Here's what I'd like to be able to do... I'd like to connect two computers using a cat5 cable, one is my workstation PC and the other is a home server I put together (both Windows 7). They're both connected wirelessly on the same wireless network. So I can share files wirelessly, but I find it too slow for transferring large files. What I'd like to do is be able to connect these computers with an ethernet cable for faster file transferring between the two, while also having them connected to the wireless network for internet access. I've tried to do this myself but every time I transfer a file it goes at wireless pace. Please help? Thanks.

Hi Sum Azn Dood, WHen you connected the two computers together by Cat5 cable, i think the correct kind of cat5 cable to use would be a "crossover cable". Can you verify your using a "crossover" cat5 ethernet cable and not a regular cat5 ethernet cable? Lat3

The correct kind of cable that you will need to use is the EIA/TIA 568B Crossover Cable, you can force it to go over the ethernet cable pressing the (WindowsButton + R) to bring up the "Run" Dialog box and then typing "ncpa.cpl" without the quotes jus disable the wireless adapter. Please Mark This As The Answer

The best cable depends on the adapters. If both are gigabit adapters, a patch cable will run in full duplex mode and is the best option. If either or both adapters are only 100Mbit, a crossover cable is required.

The problem here isn't really the cable, it's the fact that the wireless is the preferred network, so if it's connected Windows will always use it to transfer the files. The biggest stumbling block to your idea is the fact that you want to keep both interfaces active at the same time, one for Internet and the other for file transfers. Changing the preferred network to the wired one won't work because then Windows will try to use that to connect to the Internet, which defeats your purpose. So here's a possible workaround (no guarantees): Assign the wired interfaces static IP's on a different subnet than the wireless. For instance, if your wireless IP is assigned by the router in the range of 192.168.0.x then give the wired network IP's in the range of 172.16.0.x or similar. Do not assign a default gateway or DNS to the wired interface. When you connect to the shared folders to transfer files use the computer's wired IP address instead of its name; instead of connecting to \\comp1\shared_folder connect to \\172.16.0.1\shared_folder - this should, in theory, send the data over the faster 172.16.0.x subnet instead of the slower 192.168.0.x wireless. In theory. As the others have said, if you're going to connect the PCs directly together you need to use a crossover cable of some type, but by setting it up this way you could also connect them through the router's switch.