Hooking up PCs in tandem without internet?

[Navy Chief]

A friend of mine just bought two new PCs, and wants to connect them to work together, but there will not be internet connected to them.

Someone recommended the software, "PCAnywhere", by Symantec, but need to know if that is indeed what should be used.

A cable will be connected between the two.

NC

[jmig]

You should be able to connect them directly. XP has provisions for that. I am sure Vista must too.

[N2056]

I had a setup like that at one time. I seem to remember having to use a router, but beyond that XP setup the rest of it.

[dominique]

Windows XP does it. You need a CAT5 crossover cable and two ethernet adapters (one one both sides). A lot of computers have one built-in (telephone type socket).

You can do it with a USB cable too.

Alternatively you can have a wifi connection between the computers even if you are not connected to the internet. No cable is then needed.

[Willy]

I've set up home LANs here with Win98, Me and XP machines. If it's just two, use the crossover cable. You'll need a hub switch and regular CAT 5 ethernet cable if setting up more than two to the LAN. If one of the machines is a XP machine there's a wizard for this that you can copy to either a floppy or CD if you have a machine without a floppy drive.

The ethernet card has a connection socket that looks like a big phone connector.

[Henry]

yup you can just network them together
i have 7 at the office running windows 98 to vista
no problem, actually Pc anywhere is internet operated
its pretty easy to do
H

[Dangerousdave26]

As stated by others all you need is a cross over cable plugged into each network port.

Then you may need to set the IP addresses to the IP address range.

You will also need to turn on File and print sharing in your networking settings.