🚀 go-pugleaf

I'm not convinced that wizards are a good thing.

My father-in-law got a new e-machine (with XP) to replace his old one
(98). He lives right next door so I went out and bought a Linksys
WRT54GS Wireless-G Broadband Router with SpeedBooster for my network
and an adapter for his new pc. I figured he could share our web browser
and back up files on my network. However, I'm having trouble getting
his new computer connected to the internet.

Word, Windows Explorer, and Juno (email) are the only programs he uses.
He has dialed in to Juno for many years now and does not want to change
his email program. A few years ago he also added internet capability
through his Juno dial-up connection.

When I first connected all the hardware and ran all the wizards I could
find the LAN worked, however, trying to connect to the internet using
IE caused a pop-up to appear asking if I wanted to dial in. I knew this
had to do with the dial-up setting for Juno but after muddling my way
through more wizards it actually began to work. I could dial-in with
Juno and access the internet through the wirelss LAN.

Then I messed it all up. I figured I could connect his new computer to
his old one so he could share files and printers between them. I
don't want to get into all the problems I had attempting this but the
result was that inserting a cable in the NIC port of his new pc and
running more wizards caused a bunch of settings to change. Now that the
cable has been removed and the thought of networking his pc's
forgotten it seems no amount of wizardry will return the settings to
what they were before. I can get him connected to my LAN okay but not
to the internet.

Can anyone tell me what steps I should take to perform a configuration
of this pc without using any wizards? Are wizards necessary? Any help
would be greatly appreciated.