I have a serious problem at the moment, I have two computers, one of which being an absolute dinosaur, no network card, no modem, no USB ports, no CD-ROM drive, nothing really except for a crappy floppy drive. this, is the windows 95 machine. the other, is a brand new Dell system, 512 megs of RAM, decent processor, etc etc.. what I need to do is this : I have some files on the really old computer that must be somehow transferred to the newer one by tomorrow, I don't have a compatible NIC for the old one, so networking that way is out of the question, but...I want to try this direct cable connection thing, but so far every guide I've found is too complicated, even for myself! I'll put it straight. I need a direct cable connection using the serial ports on both computers, I need to access a folder, transfer the files within it, and place it on the other computer. One computer is Windows XP, the other is Windows 95.. How do I do it? (and yes, I've already searched for information within this site, and via google) Oh, and the Dell computer doesn't have a floppy drive either, as usual.

http://www.wown.com/articles_tutorials/dccmain.html The following software will suffice though Parallel Port laplink is required for the first one: http://www.briggsoft.com/lmaven.htm http://www.laplink.com/products/filemover/overview.asp

which do I use? there are many guides, but I'm not sure which one to pick. I've never done a direct cable connection before, so...it's all new to me, I'm not quite sure about the guest/host thing either, could you give me more help?

Just pull the hard drive out of the old machine and simply, temporarily, connect it via the IDE connector on the new machine. If there is not one available then just disconnect the CD drive for the exercise. Transfer your files, return the drive to the older machine and reconnect the CD drive. Regards, Bryan

Bryco, ordinarily, I would agree with you on this, but since the host computer ...is a brand new Dell system... this would probably void the warranty. Stu, have you looked at the Windows Help files? On a Win98 system, the help files are pretty thorough regarding DCC. I'm guessing that they are probably pretty thorough on your new system too, if not on the Win95 system. As previously mentioned, a parallel port connection would be much faster, but if this is a "one-time" file transfer, speed probably isn't much of an issue here. You will need a crossover cable, rather than a normal straight-thru cable. A parallel port crossover cable is available at WalMart for about $10 US. HTH Dave If Wile Coyote had enough money for all that Acme crap, why didn't he just buy dinner?