If you're connecting the computers together directly (that is, not through a hub/switch/router), you need to make sure you are using a "crossover" Ethernet cable; the computers will not be able to communicate if you try to connect them using a standard Ethernet cable. The following link has a bit more information on the whole "crossover vs standard" cable issue, including pictures which will help you identify the difference between the two types of cable:

http://www.aptcommunications.com/ncode.htm

It is a working crossover cable; I've made double sure of that.

Hello,

Do an ifconfig on the linux laptop, and make sure the device is properly installed, and IP numbers properly configured.

Check the XP box to make sure that interface is up and properly configured.

You should be able to ping across the two of them.

Also ensure that there are no firewalls setup. XP SP2 is enabling a firewall that could be killing the traffic.

Christian

So... you've got the web server on XP running too, or just FTP server? Why not use SAMBA?

As far as I can tell, I've enabled all internal traffic on XP's firewall. It won't let me (or, quite possibly I can't figure out) turn off the firewall for individual network connections, but I can tell it what packets to accept or reject. So, I've enabled all packets for the internal network while keeping the firewall for my ADSL up and running.
I've double checked the IP's, can't find anything wrong with them. To be extra sure, I switched all the IP's to a mask of 255.255.255.0 and then 192.168.0.2 and .3, but that still didn't work. The laptop and PC are just like my ex and me: refusing to speak to each other.
XP box should be set up fine as, if I plug the network cable into my work laptop with the same settings (also running XP though) I can ping to my heart's content.
mediaphyte, at this stage I'm just trying to get my boxes to ping each other.

That can indicate a problem with the route/gateway settings on hte RH box.

Open a terminal window on the RH box, type the following command at the prompt, and post the command's output for us:

route

The output is as follows, (and I get a sneaky suspicion some of it shouldn't look like this...)

Destination - Gateway - Genmask - Flags - Metric- Ref - Use Iface
169.254.0.0- * - 255.255.0.0 - U - 0 - 0 -0 eth0
10.0.0.0 - * - 255.0.0.0 - U - 0 - 0 -0 eth0
127.0.0.0 - * - 255.0.0.0 - U - 0 - 0 -0 lo
default - 10.0.0.13 - 0.0.0.0 - UG - 0 - 0 -0 eth0

1. As Christian asked, can you post the results of running the "ifconfig" command on the RH box please?


2. 169.254.0.0- * - 255.255.0.0 - U - 0 - 0 -0 eth0

The above entry in your routing table comes from DHCP auto-configuration. Since you're using staic IP addressing, it shouldn't be there. It might just be a leftover entry from your previous configuration changes, but it might also be a sign of a current conflict.

From the RH box, please post the contents of your /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth0 and /etc/sysconfig/network files.

Right,

ifconfig:
eth0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:B0:d0:88:4E:EC
inet addr:10.0.0.5 BCast:10.255.255.255 Mask:255.0.0.0
UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1
RX Packets:107 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:1 frame:0
TX Packets:4 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:100
RX Bytes:7882 (7.6Kb) TX Bytes:240 (240.0 b)
Interrupt:10 Base address:0xfc00

lo Link encap:Local Loopback
inet addr:127.0.0.1 Mask:255.0.0.0
UP LOOPBACK RUNNING MTU:16436 Metric:1
RX Packets:74 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX Packets:74 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:0
RX Bytes:4918 (4.8Kb) TX Bytes:4918 (4.8 Kb)

For the ifcfg-eth0:
USERCTL=no
PEERDNS=yes
TYPE=ethernet
DEVICE=eth0
HWADDR=00:b0:d0:88:4e:ec
BOOTPROTO=none
NETMASK=255.0.0.0
ONBOOT=yes
IPADDR=10.0.0.5
NETWORK=10.0.0.0
BROADCAST=10.255.255.255
GATEWAY=10.0.0.13

Finally, for the /etc/sysconfig/network:
NETWORKING=yes
HOSTNAME=localhost.localdomain