An Idiots Guide to Bridging Halo 2

Bridging in Halo 2 on XBOX Live is the act of giving a friend host by manipulating the system. It can be hard to learn, but with a proper tutorial, it will become easy. There are two ways to bridge. The one I will discuss here is bridging through a router. You can also bridge through a crossover cable, but this is harder, and takes more equiptment. When I learned how to bridge, I didn’t understand the technical terms, so this tutorial is all in layman’s terms. Here it goes:
Is Your Setup Right?:Internet comes out of a hole in the wall. From the hole in the wall, a wire goes into a box. From the box, more wires go out. One wire goes to your computer. Another wire goes to your XBOX. This is the proper setup. If you don’t have this setup, you can’t bridge through a router. But if you do, you can proceed to the next step.
Acquiring & Installing Software:Bridging requires two pieces of software. They are called Cain & Abel and Zone Alarm Pro. Cain is free, but Zone Alarm Pro (or ZAP, for short) costs money, assuming you obtain it legally(but if you look hard enough you can find it free..If not spend the £20.. is a cool firewall anyway..i have used it for ages now on several P.C’s no problem.) First uninstall and existing firewall I.e crappy Norton..(you dont need that crap on yor P.c), Then install ZAP. Follow on-screen instructions, and it’s self explanatory. You will have to restart your computer. Next, install Cain & Abel. If it asks, you DO need to install the packet driver. Now you have all the software. Proceed to the next step.
Setting Up Software:ZAP is self-explanatory, but Cain is harder. To set up Cain, for our purposes, is a detailed proccess. I will guide you through the steps:1) Sign into XBOX Live.2) Open up Cain.3) Press the “Sniffer” tab at the top.4) Press the “Enable Sniffer” button. It is the button directly to the left of the yellow “Poison” button.5) Press the blue cross button.6) A box should appear. Check “All hosts in my subnet” and push “OK”.7) Press the “APR” subtab at the bottom of the screen.8) Click anywhere in the top white box. This will cause the blue plus button to be available.9) Click the blue plus button. A box will pop up.10) Select the top IP address on the left side. More IP addresses will pop up on the right side.11) Highlight all IP addresses on the right side, then click “OK.”12) IP addresses should appear, and they should be “Idle.”13) Highlight all IP addresses that appear, and click the yellow “Poison” button in the top left corner.14) Status shoud change from “Idle” to “Poisoning.” Then, IP addresses should slowly start popping up in the bottom window.15) If all you followed the above steps, you are ready to start bridging.
Bridging Host:1) Find the person who you want to bridge host. Have him go create a party by himself. This is VERY IMPORTANT.2) Join his party.3) Go to Zone Alarm Pro and click the “Firewall” tab on the left.4) Click the “Zones” tab at the top right.5) Click the “Add” button at the bottom right, and select “IP address.”6) Add Bungie’s IP address. It should show up in Cain, and it is currently 65.59.234.161. Put it in your trusted zone and name it “Bungie”. Always keep this in your trusted zone, and you will only have to do this step once.7) Now find the IP address of the person you are giving host. Use Cain, and ask him to go to www.ipmonkey.com if you are not sure which IP is his. When you find out his IP, add it to your trusted zone the same way you added Bungie’s IP in step 6.8) Click “Apply” in the bottom right hand corner.9) Go to the “Main” tab at the top right, and then set your “Internet” firewall to “High” and your “Trusted” to “Medium.”10) Have your friend start the game. He will get host, automatically! If you did everything right, you will get empty boxes in the MatchMaking screen at Step 2, and you will never join someone else’s game, you will create your own and wait for other “NOOBS” to join it.
If you cant get this right give up and take up Knitting……

Ksi Nitro