10Base2
 

Apologises but been a very long time .... can someone confirm if it is a valid setup to run two PCs back-to-back with a straight coax cable ?

Both machines work fine on a UTP crossover on the same cards but not on on a straight coax. One machine runs ME the other 2000.

Cards have UTP ports and work OK with UTP crossover cable. When trying with coax - cards are forced to use 10B2 interface via Control Panel.

Any suggestions would be welcome.

Probably stating the obvious ... sometimes it isn't

10b2 coax needs to be terminated at each end with a 50 ohm terminator. ie use a T piece at every computer and finish off each end with the terminator.

TERM--T-----T-----T--TERM

You may also have to specify the media (UTP or BNC) in the adaptor properties...most can be set to auto detect.

MAx

Concur with all that Agent86 says. I regularly run just such an arrangement when I'm "on location" but the two cards I use (3Com and D-Link) have a kind of "dongle" that enables me to connect either co-ax or UTP.

There is a "gotcha" that you've probably sorted if you've succeeded in getting them to communicate with UTP but I'll mention to help others.

The default Network Guest Account setting in Windows 2000 is "Disabled". If your machines don't recognise each other, it may not be because of the connection but the system settings. This is easy to fix in Control Panel/Administrative Tools/Computer Management/Local Users and Groups/Users and double-click Guests in the right-hand pane.

Likewise, I concur with Agent86.

You need to have T-pieces and terminators to get coax to work. Also, there is a minimum distance between connected nodes -- it's such a long time since I worked with large-scale coax installations that I cannot remember exaclty what it is, but if you've got a metre or two between the two boxes that should be OK. Some early cards do not autoselect the media, so you might have to set a jumper on the card...

Thanks guys - your advice did the job and I always like to respond with the outcome.

Coax was a bit before my time so I was unsure.

Thanks again.

Glad we were able to help. Thanks for letting us know how things went.

What made you go for coax anyway??? :confused:

Just some old cards knocking around which having no use for, I donated to a neighbour.

You don't need a hub, either.. one less active SinglePoint of Failure :D