20th December 2000

I didn't get into home networking until recently; before last year, I had no need for it. There are a plethora of products available to make the process pure and simple. Right! Proxies, promises, and... inevitable problems. Here's a handy tip for ME... er, you? I just found out that Millennium Edition users may not have Universal Plug and Play turned on (which enables peer-to-peer Plug and Play functionality for network devices). From the Control Panel, open the "Add/Remove Programs" applet. Flip to the "Windows Setup" tab, select the "Communications" option, then press the "Details" button. Be sure there's a checkmark in the "Universal Plug and Play" box. Keep pressing the "OK" buttons to back out of the property pages, and then Windows should install the component. This doesn't stop me from recommending Windows 2000 and a hardware firewall for the most secure (and trouble-free) networking solution. For more information on this "hidden" feature, check out Microsoft Knowledge Base article Q262458.