Consider the woes of the poor Win98 machine, with its two NICs. You say those NICs are on 192.168.0.2 and 192.168.0.5, both with netmask 255.255.255.0. That netmask says to Win98 "anything starting with 192.168.0, send it through this interface".

Oh, I didn't know that. I'm not that educated when it comes to networks. I've always wondered what that subnetmask did.

The solutions to this problem are either (a) ditch Win98's second NIC and buy a hub like the Good Lord intended, or (b) give your mini-LAN between the Empeg and Win98 a different collection of IP addresses, say 192.168.1.1 and 192.168.1.2. But option (b) means you'll have to muck about with routes if you want the Win2000 machine to see the Empeg, so on the whole I'd go for option (a).

I may buy a hub in the future, but I don't see the need for it now. It was never my intention to access the empeg via the win2000 machine, so I don't care about that. (all my mp3's are on a backup hd in the 2000 machine too, so I can always play them if I want to). Emplode is installed on the '98 machine.
When I get to it, I'll probably buy a router AND a hub, because I'd like to split my broadband internet over my two pc's. But since a router costs a lot more than a hub, and since I've just bought my Empeg, it has to stop somewhere.

BTW, I've tried you b) suggestion and it works. Yay! Thanks a lot!

Also thanks tms13 for your link about the faulty manual. I had never never read that post before because I haven't been here around that long yet.