You can only assign 1 static IP to the router. If you need to put additional systems on the net, you can port-forward to your internal machines.
i.e.

1.2.3.4 port 80 --> 192.168.1.10 port 80...

If the wireless access point / router has MAC filtering turned on, try turning it off... it just might speed up your connection... mine did.

Are any of the systems equipped with 10Mbps network cards? Does your 100Mbps switch support auto-negotiation? If it doesn't then you have a speed mismatch.

Just create the same user and password on both machines. When you're browsing resources, the browser service will try to authenticate with the local user on the other machine. Since you're in a...

I'll still stick with my slow browser theory ;)

given the fact that

-since both machines are connected via a x-over cable, there's no need for a firewall and most likely he didn't install...

PPoA (Point-to-Point over ATM) and possibly PPoE via DSL is actually a "dialup" protocol, so he's right in that sense. If your provider uses PPoA/PPoE, your router might be automating the...

I maintain a couple of servers where I work, so here's what I would recommend:

Hardware:

Try to get redundant components; redundant power supplies, redundant hard drives, etc. The level of...

He stated that it eventually connects, so the services must be running. My guesses are (1) either the NIC's power management feature has been turned on or (2) slow browser service.

For (1),...