Home PC Network help

[Peter Gavin]

The LOML and I have recently pictured a new home computer and plan on using the old one for my son to play games and surf the internet on (oh yeah, homework too). The newest one is running Winds XP media edition and the old one is on Windows 98. My son (8 yrs old) loves medieval type fantasy adventure games and while we originally played together he is now getting better than me and quite honestly it is getting harder to share time playing. My thought is that if we could link the two computers in a network we could play together. An added benefit (I hope) is that I will be better able to monitor any internet surfing that he does. I know there are a lot of computer (hmmmmmmm what's the word?) experts on this forum and I was wondering if they thought it was possible? how it can best be done easily and inexpensively? and if you are aware of any two player games that would keep an 8 YO's interest? Would I be beter off just splurging on one of the game consols that hook up to the TV?

Thanks in advance for the help.

Peter Gavin

[Damien Falgoust]

Networking the PCs is a snap: just buy a router from Best Buy, be sure you have network connections in each PC, and follow the instructions that came with the router. To be extra-fancy, get a wireless router and stick wireless network cards in each PC -- no cables to run.

Having said that, I'm betting that old PC is pretty aged and you're unlikely to find games an 8-year-old might like that run on it. Most games coming out now require XP, so you're going to be looking for older games where availability is an issue. Plus, PC games can sometimes be a bear to set up because hardware configurations on PCs are near-infinite, it can sometimes take a lot of fiddling just to get the game to work.

I think a console works better for your situation. They're simple to set up and you're guaranteed that the games will work with zero fiddling. That's always an advantage when dealing with impatient kiddos.

So how much do you want to spend?

If you get the latest generation, an XBOX 360 will run you around $400 (don't get the "core" sytem for $300, the hard drive on the premium system is worth it) plus an extra controller plus games. Pricey.

OTOH, the Xbox 360 has some nice media features, especially since you have Windows Media Center. You can network the 360 just like a PC and stream your music, pictures and video to your living area from your PC. I do this for my music and pictures (I only have the garden-variety XP) and it's really nice. Thus, the 360 you might get some use out of even without the kiddo around.

If you can wait a bit, the Playstation 3 ($600) and Nintendo Wii ($250) are coming out this holiday season.

Or, of course, you can grab a last-gen system for a song. The Xbox, Playstation 2, and Nintendo Gamecube can all be had on the cheap, and there's a large established library of games available for them.

[Matt Warfield]

I think the key to how to set this up would depend on how much you want to be able to monitor Internet activity. If you want to be able to monitor all traffic, then I'd setup a proxy server on your computer to provide internet access to the rest of your LAN. Then it's simply a matter of reviewing the traffic log files for items of interest. Of course, this isn't the easiest way to setup your network/internet connection. Damien's recommendation of a router will take care of the easiest, with some degree of security.

Matt

[Joe Pelonio]

We started with a wireless system and have since gone to hard-wire. It depends on where you live, in our area everyone has a wireless network, cordless phones and other devices so there was a lot of interference.
When we went online there were 6 choices of networks to connect to, from picking up the neighbors' systems.

[Jim O'Dell]

:D Well, I was right in the middle of a reply, and power dropped out here at work!
Sometimes networking with XP and another OS is not easy. I just went through this with XP Home and Windows 2000. I fussed with it for 3 weeks, and didn't get anywhere. My computer guru here at work came out last night after work and did it for me, (Thanks Lou!) but he fought with it for over an hour. Seems that XP Home and XP Pro work totally different. Home is tougher to do, at least if you aren't used to working in it.
I found the best price on a wired Linksys router at CompUSA on line, and was able to pick it up at the store. It was immediate, and saved me about 6 or 7 bucks over Amazon, even with the free shipping. Didn't look at the wireless price since I was replacing a bad wired unit.
I have no help for you on the game end. I would guess that a 98 based machine wouldn't be strong enough for many of the newer games, and therefore would be very limiting for your son. Would probably work fine for you and I!:eek: :D Jim.

[Damien Falgoust]

More on the game front:

Console games are better than PCs for in-the-room head to head stuff, IMO. Virtually any sports game or "beat em up" fighting game will be a lot of fun to play head to head. Because you're playing on the same screen while kicked back on the couch (rather than while hunched over separate monitors), there's a lot more room for interaction (ie, trash talk) between players.

I've been playing the snot out of NCAA 07, so if college football's your bag, there you go. I actually like it better than its NFL counterpart, Madden 07. (Go Horns!)

Madden 07 (NFL), NBA 07, and NHL 07 have also all either been recently released or will be released in the next few weeks. If you prefer individual sports, Top Spin 2 is a great tennis game, and Fight Night Round 3 is a nifty boxing game. Tiger Woods Golf is also out there if that's your bag.

On the beat-em-up front, Dead or Alive 4 is probably best, although there's some, uh, well-endowed characters in there and -- how to say this? -- they jiggle realistically when they're jumping around. So be forewarned.

However, for an 8-year-old (or 33 year old), there is one game that is MANDATORY. Lego Star Wars II. It was just released, and it is FANTASTIC. It's a game that covers the original trilogy, but...with Lego characters. It's hard to describe, but the end product is simply fantastic.

And it can be played head-to-head. My wife the anti-gamer actually loves it. It's got a universal appeal that's hard to beat. And it's available for every console on the market today, plus PCs (although it probably won't run on your old 98 box).

The PC is less kid-friendly for gaming. Most of the games I find that are great on the PC are either (i) crazy violent, e.g., Quake 4 or Half Life 2, and thus not good for the kiddos or (ii) deep strategy or simulation games that will bore the average elementary schooler to death.

