reformat + linksys router

Hey!
A background story might help to start:
Our desktop is about 5 years old (my dad mostly uses) but it was amazingly slow so I did a reformat to it a few days ago. While I was adding my dad's favorites back onto it, I noticed that some of the larger web pages had problems loading. I installed the cd's for the modem (we have cox cable as our isp) and router. The modem is a terayon tj715x. The router is a linksys wrt54g. While I was using the internet on both computers, it stopped working all the sudden so I shut everything down, unplugged all the cables to them, plugged them back in and powered up my computer and the desktop. Both seem to be working alright now but I do have two questions...

1. On the front of the router, it has a display ( http://techrepublic.com.com/2346-1035_11-62182.html ) with 4 lights that I thought were supposed to light up for every device connected to it. When both computers are on and browsing, only one light lights up.

2. My second question is if both computers are supposed to have the same IP. I'm thinking yes because same source of internet but something I was reading made me question that.

Thanks!

 

Only if they're both connected through ethernet. I'm guessing the second computer is wireless.

The local IP's will be different (192.168.1.2 etc) but the public IP address will be the same ( Check your IP here)

 

The second computer is a wireless one.
Does that website give the local or public? There the some on both so I assume it's public?
On my machine (vista) ipconfig gives me ipv4 address: 192.168.1.102
The other machine (xp) gives an IP address of 192.168.1.100
If I use my laptop and try to ping the desktop ip, it times out. Am I looking at the wrong field?

 

Yes, it's your public IP.

No, you're looking at the right field. Not sure why it's timing out (maybe a firewall?)

 

I disabled the firewall and tried again. On the desktop I can ping 192.168.1.100 and 192.168.1.102. The only difference in time is 1ms on the maximum so I think that one is the desktop itself and the other is the laptop. So unless I have any other problems, I guess everything is working alright.
Thanks!

EDIT: Using speedtest.net, there is a 6 Mb/s difference between the old desktop and my laptop (9.19 vs 3.00 Mb/s). Would the dated hardware in the desktop make a difference in the internet speed?

 

The reason you cannot ping the desktop from the laptop is that a firewall is likely blocking icmp packets.

As for the variance in speed,,,,which one is going slower?

 

The 5 year old desktop is going slower but I didn't think the hardware would affect the internet speed