HI there
I am wondering of anyone can give me a hand with a network I want to setup in my home. I have two laptops that I want to network wirelessly while sharing one DSL internet connection. Here is my setup:
I have one laptop, a Toshiba Satellite 3000, running Windows XP SP2 and beause it is an older machine, I have a PCMCIA D-Link Wireless G Adapter in order to connect to wireless networks. Now when I connect to the Internet with this machine, I use the onboard Realtek RTL8139 Family PCI Fast Ethernet NIC to connect to the ADSL modem supplied by my ISP.

On my other laptop, a Dell XPS M1530, I have Vista Home Premium with SP1. Again, when I connect to the internet with this machine, I just disconnect the cable from the Toshiba and plug it into the Dell and I am set. What I want to do is leave the DSL line connected to one machine all the time while accessing the internet with both machines and also transferring files from one machine to the other. One my Dell I have a Marvell Yukon 88E8040 PCI-E Fast Ethernet NIC and I have an Intel PRO/Wireless 3945ABG controller as well. So I have a few questions.

I have heard about setting up an ad-hoc network. Is this ideal for me? Also, what machine would be best to have the DSL line connected to and act as host for the other machine, the Toshiba running XP or the Dell running Vista?

Ultimately, how would I go about setting the network between these two laptops? Can somebody help me with that? DO I need other software or does Windows in both XP and Vista have all the tools I need for the job?

Thanks,

I personally would go get a wireless router. That way you can hook your dsl modem to the wireless router, and then both of your laptops will connect to the router... That's the norm for home networks. Then you can set up file sharing in windows to transfer files from one computer to the other.

Here is a cheap model router that I use and most home networks use.

http://www.amazon.com/Linksys-WRT54G.../dp/B00007KDVI

Hope this helps,

~Mike