[popper]

if your setting up your first LAN network today, its always a good thing to think about the longer term and buy the faster kit from day one, that way you can maximise your copying from machine to machine speed/time.

with that in mind, a router that can do 1gigabit is a good investment today, as is the new pre-11N wireless routers.

although even the old 10/100 cheapo kit the local salesmen/woman are desperate to push off the shelves to make room for the better/faster kit will work to some degree, not that good for maxing out the 20Mbit web though or maxing machine to machine filecopy for that matter.

its should be relativly simple to get going if you can get the basics in your head, they are connected something like this.
VM-cableModem<===>(wireless)router-wan-port
router LAN port1 (through whatever it has)<===>PC1
router LAN port2 <===>PC2, etc or
Wireless connection<--->PC1-wireless card etc.

treat the router as the first and only machine connected directly to the WAN port, and if its any reasonble kit it will auto set for DHCP and get its Webside IP of the VM cable modem if you powerup as usual, CM, then the router.

then you should be getting your LAN side IP No.s off the LAN side of the router in auto mode and you can connect as usual to a webpage.

to change the defaults in the (wireless)router you would connect to its internal mini webserver on its default IP (something like 192.168.1.1) see the routers PDF file to tell you its default IP etc.

if all goes well you shuldnt have to many problems if the VM IP servers are happy to give the new router its IP after seeing the MAC on the line.

<===> =straight through rj45 cable
<=X=> =crossover/X=over rj45 cable
<---> = wireless connection to the PCs/devices wireless card