Hello, in my Office (2 people, 3 PC's) we have a machine running XP Professional which we use as a file server. (Other PC's in the office have S: mapped to a folder on the server). I'd like the S: to be accessible in the same way from my home PC. Am I right to use VPN for this? If so are there any special requirements I need or can I just do this using XP prof's VPN tools in Network Connections? Both the office and home have a Netgear DG834 Router and fixed IP. I've had a go setting it up locally on my home network, but I just get a 733 error... Thank you for any help you can give me, James

If the VPN connection available on the XP Pro box is PPTP, then you need to enable it first. Then you need to setup your router to port forward TCP 1723 to the internal IP address of the XP Pro box. You may also have to setup security credentials, usernames and passwords on the server for remote users to use as logins. Once the connection is made from a remote location, you can make a connection to the server by clicking Start -> Run -> \\<ip address of server>. You will then see all of the shared items. From there you can map drives, etc.

To accept incoming VPN connections on an XP machine, I believe you must enable Internet Connection Sharing on, and from my experience, ICS is problematic. If you want something that is reliable, I would suggest either purchasing a VPN router, or you can easily turn an old machine into a firewall/router with VPN capability... www.ipcop.org "How many squirrels had to die to make you look fly?!"

Yup, I agree - ICS seems very problematic. Would I also need two network cards to get this working? My Netgear Router has a VPN setup wizard, but i'm completely out of my depth with it. (The windows one looked so simple at first glance!) If anyone could recommend a VPN setup guide for my router i'd be very grateful. Does anyone know if the windows VPN connection will allow me to connect to my routers VPN? Thanks for your help so far!

AFAIK, your modem/router doesn't feature a VPN server. It has VPN passthrough, which means it allows VPN connections to be made through it but cannot establish or maintain VPN connections itself. Some Netgear home models only allow a single VPN passthrough; some can handle multiple connections. "If it ain't broke, upgrade anyway."