How do I set up two separate networks that share an internet connections?

Question

I am trying to set up a network for my girlfriend's law office. The office consists of her, her partners and several unassociated attorneys that rent space.

She wants a network where she and her partners can access each other's computers, but none of the other attorneys can, but, their DSL must still provide internet connection to the whole office.

I'm a SQL programmer, not a network engineer, so I'm not quite sure how to accomplish this. It seems like it should be pretty simple?

Thanks.

P.S. Their network would be peer-to-peer, and there is no PDC.

P.P.S. I would prefer a hardware based solution.

Some people are saying "stack two routers." Does this mean plug in a separate router into the main router and run all the partners' stuff through that, and everyone else's through the main router?

And in that case would machines coming off the secondary router still use the primary router's DHCP?

Answer 1

They can all be in the same network. All you have to do is controll access to resources on each computer. Because it's peer to peer it's not easy to administer the rights and priviledges but here's something you can try.

Make a shared folder on her and her partners' computers and create an account on those computer and maybe call it "privateaccess" and only give password out to people who are suppose to have access to it and not to the attorney's. When someone tries to access that shared folder it will ask for a login name and a password. If they don't know the password, access will be denied.

Hardware Solution: Internet connection connected to a router and another router connected to that router. The router nested inside the other router should use a different subnet. i.e. if the first one uses 192.168.0.x then you should use 192.168.1.x for the other next work, but even with this solution you STILL need to setup rights with the windows system as described above but this will effectively separate the two networks. In my opinion the hardware solution is not necessary.

Routers typically have 2 IPs, internal and external. The nested router will be assigned an IP in the first network's subnet by the DHCP server maybe 192.168.0.5 or something similiar, but all the computers connected to the second router will see the router as 192.168.1.1 or something similiar on a different subnet.

Answer 2

Put all the computers into one workgroup with access to the Internet.
Go to the partners computer and right click on what they want to share (the whole drive are a single folder)
Select sharing and security
In the middle of the window, where they check that they want to share the folder, is a link to "Learn more about sharing and security"
Click on that and it will take them to a wizard where they can limited access to the shared drive or folder to only certain people.
Repeat the process on the other PC.

Answer 3

a router with two lan interface should be fine. put ur gf and attorneys in different subnets. otherwise go for a cllient server setup. put them in different domains. use a proxy server which gives nice domain specific control.

Answer 4

Router like linkys put the main rounder then the other

Answer 5

Stack two routers.

Yes like you said.