Windows 7 Connecting windows 7 machine directly to XP machine

[MrLH]

I am trying to make a direct connection to a XP machine using a cable. No switch or router involved. Can it be done? There are 3 cables joined by fem/fem connectors and one of the cables is a crossover. In my mind as long as there is a crossover in the mix then the transmit + and - are connecting to the other computers receiving + and - and vice versa, right? Anyhow I can't seem to make them talk. I need a valid IP config but am so new to Win 7 that I'm not sure how to do this. It has been a very long time since I have connected machines this way, last time was with 2 Win 98 machines so can someone help me out with this please? I would hook up the XP machine to the router but don't have a cable long enough and no spare wireless cards. I know this is possible and that I can use my Win 7 machine as a gateway. Help!

 

[Jimbo22]

Yes it can...have a look at this.

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-vista/set-up-a-computer-to-computer-ad-hoc-network

 

[BIGBEARJEDI]

Make sure you are trying to use the Crossover Cable (should be RJ45 Ethernet Cat5 or Cat6) between the 2 Ethernet ports on the XP computer and the other computer (Win7). It sounds like you know the correct ports, but back in the Win98 days many of my customers tried hooking up between the 2-RJ11 jacks which are for Modem-Phone ports.

That will not work; there were also Serial Port Cables for computer-to-computer connection (DB-9), and there were special crossover cables used for those. Just want to make sure you are talking about using Ethernet ports which came built in on just about all laptops and desktops by the time XP showed up!


BIGBEARJEDI

 

[MrLH]

Make sure you are trying to use the Crossover Cable (should be RJ45 Ethernet Cat5 or Cat6) between the 2 Ethernet ports on the XP computer and the other computer (Win7). It sounds like you know the correct ports, but back in the Win98 days many of my customers tried hooking up between the 2-RJ11 jacks which are for Modem-Phone ports.

That will not work; there were also Serial Port Cables for computer-to-computer connection (DB-9), and there were special crossover cables used for those. Just want to make sure you are talking about using Ethernet ports which came built in on just about all laptops and desktops by the time XP showed up!


BIGBEARJEDI

Yeah I know the difference between those different types of ports, these are cat5e connections and one of the cables is crossed over so even though the other two cables that are junctioned together with this crossover are standard the signals will still travel to the right destination. I'm finding out though that todays ethernet ports are smart wired to change pins when a standard cable alone is used to connect machines. In any event I have solved the issue and it is working very well now. Thanks for replying.

 

[MrLH]

Thanks BassFisher for providing that link. I actually got it working by going into network connections and clicking on the wireless connection which is how my win 7 machine gets on the internet. In the properties window there is a tab called sharing. In there is a checkbox for "allowing other network users to connect to the internet using this computers internet connection". Once I selected that and ok'd my way out it began to setup the connection to the xp machine which I could see was connected but for which it didn't have an ip. After I did this I was able to connect to the internet using the xp machine and was also able to share files and devices as well. It's funny that the ad-hoc setup for win 7 only seems to be setup for connecting machines wirelessly.