[ale] Do I need a patch cable?

[Kevin Krumwiede]

On Tue, 30 Mar 2004 18:56:56 -0500
Trey Sizemore <trey at fastmail.fm> wrote:

> I currently have a Netgear 4-port router to which I connect my
> machines to.  CAT5 cable from NIC of each machine straight to router. 
> I have an old P200 that I've placed a couple of NICs end and want to
> use as a firewall with Smoothwall.
> 
> My question is, if I run my CAT5 cable to the Smoothwall box, can I
> just use another CAT-5 cable (like the one going into the Netgear
> router) to go to the other NIC in the Smootwall box or do I need
> something like a patch cable?

How many machines do you have?  The Netgear might function as an
ordinary switch if you disable its DHCP and configure it to whatever
subnet you want to use.  If so, just connect the Smoothwall box to one
of the Netgear's regular ports instead of its uplink port using ordinary
patch cable.  (I think you meant crossover cable.)

Krum