Computer newbies forum: How to? Connect 2 PC's without router?

Dable,

Remember that most of the programs will need to be "reinstalled" on the new computer if you're going to use them again. So, if you only have a handful of documents, or small pictures, to transfer, some folks have done it by sending themselves, or a friend e-mail, then retrieving it when the new computer is installed.

On the other hand, if the old computer has large amounts of pictures, or other files, then you might want to network the two computers temporarily so the data can be transferred quickly and easily. Here are a couple of links on how you might choose to do that:

Direct Connection with a "Laplink" Cable

USB LinQ Link Cable Networking

USB Cable Networking : Introduction

If both machines have a network card installed, purchase a CAT5 Cross-over cable and simply connect the two computers through the NIC's.:
Configuring Your Home Network

Hope this helps.

Grif

Dable,

A cross-over cable connects the mouth of the one computer with the ears of the other one, and vice-versa (so it's 'crossed'), while a straight cable connects mouth with mouth and ears with ears, which make conversation impossible.
Read "sender" for "mouth" and "receiver" for "ear" and you've got in in somewhat more technical terms.

You surely can configure your firewall so that it recognises the difference between the Internet and your mini local network, and will allow access to computers that are part of it. And if you can't find out: simply disconnect from Internet (turn off the cable modem or disconnect the cable between it and the PC) and disable the whole firewall.

Hope this helps,

Kees

Dable,

Say the send is at the upper side of the connection, and the receive at the lower side. Of course, that's the same on all computers, because it's standardised or it would become a chaos.

Then we have (with 1 for computer #1 and 2 for computer #2, and S and R for Send and Receive) something like:

S1 ... ... S2
R1 ... ... R2.

Now connect S1 with S2 and R1 with R2. You'll see a straight cable, and you see also it doesn't communicate at all: nothing is ever received.

Then connect S1 with R2 (messages from #1 to #2) and S2 with R1 (message from #2 to #1) and you'll see a crossover cable.

That's the whole story in newbie-language.

Kees

Just a thought that is a different approach to solving this problem. Have you thought of taking the old hard drive from the Gateway computer and setting the jumpers on the harddrive to make it a slave. Then install it in the new Dell computer as a second hardrive. This will give you all the data,licences, that are on the old harddrive and additional harddrive storage space. The process isn't all that difficult when it comes to moving the hardware from the old box to the new and it keeps your files in your hands instead of going away to somewhere else with the old computer.

I agree. That is simply the fastet, cheapest, and most secure (for the data files) way to do it.

This is certainly the best, least expensive, fastest, and safest ways to accomplish your goal. The Crossover is a good idea, if you were concerned about breaking the case's seal, but since you're talking a 200Mhz Gateway, the warranty's probably long expired anyway. But the integrity of the data is more likely to be preserved better this way. Not to say that the crossover is a flaky connection by any means, but having both drives in one computer would certainly be faster, and safer.
-Mike

"Bear in mind however, this will only work between WinXP and Win98 only if both HD's are formatted FAT32 - it will NOT work if they are formatted NTFS, the 2 OS'es wont see each other."

This is not true. Not to be rude but you need to read up on Networking. Networks are based on protocols. You can share regardless of Fat Fat32 or NTFS.


NTFS is just more secure. If you set up your windows 98 computer for file sharing in Network Neighborhoods properties, TCP/IP, and then share the drive without passwords the XP computer will access all the files easily. As for vise versa the windows 98 computer won't see the xp computer unless you set up permissions on the xp computer. Then you would have to log onto 98 with user and password that you set up on xp.

I have a simple 8 port switch with XP,2000 pro, 98,95, 3.11wfw, ms-dos, and Linux computers which can all see and acess files across each other. XP and 2000 are NTFS and linux is a different file structure all together. Sorry I forget the name at the moment. "efh?"

Anyhow it is possible to connect any fat32 or ntfs together it's just fat to fat is "less secure" and easier to connect then fat to ntfs. And accessing a Fat file system without passwords is extremely easy.

I have a older sony laptop with xp and I want to transfer all my info to a new desktop. I bought the cat 6 cable and contected the two computers I set up the incoming connection but got stuck there. What do I do next? Help!!!

Unfortunately, judging from the age of the old computer, the hard drives won't both be formatted the same.

Dable, all of the posts are really great recommendations. First, a pen drive is a great idea and I've seen them as high as 3 GB, its like having several floppies in one little drive, but make sure you safely remove it from the tray each time you disconnect it from any computer or it's life span will be significantly reduced. Next, you can always take the cover off and add it as the slave. That's another really good idea, and as far as I know, NTFS can read FAT32 files. FAT32 can't read NTFS. The crossover cable is another really good idea. A crossover cable is just reversed. Look at the RJ-45 connecter of your stright through cable. You'll see 8 wires, actually, it's 4 pairs. You have orange-white, orange, green-white, blue, blue-white, green, brown-white, brown in that order for straight through cables. In other words you have both RJ-45 connecters identical. That kind of cable connects computers to a router or hub and to another computer. Also that's the kind of cable given w/your cable modem. A cross over cable connects a computer to another computer. The lay-out for setting up a cross over is; orange-white to green white, orange to green, green-white to orange-white, blue to blue, blue-white to blue-white, green to orange, brown-white to brown-white and brown to brown. If you know someone that has taken a cisco course then they should be able to build you a cross over cable if you wanted to go that route. Besides, building a 10 foot cross over cable only costs about $.75.
The router or a CD-Burner is also a good option, you can get both of those items for about $30 online. I hope this helps you.
Sean

One option is to upload up to 1 GB of data to YouSendIt.com then download it to your new PC. YouSendit is a free service. The files you send will remain there for 7 days before they're deleted automatically, or you can delete them yourself when you're done. There's also an option to send the files using https if you need encryption.

The easiest & Fastest way to do what you want is this one:

Shut down both computers, open them, unmount your old hard drive, mount it on your new computer ***, turn on your new computer, press "DEL" key while botting (or what the manual says to enter setup), make shure your machine recognizes the old drive, press F10 or what the BIOS says to save the new configuration, let windows start, open Explorer and copy folders or files from the old drive to the new one.


*** to physicaly install the old drive on your new machine you can use an unused IDE cable conector or use another IDE cable conected to the motherboard controller (40 pin connector), make shure the red strip on the cable get on "PIN 1" on the drive & IDE controller on the motherboard, if you use an existing cable from the new computer, you must check the jumpers of both drives conected to the same cable, most drives have illustrations showing you where to place jumpers to make each drive a master drive or a slave one, the drive on the middle conector must be salve, the drive on the extreme of the cable must be master.

When you have copied what you want, make shure to shutdown the machine, unplug the old drive, restore original jumper configuration on all drives, restart your computer entering BIOS setup again so the computer knows that the second drive is not more installed, return your old drive to your old machine, close them, and you now have what you want.

Jose Ignacio Mendieta Vera.

You've probably done it by now, but I had exactly the same scenario, and after messing with serial cables (couldn't get it to work), uploading and downloading (works but slow if you are dialup), I found absolutely the best answer is the flash/pen drive. Cheap, takes seconds to do the transfer, and so useful in the future.

Hmmm. I'm surprised no one has mentioned this solution: Go to http://sewelldirect.com/FastLynxHomePage.asp?kid=-609910610&match_type=search

This site provides software and requirements for using it to transfer files from one pc to another. You can even download the free trial version of the software which allows you to transfer up to 10 files or 10MB at a time. It also explains multiple ways of connecting 2 pcs.

Just click on the link for the free trial version or click on "learn more" to uh...well... learn more, I guess!