Wireless Connectivity - The Future!

I remember my first video game was a Nintendo. Dad bought it for us two girls to spend some time fighting evil instead of each other. I had games like Looney Tunes something and the Goonies. Not to forget Super Mario Brothers. Still a classic with the youth as I still see my younger cousins fighting over who gets the magic mushroom in this round. My old Nintendo is now well packed and in some corner somewhere gathering dust. I am sure someday it'll be an antique, there will be people wondering how people played with the little controls and what the wires was for.

The new age commands new changes. One of the new changes that we'll see coming soon is that of the Wireless age. I am certain that day isn't far, oh hell we're almost already there. People want less congestion these days. They see congestion in most part of their lives and don't want to see it in their house. Isn't that why we comfortably moved from the age of long cords for phones to the wireless phones? It makes life simple.

In the same manner, when we are fighting terrorists in Counter Strike, wouldn't you rather sit in the ease of your bean bag with your munchies and drink on your side and shoot them terrorist butt till eternity? Sounds much more fun then that dingy parlour I was talking about doesn't it?

Let me show you how to connect 2 systems that have wireless capability. We will try a Peer to Peer (P2P) network. Its fairly simple to make a P2P network. You'll need the following

1. 2 systems with wireless capability running Win XP.

(Note - if you want to connect more than 5 systems you'll need Win XP Pro - Win XP Home allows only 5 systems to connect via Wireless connections)

Yup that's it, that's all we need. This is how we make the connection.

Step 1. Assign a local IP address to each system.

Start --> Control Panel --> Network Connections --> Right Click Wireless Network connections --> Select Properties --> Select on Internet Protocol(TCP/IP) --> Click on Properties --> Now you will get 2 options a) Obtain an IP address automatically or b) Use the following IP Address. Both are fine, but if you are using option b, please ensure you use an IP address between 192.168.0.1 to 192.168.0.254.

Step 2. Switch on the Wireless adaptor on your system.

Step 3. The host computer will have to assign a name to the network name by clicking on Setup a new Network under Wireless connection and following the steps.

Step 4. Refresh to find list of Wireless Networks in Wireless connection. Once you see your Network name, you'll be good to get your guest computer networked.

Step 5. The guest computer will now be able to see your wireless connection. (Note- the guest computer will have to follow step 1 and not have the same IP address as that of the host)

With this we are done setting up the wireless connection. Happy gaming guys.