How do I connect my Laptop to Desktop?

Right. So I got a crossover cable,
plugged one into laptop and one into desktop.

How do I now transfer files from one to the other?
:oops:

You'll have to share out the folders you want to be visible from one to the other. You'll also need to set up IP addresses on both machines that are in the same sub net (e.g. 192.168.0.1 and 192.168.0.2 with a netmask of 255.255.255.0) and then go to the "network neighborhood" and you should see the other machine. If you don't here's a wee checklist:

1) Turn off firewalls on both machines
2) Check you actually have connectivity, open up a command prompt and see if you can ping the other IP address (ping IP_address).
3) Check that both machines are in the same windows work group
4) If all that fails try entering the following in the windows explorer address bar: \\ip_address\

Good luck!

Bart.

Bart,
Thanks a million.
It was windows firewall and macafee on both.
I had to allow the ip's of each (obviously enough!)

Everything works great now
(even the wireless network)
So.
Now I have a crossover cable to return!
(actually I'm gonna keep it just in case)

Cheers again!

Now I have a crossover cable to return!
(actually I'm gonna keep it just in case)

Cheers again!

Crossover cables are very handy things to have. As sad as it sounds I always have one in my backpack, along with a male-to-male FireWire for copying data really quickly between Macs. You'd be surprised how often those two come in handy!

Bart.