Noobie home network question

[Turtles]

Currently mine and my Dad's computers are both connected to the internet through a Linksys router. Now I want to set up a home network so that we can both use our printer. At the moment only I can use it. It would also be handy to share movies, music, etc without having to transfer them between computers.

Never set-up a network before so bear with me if I seem a little dim

 

[Turtles]

It's XP Home, thanks for the help. I'll let you know if I hit any snags.

 

[Turtles]

Not having any luck.

- Both computers are in the same workgroup
- Printer installed on my computer fine. Name has been given to it under the sharing tab.

But I'm having problems with the other computer.

- When I go to add a network printer it doesn't find anything when I browse for printers or when I enter the printer URL (which I think is \\< name of your computer>\<the name of your printer>). I get a error message 'windows cannot connect to printer'.

As for sharing,

- in My Computer > 'Shared Documents' > Properties > Sharing, I've ticked the 'share this folder on the network' box on both computers but nothing appears in the shared folders when I add something.



Any ideas?

 

[Turtles]

Connected to my PC.

 

[Turtles]

Got a quick question.

What is this:



Click to enlarge

It appeared after I attempted to network the two computers together. My dad noticed it when it appeared on his computer and it's also on mine. I'm just guessing its the connection between the two computers but why are they exchanging/receiving packets. The icon disappears when the router is turned off.

The bottom icon (gigabit,etc) is our normal internet connection but what's the other one.

But yeah, just a little weird how they are constantly exchanging/receiving packets when I'm connected to the internet, but the PC is idle. So I think it's to do with the connection I set up between to two computers but as I said I don't really have a clue and just wondered what was up

My bad if this is a total noob question

 

[Turtles]

bumpy