I'm replying to the subject of networking. The question of security (either confidentiality or the intimate details of the RJ45 connector) never occurred to me. I'm still struggling with the transfer of data down the RJ45 cable. So far, I have only managed to connect my Onet+ to the internet via public WiFy or my Win XP desktop PC using a crossover RJ45 cable
My comments about the security of the RJ-45 connector were only about it's physically staying connected. With a different cable, it's not being a problem.
If you have to connect to your WinXP computer with a network cable (straight or X/Over shouldn't matter for modern network cards which will automatically detect what cable is being used), then presumably you have two network cards in that machine, with the other card connecting your desktop to the modem/router.
Or do you have one of those fake USB modem things?
How many network ports does your router have? Can't you run a cable into the router directly?
(I must admit that I've forgotten most of what I learned about this stuff - I wired the house in CAT-5 nearly a decade ago and have now forgotten what the alternatives were then. It was a big choice to go for CAT-5 cable instead of co-axial, but for once in my life I got the technical decision right. Anyone want a Sun portable, or a VL-bus video card? RLL hard drive controller?)
However, I infer from the Elonex user manual (and from some of the posts in this thread) that internet connection is possible without using my desktop as a gateway. How do you do it guys?
Well, I just unplugged the cable from the back of the wife's laptop (which was surfing last night ; I can't remember if it's Win2K or Unix this week) and plugged it into the back of the Elonex. I can ping machines on my network (well, on the network that the cable is connected to ; I have a physically separate network, but that runs on different wires in the same floorspaces) and I can browse to the web pages for devices inside my network. But for some reason within the Elonex I can't see beyond the router. Which tells me that I've fsck'd up the network configuration on the Elonex.
Unless you've broken things in exactly the same way that I have, once you plug the network cable in, the Elonex and your DHCP server (on your router, most likely, including the WinXP box if that's acting as a gateway and DHCP server) will communicate and your Elonex should acquire a network address. After that, you're on the network, with the access to the Internet that your network configuration and gateway rules permit.
Damn it - more things to sort out. In addition to the 5.25" floppy data recovery and 74 other things.