7th August 2001

Lockergnomaniac Rey Coll submitted an interesting tidbit regarding a built-in DirectX local network chat app. Assuming you have a relatively recent version of DirectX installed, click Start | Run, then enter: "DXDIAG" (sans quotes). Once the tool launches, flip over to the Network tab, then click the "Test DirectPlay" button. Set up a new session by typing in a unique user and session name on one computer, then join that session from another computer by "joining an existing session" and providing the IP address of the remote machine... voila! Chat your heart out. We don't need no stinkin' ICQ! If you've never used this tool before, it was designed to troubleshoot any DirectX snags you may have been running into. If you don't even have this tool, then I'd encourage you to update your DirectX version. As always, make a backup first.