[Damien Falgoust]

A couple of additional notes:

A nice thing about the Xbox 360 is that if you have it connected to the internet (and you have the hard drive version), you can download demos of almost all available games for free. Smaller arcade-y games are also available online via Xbox Live Marketplace. So you can try a lot of stuff before you buy.

If you elect to get a Playstation 2, the game you must buy is Guitar Hero. You'll know it by the special guitar-shaped controller that it ships with. This is another universal appeal game -- I have yet to meet someone who doesn't dig rockin' out while trying to match the onscreen guitarist note for note. I don't own a Playstation 2, but I've been tempted to pick one up at their current cheap prices just for this game.

[Cary Falk]

Peter,
If you want to do 2 player games I would suggest xbox, playstation2 or xbox360. xbox360 is nice but I don't think it is worth its preminum price for an 8 year old. There are plenty of games for the other two consoles which are really cheep right now(<$150). As others have suggested gaming on the computer gets very expensive and you can easily get into compatibility issues from game to game. I upgraded my computer so my daughter could have the guts of the old one and networked all of them together. I have enough power to play some of the latest games(not all) but the cost was more than twice the cost of even the xbox 360 I have. The gaming consoles in my opinion are much more fun to play on. I have xbox, 360 and pc games.

If you are going to network, which I would suggest doing anyway even if you don't play games on them, I have 2 suggestions:
1) replace Win98 on the old computer with Win XP. All kinds of problems went away for me when I made the change. Win98 sucks along with Win ME.
2)Download the trial version of Network Magic on all computers and let it do it's thing. It fixed my wireless network problems in 10 minutes. I had been bangng my head on the wall for 2 days before that trying to get it to work.

[Peter Gavin]

Thanks for all your help. Luckily my son (and I) like the in depth strategy games that some people find so boring. I think the best bet for me would be buying one of the older console games for a relatively low price. That way, we won't have to invest in all the router/ network stuff that may or may not work for the older computer. When my son gets older we can figure out if we need a better system, but right now I am sure he would be thrilled with it.

Peter

[Damien Falgoust]

That's a fine solution, although be forewarned that you won't find much in the way of serious, indepth strategy games on a console -- the Civilization IVs and Rome: Total Wars of the world just don't exist in console form. And they presumably won't run on your 98 box (earlier games in both series might, though, depending on your specific hardware -- does the PC have a 3D card? What generation?).

Whatever console you get, you should still get Lego Star Wars II.

[Chip Charnley]

I pretty much agree with everything that has been said here except for one thing. That you need a ROUTER. You may very well only need a switch which is much cheaper.

1) Is you internet provider willing to provide more than one IP address? If they do, you only need a switch. You also need to know if it is it free or extra cost. May ISP's these days are providing 2-3 IP addresses in their base pricing.

2) If you want complete control of the second system's access to the internet, you can use the XP system as a 'router' with the connection from the second system to the XP system being a local LAN. Again, in this configuration, you only need a switch not a router.

These two situations are important as a switch is significantly less expensive than a router. I have seen 10GB 4 port switches on edealinfo.com for as little as $10. And before someone asks, you don't need 100GB until you are considering doing high-speed apps between the systems at home. The effective speed of most home internet connections is such that there is little to nothing to be gained by 100GB LAN speeds as the internet connection is the bottleneck.

The last thing I will mention is that you need to look at the hardware you are running WIN98 on. While I agree that often times anything running W98 is too old to run WXP, it often is sufficient to run W2K and there are many games out there that will run on W2K as long as you aren't set on the newest games. I would postulate that, for an 8yo, you could finds lots of games in the bargain bins that he would be thrilled with for a couple years yet. Once he gets tired of them and starts to really look hard at the newer games, you can look at a newer, old computer.

Assuming that the CPU will handle W2K reasonably well, the most likely thing you might need to upgrade is the amount of memory (which is relatively inexpensive). Second most likely is the video card. Again, if you look for something that is not top end these days, it's not too expensive. In fact, I think I have a couple older video cards that would fit this bill in a file drawer as I keep 4 computers (myself, 2 grown sons and my best friend:rolleyes: :D ) up to running things like Dungeons and Dragons Online so I upgrade a video card or two every year. If you decide to do something with the W98 box, drop me a PM.

Chip

[Chip Charnley]

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[Damien Falgoust]

Consumer grade routers can be had for around $30-40. (Here's a wireless one for $40 (http://www.amazon.com/D-Link-DI-524-Wireless-Router-802-11g/dp/B0001PFQ08/sr=8-6/qid=1159109726/ref=pd_bbs_6/002-0331288-7339264?ie=UTF8&s=electronics)). A switch is an inferior solution -- penny-wise but pound-foolish.

1. If you have more than one computer, you need either (i) a separate cable modem connection for each IP address provided by your cable company (assuming your cable company allows multiple IPs), or (ii) a router.

1a. Even if your cable company allows multiple IPs, you are at the mercy of their IP address limit. With a router, you can have every computer and other network device on your network sharing the same internet connection, no matter how many.

2. A switch does not do NAT translation, which provides some protection from unwanted intrusions (routers also act as hardware firewalls).

3. A switch will not do DHCP, e.g., automatically handing out IP addresses, meaning you have to manually configure IP addresses.

4. Using one PC as a router means that PC has to always be turned on -- and you can only hope it doesn't lock up on you at a critical moment.

5. A wireless router (which can also handle wired connections) provides a nice upgrade path; many non-PC devices are starting to have Wi-Fi capability -- dgital cameras, printers, security cams, media players and the like. I like the fact that I can stow my printer off in an unused corner without having to run wires to it, and every computer in the house can print to it (my desktop, my work laptop, my wife's work laptop). It's a good feature to have, and you can turn off wireless broadcasting until you get wireless devices down the road.

PS -- Did I mention you simply must pick up Lego Star Wars II?