Im not exactly a network noob, but this has me stumped. I just got a new (slightly used) laptop for free. it works great, but it didn't have a wireless card. my desktop has a wireless USB dongle, and my server has a nice wireless card. all 3 have ethernet ports, that Ive never used for anything, but have no reason to think are damaged. in order to get my laptop a wi-fi connection, i decided to use the USB dongle on that till I can get a pcmcia card to go with it, and have the ubuntu machine (my server) share its connection with my desktop via ethernet.
first thing I did was configure my eth0 interface (the ethernet card) to an IP address of 192.168.2.1 (the eth1 interface--wireless-- is 192.168.1.250). then I installed firestarter, and told it to share the eth1 connection with eth0. then I double checked my settings, rebooted, and made sure all settings were still properly intact. Then I went over to the windows machine, manually set it to connect to the ubuntu machine (ip 192.168.2.3, mask 255.255.255.0, gateway 192.168.2.1). and turned it off. then I plugged 'em together with an ethernet cord I knew was working (it had previously been in use with a printer, and had never given any problems), and turned the windows compy back on. it then proceded to vigorously claim "Media State....Disconnected". Firestarter seemed to be running fine, and I could ping eth0 fine from the terminal on the ubuntu machine, but there didn't seem to be any connection between them.
after some thinking I decided to test it out using ICS on my lappy. pretty much the same configuration, and what do you know? both the lappy and the desktop were claiming "Media State....Disconnected" on the ethernet port. anybody have any suggestions? Ive tried both setups now with different ethernet cords, triple-checked the settings, and haven't been able to find anything wrong. nor do any of the computers report driver (or any other) issues with their ethernet cards.
first thing I did was configure my eth0 interface (the ethernet card) to an IP address of 192.168.2.1 (the eth1 interface--wireless-- is 192.168.1.250). then I installed firestarter, and told it to share the eth1 connection with eth0. then I double checked my settings, rebooted, and made sure all settings were still properly intact. Then I went over to the windows machine, manually set it to connect to the ubuntu machine (ip 192.168.2.3, mask 255.255.255.0, gateway 192.168.2.1). and turned it off. then I plugged 'em together with an ethernet cord I knew was working (it had previously been in use with a printer, and had never given any problems), and turned the windows compy back on. it then proceded to vigorously claim "Media State....Disconnected". Firestarter seemed to be running fine, and I could ping eth0 fine from the terminal on the ubuntu machine, but there didn't seem to be any connection between them.
after some thinking I decided to test it out using ICS on my lappy. pretty much the same configuration, and what do you know? both the lappy and the desktop were claiming "Media State....Disconnected" on the ethernet port. anybody have any suggestions? Ive tried both setups now with different ethernet cords, triple-checked the settings, and haven't been able to find anything wrong. nor do any of the computers report driver (or any other) issues with their ethernet cards.