# Trying to bridge a wireless connection

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trying-to-bridge-a-wireless-connection/363592>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [July 8, 2006, 3:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trying-to-bridge-a-wireless-connection/363592 "2006-07-08T03:22:08Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![bouv](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bc8723/32.png) [@bouv](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bouv)\
**Post date:** [July 8, 2006, 3:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trying-to-bridge-a-wireless-connection/363592/1 "2006-07-08T03:22:08Z")

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OK, so I got my desktop back up and running, but it’s in a room far away from my wireless router, so I can’t run an ethernet cable to it. However, I do have a laptop with a wireless card (how I’m connecting right now,) as well as a hardwire ethernet port. I was told I could easily use the laptop to connect my dekstop to the internet by bridging the connections in the network control panel. I connected the two computers using a crossover cable (as I was told to do,) and when I did that the ‘local area connection’ appeared in the taskbar and tried to get an ip or something on both PCs. It didn’t get any address, but I figured ‘eh’. I go to my laptop network connections, click on both the network connections, and tell them to bridge. When it does that, a new network is created (the bridge), and when it finishes, all three networks (the wireless, the hardwire LAN, and the bridge) have little red X’s and are connected to nothing. I can’t even get the already existing, and previously working, wireless on the laptop to connect, until I cancel the bridge and then it works fine.

So what am I doing wrong? Should I use regular ethernet cablr and not a crossover? Do I need to fiddle faddle with the network properties some more?

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**Author:** ![xash](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/c6cbf5/32.png) [@xash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/xash)\
**Post date:** [July 8, 2006, 9:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trying-to-bridge-a-wireless-connection/363592/2 "2006-07-08T09:34:51Z")

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What OS do you have on the laptop and PC? Also, please list all IP addresses and subnets on your network.

Cross-over cable is correct.

You would probably need to enable Internet Connection Sharing on the laptop’s wireless network connection. Go to Network Connections, select the wireless network connection, right click - go to Properties/Advanced, select Internet Connection Sharing “Allow other network users to connect through this computer’s Internet connection”.

After enabling Internet Connection Sharing, try bridging the connections.

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**Author:** ![bouv](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bc8723/32.png) [@bouv](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bouv)\
**Post date:** [July 8, 2006, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trying-to-bridge-a-wireless-connection/363592/3 "2006-07-08T14:53:53Z")

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OK, turns out all I needed to do was activate the ‘internet connection sharing.’ No need to bridge at all (and in fact it wouldn’t let me bridge.)

Thanks for the help.