hey, i have never been able to host games and do ftp servers etc. cause i have a router w/ a firewall. people tell me i have to do static ip or something in order to do this. how do i change my settings now to have it do static ip's? i have a 4-port linksys router and i think it automatically assigns my computers ip's (not sure, if that isnt possible or something, just assume its wrong) with dhcp. any help at all is good (i would really like a step by step guide on how to do this) thanx

what they mean when they say 'you need a static IP' is that your router needs to keep the same IP always, not the computers in your network. When your router connects you to the internet, it is assigned an ip address from your ISP (internet service provider), the same as your computers (probably) get giving ip's from the router. The way you do it is either ring your ISP and say I want a static IP, and they'll probably charge you a monthly fee for it. OR Goto www.dyndns.org, sign up, download one of the client programs and set it up. Read info on that site about it if you want, too much to explain. it's good tho :)