ranges but the one generally used in home networks is 192.168.0.* (or a net address of 192.168.0.0 with a netmask of 255.255.255.0 to put that into techie speak). All a netmask does is define what is to be considered local. What that really means in English is that all addresses that start with 192.168.0 will be local and traffic will not go out of the router. Traffic to ALL other IP ranges will be considerd internet traffic and get sent out onto the internet by your router.

Again, to get to the core of the point, if you want your machines to be able to talk to each other they need to be in the same subnet.

Now, in an ideal world you don't want to have to deal with scary technical stuff like IP addresses, subnet masks, gateways and so forth. That's where DHCP comes in. It stands for "Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol". Basically, when ever a machine that is set up to use DHCP starts up it sends out a request that says "if there is a DHCP server out there please tell me what IP to use, what netmask to use, what DNS server to use and what default gateway to use". IF your router is set up as a DHCP server it will then answer your machines and configure eveything up correctly for you. Saving you a lot of trouble!

''All your machines on the network should be set to get their IP address dynamically via DHCP''
I have the laptop connect wirelessly to the router (is this already a 'network' then?)

Yes. A wireless network behaves just like a wired network but the wires are replaced with radio signals that connect the hosts together.

''running firewalls internally''
I have Macafee on each. What do you mean by Internally?

I mean between your machines within your local network. Depending on how you have macafee configured it may or may not block internal traffic on your network. If you have everything set up and you still can't see your other windows machines on the network then try turning off Macafee. As long as your wireless network is secured and you are connecting to the internet via a router you are safe from the bad people out there. A router basically acts as a one-way valve letting you access the net but not letting the net access you!

''a 'crossover cable'.''
I'm assuming this is not a standard LAN cable?

No, it's one that is wired differently. Superficially it looks the same and has the same terminators but it's internal wiring is different. It is common practice to put green ends on crossover cables so that you can tell them apart from regular patch leads. If you use a regular patch lead a direct connection won't work.

''You then need to manually set an IP address on both ends of the connection. ''
Again , sorry , How?

You need ot edit the TCP settings for the connection in question. You right click on the connection, select TCP/IP from the list of protocols and then hit "properties". Where you find your list of connections is sublty different on different versions of Windows. Ideally I'd do you a screen shot but since I don't have any windows machines at home (having to deal with them at work is enough stress for me ) I can't. Maybe one of our Windows users will oblige? Anyhow. These settings allow you to tell your machine to use a specific IP address or to use DHCP.

Hope that clears things up a bit. I wish I could simplify things a bit more but the reality is that you need to know the basics to get a working network set up. TBH I may have even been a little too skimpy with my descriptions. I realize I haven't described what a DNS server is or a Default gateway despite having mentioned them. If you have any more questions please feel free to ask. As you've probably guessed this stuff is all second nature to me, it's my bread and butter at work!

Bart.

Thanks for all that Bart.
Its clear now to me...great help!

Right. So I got a crossover cable,
plugged one into laptop and one into desktop.

How do I now transfer files from one to the other?
:oops: