This problem can be solved rather simply but elegantly.
You need to purchase a linksys router, with four network ports in it.
For less than a four computer network you don't need a hub.  The router
lists for $189 or so, but can be purchased at discount on the internet for
much less.

If you have cable or dsl, you hook your cable / dsl modem to the router.
The router has DHCP turned on by default and acts as a gateway with address
of 192.168.1.1

Each machine gets an ip of 192.168.1.101 up to 192.168.1.355
Your home network is totally insulated from the internet and intruders by a
hardware firewall and network address translation.  No access without a
password.  The default password is unique.

If you have dial up you need to have a NIC in your computer that uses the
modem for dialup.  The NIC is hooked up to the router.  The other PC's also
hook up to the router.  You dial up with the primary PC, which will have no
firewall protection, so you need Tiny Personal Firewall, etc.

IP address is as before.

The other PC's in the network do the DHCP thing with the primary which must
be on and hooked up to the interet for internet access.

I hear that even if you are too far away from the phone company central
office, you can still get a reliable 56K DSL hookup from the likes of
earthlink.
I have a friend who has low speed DSL with earthlink.  He is in a notorious
old and unreliable part of the verizon system, with ancient equipment, and
no upgrade in sight.

I did some research on microsoft's version of TCP/IP and learned enough to
discover that it is a kluge which probably explains the lack of reliability.
M$ seems to have great difficulty implementing software solutions to what
are essentially hardware problems, like modem sharing and PC networking.

Robert Hemming




>   2. Networking Win Me & XP Home (2)
> Date:    Sat, 13 Jul 2002 16:00:46 -0700
> From:    Peter Shkabara <[log in to unmask]>
> Subject: Re: Networking Win Me & XP Home
>
> I am not sure of your exact configuration as to Internet connection, but
> here is how I do it. The XP machine is connected to the Internet via
> dialup modem, but it could also be any Internet connection such as
> cable, etc. The connection is configured on the Advanced tab to "Allow
> other network users to connect through this ...". When this is done, the
> XP machine gets assigned an IP address of 192.168.0.1 and all other
> machines that want to use this connection must be on this same network.
> You can set the other machines for DHCP, but I don't recommend this
> because you will need to have the XP on before the others start up.
> Instead, set the other machines to a 192.168.0.x address where x can be
> anything from 2-254. Set the gateway to 192.168.0.1, and add a valid
> address for a DNS server. This should allow you to have a local network
> as well a share in the Internet connection.
>
> Peter
> ------------------
> The NoSpin Group
> [log in to unmask]
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> I'm trying to get two computers to access the internet as well as talk
> to each other. I thought I was pretty familiar with how to set things up
> (I have 5 networked at home). The set up that I'm doing, though is one
> Windows Me machine and one Windows XP Home machine. Cable internet
> access and a 4 port hub/switch.
> ...
>
> I've tried to configure the XP machine to use 192.168.*.* (with numbers
> instead of asterisks, of course), but there is still no change in the
> way it acts.
>
> My big question is "Does the XP machine want to be the "main" machine?"
> Should I make the XP machine the gateway computer? I'm actually going to
> try this tomorrow, but I'm just wondering if anyone has any experience
> with a problem like this. There could be something that I'm missing.
> Both computers are using Client for Microsoft Networks, and they both
> are using the exact same workgroup. They both have individual names. I'd
> like to be able to use the Me machine as the gateway, but if I have to
> switch to make this work, I will.
>
> Tom
>
> ------------------------------

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