dumb question about networking

[mattheadfat]

I've been told that you can go directly from on networking card on one computer directly to another? or even split a cable modem with one IP by having one 'puter with 2 networking cards and the other computer with 1 (having the computer with 2 net. cards pluged to the cable modem and also to the other computer, without any hubs or anything). I am completely wrong? is this at all possible?

[BBA]

No, you are not wrong, you are missing a few crucial details though.

1. To go from one NIC to another NIC, you have to use either a hub or a special cable called a crossover cable. A crossover cable looks like a regular CAT5 cable, but two conducters are switched so the one of the NICs wont try to send on the conductor the other sends on, and the same for the recieve channel (a hub does this cross wiring internally),

2. To use the configuration of one PC on a cable modem, and another connected to it's second NIC, you would have to either run a proxy program or WIN98SE's internet connection sharing app. I use this configuration here, but I chose the SYGATE proxy because it is superior to ICS.

BBA

[Vampiel]

Everything you said is correct, you can do that with ADSL and even a normal modem no matter what speed (but you prob wouldnt want to cause of bandwidth |]). As a matter of fact all the cable company is really is a wide area network wired with coax. You could put 6 computers on the same exact cable modem, linkng then throug a network of course, and if you were playing a game like q2 multi-player, you would have the same ping as if only 1 person was on the cable modem. Although if some one was u/l or d/l it would greatly affect it depending on how much bandwidth you have (multi-player games only require around 5k d/l 3k u/l per second, the only reason DSL/CABLE is so much less ping on them is because they are digital lines not analog like 56k, etc...). Yet if you were d/l a file at 50k/sec then your ping would fly to the roof. Yes you can hardwire 2 computers without a HUB, I think you can do up to 10+ like that depending on what OS/LAN Software you are using, but im no network expert. Although it would be a very slow network, but hey it works. |)

[BBA]

Vampiel, I do in fact have 4 PC's on a single cable server PC network. All pings, even when others bring their PC's over are consistantly low, even when u/l or d/l is in progress. I havew had as many as 10 PC's gaming on the internet all at the same time off of my single cable connection.

One other reason I like SYGATE, all games play thru it as if they were directly on the internet themselves! No other proxy app I found does this, so I'm sold.

BBA

[Vampiel]

Yes I see how that would be possible on cable, but ADSL not is not the case, unless you have and SDSL, all depends on the dl/ul ratio of your connection. I have been on ADSL with 4 other people and ran perfect ping, until some1 started u/l at 20k/sec the ADSL was a 1.5dl/256k ul.

[xtant]

BBA, I have a question for you. I have a cable modem, and I'm looking to set up a dedicated game server without having to register another ip. If I set up two pc's running off one connection using sygate, will this work?

[mattheadfat]

i was told by the guy who installed the cable line into my basement for my computer that you can purchase a second ip for 10 extra (canadian, from my service provider). Otherwise, you can run 2 computers with 1 ip, but you only get half the bandwith for each computer, if both are d/l or u/l, othwise, if one computer is not in use, you get full bandwith on the other. and full bandwith if on both computer if both have an ip. this goes with 3, 4 or more computer as well. is this right? i'm not sure