I recently had a reason to check out the Windows XP and Windows 2000 Internet sharing abilities. I hadn’t looked at XP in a long time, so I decided to dust off the box and see what it was all about. I still don’t much care for it, but the Internet sharing seems to be a neat little idea. Microsoft has done a nice job of setting up the wizards so that a home user can do this rather easily.

The scenario I was given is probably a pretty popular one: The Win2K "business" machine is attached to the Internet. The Windows XP machine, located a few feet away, is the "play" machine. The goal was to connect both machines in a Windows network, and to share a single Internet connection.

When finished the machines would need to have the ability to share files, printers, and most importantly an Internet connection. And it needed to be as cheaply as possible; the goal I set was $30.

It turned out to be considerably easier, and cheaper, than I thought.

The two PC’s already had some configuration: The Windows 2000 PC had an Ethernet card that was connected to the Internet (in my case it was via the LAN; for most home users this would be where the cable modem connects). The Windows XP machine had a network card that wasn’t connected to anything.

I added a D-Link DFE530-Tx card to the Windows 2000 machine (this card can be purchased at Office Max $9.99). Windows 2000 automatically detected and installed the card. I right-click on Network Neighborhood -> properties which brought me to the "Network dial-up and connections" screen. Here I found the one and only problem I ran into: When I added the D-Link card Win2K had set this as my Local Area Connection. MY original card was pushed to Local Area Connection 2 (you can find this by right-clicking the connection and choosing "properties"; it will tell you the card you are looking at).

Once I was able to verify which card it was I right-clicked the Local Area Connection and clicked the Sharing tab. I checked the box that said "Enable Internet Connection Sharing for this connection" and accepted the warning about the IP address being set.

From here I simply added a 10 ft. crossover cable (This can be purchased via BestBuys.com for $4.95), logged into the XP machine and ran the following sequence:

Start->Control Panel->Network and Internet Connections

Choose "Setup or change your home or small office network"

Click Next

Click Next

Choose "This computer connects to the Internet through another computer or through a residential gateway"

Click Next

Add the computer description and name (the name should already be in there)

Click Next

Add the workgroup name. This name should be the same as the Workgroup name on your Windows 2000 computer; it can be found by right-clicking My Computer, choosing properties and clicking the "Network Identification" tab. (I would suggest using something generic like "Win2k"; the less information you can advertise to hackers, the better)

Verify the Information is correct and click Next

Choose "just finish the wizard; I don’t need to run the wizard on other computers" and click next.

Click finish

That’s all there is to it. The computers are now networked; printers, files and the like can be shared between the machines. The Windows XP machine has full access to the Internet, and the total cost was $14.94. Even if the XP machine had not been configured with a card, adding $9.99 to the cost brings it to $24.93. Plus tax, of course.

One caveat: Many homeowners will think that the proxy machine (in this scenario, the Win2K machine) is protecting the slave machine (the XP machine, in this case). This can be a dangerous assumption: Both machines need to be hardened. I would recommend a good personal firewall (such as the free one from http://www.zonelabs.com), a good antiviral program such as Norton (can be purchased just about anywhere; check out  http://www.symantec.com for details), and a good Spyware program (such as ad-aware from http://www.lavasoftusa.com ). Schedule scans and updates daily.

Got a better way of doing this? Let me know!

All original work on this site is uselessly Copyright © 1998-2002 by Brian Buckeye and really shouldn't be reproduced anywhere unless attributed to me. Linking to my site wouldn't hurt, either. Or sending me gobs of money, that would be good too. Although, chances are, if you like something I've written you'll just steal it & call it your own anyway.