8. Finish by restarting your PC. When the wizard is complete, you are prompted to restart your PC.
9. Configure the second Ethernet PC. Because our second PC was running Windows 98 SE, we inserted the setup disk in drive A: and clicked on My Computer | A: | Setup to launch the Home Networking Wizard. The wizard's screens are identical to those seen on the first system. The difference with the second (and subsequent) PC using the same network technology as the server is that you tell the wizard that another computer is providing direct Internet access. On the naming screen, give the second PC a unique name, but use the workgroup name established on the Windows Me PC. You also indicate whether you want the second computer to share its folders and printers with other computers on the network. You skip the setup disk step (you've already done it), and then you're done. You are prompted to restart your PC.
10. Make sure everything's working. At this point, both of your PCs should be able to see each other's folders and share printers. On a Windows 95/98/98 SE PC, click on Network Neighborhood to verify that the Windows Me PC is recognised. On the Windows Me PC, click on My Network Places (on the Desktop), click on Entire Network, click on Search for Computers (see Figure 5), and the Windows 98 SE PC should be recognised. The acid test is to try to connect to the Internet on both PCs simultaneously. In our testing, this worked beautifully the first time out. Phase Two: Connect a Third PC using HomePNA
11. Install NICs. We started phase two by adding a NetGear Phoneline 10X home PCI NIC to our Windows Me PC. We then installed a NetGear Phoneline 10X home network USB adapter on the third PC. Because Windows Me recognises HomePNA adapters, we didn't have to run NetGear's setup software for the adapter card or the USB adapter. We did need to install the drivers for the USB adapter on the Windows 98 se system, though.
12. Plug the HomePNA NICs into a phone line. After the HomePNA nics were installed, we connected each to a phone jack using regular phone cables. Note that if you have more than one phone line in your home, you need to be sure to connect the HomePNA NICs to the same line. Also note that if the PCs are in the same room, you can plug them into the same phone jack using a splitter, or you can connect the two with one phone cable; either way, HomePNA will work fine.
13. Run the Home Networking Wizard on the new PC. We inserted the setup floppy disk from phase one and ran the Windows Me Home Networking Wizard on the HomePNA machine to configure the HomePNA connection. After we set up a HomePNA network between the Windows Me server system and the third PC, the server system was able to communicate with both the Ethernet subnetwork connecting it to the second PC and with the new PC connected by HomePNA. When we reran the wizard on the Windows Me system, we specified that the Internet connection should be shared with the network via the HomePNA adapter.
When we clicked on My Network Places on the Windows Me PC, the system recognised both the Ethernet and HomePNA systems, but the two systems did not recognise each other in their respective Network Neighborhoods.
It is possible, using IP addresses, to map the network drives on the systems even when they use different network technologies, but it can't be done via the Home Networking Wizard. You can combine technologies to share Internet access or to share printers installed on the Windows Me server PC via the wizard, but not to share files and folders or to access printers across networks. For example, a printer physically connected to an Ethernet machine cannot be used by a PC with a HomePNA connection.
14. Configure Internet Connection Sharing for multiple networks. Windows Me allows two network technologies to share Internet access via a Windows Me server, but you don't configure the setting in the Home Networking Wizard. To set it up, you launch Internet Explorer, click on Tools | Internet Options | Connections | Sharing, and then check the appropriate primary and secondary network adapters for accessing your mixed-technology home networks (see Figure 6).
Phase Three: Connect a Notebook
15. Install NICs. The last stage of our mixed-technology network configuration involved adding an Intel AnyPoint Wireless Home Network USB NIC to the Windows Me server and an AnyPoint Wireless Home Network PC card to a notebook PC. We did have to use the Intel drivers in order for the PCs to recognise the AnyPoint nics.
16. Run the Home Networking Wizard. We ran the Home Networking Wizard on the Windows Me server PC and on the notebook PC, with results that were similar to our experience in adding the HomePNA cards to the network. On the notebook PC, we were able to see both the server and the notebook when we clicked on Network Neighborhood from the Windows 98 desktop.
When we searched for Computers under My Network Places on the Windows Me server, we saw all the systems connected to the Windows Me computer (see Figure 7). As in phase two, however, the wizard was not able to configure shared Internet access for multiple networks (instead, we went back to the server, used the ie Sharing screen, and designated HomeRF as the secondary network connection). Sharing drives, folders, and files would require network drive mapping, a process that isn't terribly complex but is outside the point-and-click experience of the wizard.
In the End
The bottom line is that Windows Me offers two advances to home networking: a simple and transportable Home Networking Wizard and the ability to integrate multiple networking technologies on your home network.
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