I have a few networking questions/problems

[Mariyameggy]

My brother got a laptop the other day and i have been having some trouble setting it up with our existing wireless network. I have a laptop that is about 3 years old and a D-Link wireless router. I could get my brothers laptop to connect to the router but if he turned the laptop off then back on, it would fail to reconnect. It seems to be working now but i'm not really sure why.
See bottom of post for technical details. I will add details if necessary and when i am able (i.e. if i'm not at work).

I am no expert when it comes to networking, it's not really my thing. So i have a few questions which i am not sure if they are a problem.

Firstly, what could be the problem with my brother's laptop? A while ago i was having trouble with my laptop's connection and found that updating it's wireless card driver. Would doing the same with my brother's help?

Second, i have noticed that the DNS Suffix is "domain.invalid". Is that bad? I don't really know what that means so please indicate how i can elaborate on that so you guys can better diagnose the problem.

Third, i was also trying to set up file sharing between both computers. I eventually figured out that i had to allow it in Norton's firewall, but when googling i read that i should set each laptop's ip (i.e. static) as 192.168.0.x. But when i did that i could no longer access the internet. What's the difference between static and dynamic and why the difference?

Details:
Wireless router: D-Link DI-524 802.11g
My laptop: OS: Windows XP SP3, Wireless card: Intel PRO/Wireless 2915ABG
Brother's laptop: OS: Windows Vista (Home Premium i think), i'll check the hardware specs when i get the chance

[c-tech]

hey there Mariyameggy. About the first suggestion i wouldn't be sure. The problem seems to be the IP address configuration. i believe your router automatically assigns IP addresses to computers that connect to it (it's called DHCP), and so there is no need to assign a static IP address yourself. What is the router's IP address? most of the time it's usually 192.168.1.1. If you want to assign the IP addresses yourself (i.e static), then the IP addresses you assign should be in the same subnet as your router. e.g if the router's IP address is as above, 192.168.1.1, then the addresses for the laptops should be between192.168.1.2 to 192.168.1.254 and the default gateway should be your router's IP address i.e 192.168.1.1. The subnet mask should be 255.255.255.0.
The second thing could be about the authentication, i.e are you required to input a password/username when connecting to the wireless network? kindly confirm about this.

[Michael York]

Hi Mariyameggy,

This is Mike from the Norton Authorized Support Team.

"c-tech" did a great job of explaining the basics of networking to you. I just wanted to chime in here to assist you with the Norton Firewall. Please let me know which Norton product and version you currently have installed. You can determine the version by opening your Norton product, choose the "Help & Support" link and then choose "About".

Since your router's DHCP server is allocating Dynamic IP addresses on your network, what you will need to do is to input what's called the MAC address (Hardware) of the network card for each device instead of the IP address. You will add this information in the Network Map feature of the Norton Firewall. This way, if the Dynamic IP addresses on your computer's change, the devices will still be "trusted".

As soon I hear back from you regarding the product and version you are using, I can then provide you with the step-by-step instructions to ensure that all of the computers on your network are "Trusted" by the Norton Firewall.

Thank you,
Mike