At least in New Mexico and Texas (where I've bought lots of NICs), office supply stores are usually the cheapest places to get them. Friends with LANs are another good source -- for free NICs. Ask your friends if they have any old NICs lying around -- if they have upgraded their LAN to a higher speed, they may have some surplus 10 Mbs cards. Used computer stores are another happy hunting ground, but watch out for bad hardware. Hardware for Thin Net: Get one Thin Net cable if you plan to network two computers. If you plan to network three computers, get two Thin Net Cables, two terminators, and make sure the NICs you get have a "T" shaped connector in each package. For each additional computer you plan to network, get an additional Thin Net cable. Make sure you have either a Windows 95 or 98 CD-ROM and a CD-ROM drive, or else a modem and Internet connection. You will almost certainly need one or both to install your NICs. If you have only one CD-ROM drive, you can move it from one computer to the next to install your NIC drivers. Hardware for 10BASE-T: Ethernet hub. The cheap ones come for $50 or less. If you go to a used computer store you might be able to get a high quality one with more ports and diagnostic features (lots of little lights) for the same price. You don't need a driver or any sort of software for the hub -- it comes ready to operate just by plugging in the power and turning it on. Whew, at least something about networking is easy! For each computer on your network, get one UTP cable. Many stores call these "patch cables." They look like oversized phone cords. Wizard tip: If you find a UTP cable labeled "crossover cable," you can use it without a hub to make a 10BASE-T connection between just two computers. However, a crossover cable will not work if you put it between a hub and a computer. I use a crossover cable with my laptop for troubleshooting networks, using it to hook my laptop to the network suspect of the day. NIC Installation Now open your computer again. This time you are actually going to handle the stuff inside. This raises the danger of damaging CMOS chips. Your primary line of defense against zapping CMOS is the grounding strap. Attach one end to the metal frame of your computer. It must be attached to a conducting part of the frame. Metals are conductors, so if you are sure something is metal, tie the grounding strap to that. Don't tie it to something that feels warmer to the touch than the rest of the frame. A conductor should feel cool (unless the air temperature in your working area is really high). Tie the other end of the grounding strap around your wrist. If you have used the fabric softener trick, you are less likely to be carrying static electricity. So you may tell yourself that you don't really need the grounding strap. However, have you heard of Murphy's Law? It states that "Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong." I have experienced Murphy's Law from time to time:):) Next, put the plug and play cards inside open slots in your computers. This sometimes requires that you shove hard to fully seat a card in its slot. You can tell the card is properly in place when the metal piece on the end is snugly in place where you can screw in the bolt that holds it to the frame. If you have trouble making a card slide all the way into its slot, use that bright light source to see what the problem is. If you drop a bolt inside the computer, be CERTAIN to get it out. Otherwise it might cause an electrical short, to the immense unhappiness or even death of your computer. This is where the screwdriver with the magnetic tip comes in handy -- the bolt will stick to the tip of it instead of falling into the computer. If you drop a bolt inside anyhow, you can easily fish it out by letting magnetic force stick it to the screwdriver tip. Now, with your NIC firmly bolted in place and no loose bolts -- reboot. If you are fortunate, Win95/98 will automatically find and set up drivers for your new hardware. It will almost certainly ask you where it can find drivers. Tell your computer to look on both the Win 98/95 installation CD-ROM, and any installation disk that came with your NIC, and to make an Internet connection to automatically search the Microsoft driver database. Nine times out of ten this works. Windows may have already automatically chosen protocols for you. This section tells you how to check on your protocols, and select the ones you want. For this Guide we will just talk about one communications protocol -- TCP/IP (Transfer Control Protocol/Internet Protocol). You may also want to use NetBEUI (NetBios Extended User Interface). This comes with your Windows operating system. Newbie note: Have you been trying to telnet into your friends' Windows computer? Normally Win 95/98/NT doesn't run a telnet server that allows connections into it, just a telnet client that allows the user to telnet out of that computer. You have a better chance of remotely entering a Windows computer using the NetBEUI protocol -- or talking your friend into installing a "remote administration" program such as PC Anywhere or Back Orifice. (Warning -- Back Orifice is not a very nice remote admin tool -- use with extreme caution or the baddies will abuse it!) Now, back to TCP/IP. In Control Panel, click Network. This brings up a box with the opening tab being "Configuration." If you are lucky, it already will have a line saying something like "TCP/IP->NE2000 compatible. |