HOME LOCAL AREA NETWORK

It is one of my core believes that the real knowledge comes from hands on trainning. For many years I dreamed of having a newtwork at home. But networking is not an easy task. Specially if you want to network low end PCs.

I found a copy of Windows for Workgroups 3.11. I installed it on two desktop PCs. These are the systems descriptions:

COMPAQ ProLinea 4/25s

486SX 25MHz processor

4 Mbyte on RAM

40 Mbyte on HD

1.44 kbyte FD

3COM Etherlink III (ISA BUS)

ACER Aspire

AMD K5 100MHz processor

16 Mbyte on RAM

190 Mbyte on HD

4x CDROM

1.44 kbyte FD

Realtek 8139 NIC (PCI BUS)

I downloaded the Network Interface Cards (NICs) drivers from their respective vendor sites. Also found on a Win 3.x site, the TCP/IP suite for WFW 3.11 (32 bits). And luckily found a 10Base T hub at the local flea market for $2 dollars. Also I brought some RJ45 Ethernet cables from work.

These are pictures of my setup:

After installing WFW 3.11, you need to install the NIC drivers. You do that in Network Setup:

Next you must provide an unique IP address for every PC. The Workgroup name should be the same for all. But every PC must be named differently. In my case I used workgroup: HOME, and PCs: ACER, COMPAQ and TOSHIBA. The IP addresses I used were: 10.9.8.1 ; 10.9.8.2 and 10.9.8.3.

I am not running WinNT 3.51 or 4.0 Server, so I don’t have a DNS, WINS or DHCP server. But there is a way around this. Click on Advanced and type a name for the SCOPE ID. In my case I typed: LOCAL. But any name will work as long as all PCs have it (just like the Workgroup name):

It is also done on Windows 98. I have a Toshiba Laptop that has a 3COM Megahertz PCMCIA NIC and this is the setup:

Click on properties, select the WINS tab and set the proper SCOPE ID. In Win 98 you need also to type some IP addresses (just type some or all of your other PCs’ IP addresses):

And don’t forget to set the proper subnet mask. In most small networks, it is 255.255.255.0. So only the last octet is looked for the host ID. In my network, the remaining three octects are the subnetwork ID (10.9.8.x)

You can share files and printers under WFW 3.11 and Win98 by selecting it. Finally you can see other computer’s