Sorry about the title, I couldn't think of any other attention-grabbing titles.

I forgot to ask, is it possible to use a USB data-transfer cable to use the laptop (running Linux) to access the bad WinXP desktop? The instructions for the data cable say to create a name for the desktop and the laptop, and then to access the remote computer via a link in My Computer. But I don't remember if there were any data-transfer drivers for Linux. I will search and try to find one.

Thanks for your advice.