Im no help, think you need something called a router tho, as a friend had 2 comps sharing the same line through one of them.

butch wat isp does she have? i recomend a modem router and lots of wire, you can get away with wireless but i wudnt recomend it ppl can easily use ur internet from a lap top in a car if u use wireless.

Bishop

i would advise using wireless, much less messy and most decent routers will allow you to encrypt them these days preventing bishop from leeching off your internet

imo wireless is shit..depending on the distance between the router and the comp...my mates have wireless and they always moan about how they lose con to the internet.... tbo wires are alot better...if somewhat cheaper...i managed to buy 50m of cable for about £10... got a connector to connect the 2 wires together and its been great ever since.... however as milk says.. u dont really want wires running all over the place... however if u manage to run the wire along the skirtingboard etc and staple them there then theres not a prob....

Butch,

my setup is Netgear DG834GT which is an ADSL modem, Firewall, wireless and wired router so you can have both setup if needed.
ATM i have my PC a iMac and a PS2 through it, and soon to have anouther one.

If you want to have it wireless you wil need a wireless card for the PC/PCs that will be connected. If you are having wires i would suggest buying a decent set of Cat5 cables. If you have shit cables then you will loose bandwidth.

Post edited by: [KM]ShadowDog, at: 22/07/2005 20:07

wireless setup is roughly the same cost as a decent wired connection nowadays (i leant alot about this at work experience), and if the police HQ for the highlands feels secure having the kind of encryption i was talking about, i'm quite sure you should be. and since you live in a flat it shouldnt be too much trouble losing bandwith over a distance through your house

If she is happy for one computer to be the "host" and always be required to be on for the other one to access the internet, just buy a CAT5 cross over cable, and use ICS (Internet Connection Sharing) on XP to share the connection across two machines. You'll also be able to share files like this too.

No need for a router, just NIC's in both machine and a piece of cable.

Wife and I shared a connection like this for about 6 months with no real problems.

Hubby

Post edited by: [KM] The Husband, at: 22/07/2005 22:39

do keep in mind you'll have to configure your firewall properly: some applications don't work very well or at all with ICS. If she has an ethernet modem that can serve as a DHCP server (like a router can) you could just buy a switch. Cheaper than a router and you don't have to configure anything at all. Maybe she can even get a multi-pc modem from the provider, that way all you have to do is buy a little UTP patch cable.
I'd set it up for ya if i could, but the distance is a little too big...

as talked about before, there are few ways of doing it, 2 main 1ns being a router or using a crossover cable and xp connection sharing.

Router notes:
- routers can be quite expencive, but the price comes down fast when you loose features such as wireless and being able to plug more than 4 computers into them.

- routers are allways on, so you can use the internet even if yours is the only computer turned on

- routers can be a bitch when it comes to config, but with "modern" routers, they pretty much set themselfs up now

- going wireless is a real "option" for you to take with modern routers, they have strong encryption (remember this will need to be setup and configured), and good connections (shame we are locked down in the UK signal strength wise, in the us they have massive signals). like all methods of communication it CAN be broken and your router "cracked", but with the ammount of packets sent over the router with 2 computers it would probably take months. the only downside to wireless is the price involved, it is the "new" way to network, so wireless router prices are up, i payed 150 for mine, and a standard pci wireless card is around 50. (try not to get usb adapters as they have lower power and cant go as far)

xp Sharing notes:

- internet connection sharing is only on XP Pro Edition

- the "server" computer (one with the modem) will need to be turned on for the other computer to use the internet

- i have only managed to get it working once. it worked fine once it got started, i'll give it that, but, it wouldent surprise me if you ran into so problems with it.

- software firewalls installed on the server computer will effect the connection sharing, xpfirewall and any others. with "good" firewalls you will have to set them to work in "gateway" mode - this will disable stuff that hides ports so people can connect to the other computer "through" you ok.

blablabla
yea...

lots of things you can do
but you probably just wanted me to say:
cheap and fastest option would be to -
get a cheap 4port wired adsl router with modem, 2 cat5 network cables long enough to connect them and thats it (other than router config).