Using Laptop as Wireless Card for Desktop

I have a custom-built desktop and an HP Pavilion dv9408nr with Windows Vista Ultimate x64 installed on BOTH computers.

I have absolutely NO money at the moment, so I thought I'd be clever.

My laptop is connected to my NETGEAR router wirelessly. It's able to connect to the internet and LAN with full speed. My desktop is right next to it, with a crossover cable connecting the laptop and the desktop. I then created a bridge on the laptop between the wireless (router) connection and the wired (laptop -- desktop) connection.

When I did this at first, it worked marvilously. No problems, full 12Mbps (megabits) on the DESKTOP through the laptop. Speeds vary with broadband. But not as much as what seems to happen occasionally:

I haven't TOUCHED the laptop, but on occasion, I lose connection to the internet on the desktop. Also, if I take the laptop upstairs for a moment and then bring it back down and hook it back up, it works, but really really slowly. The laptop gets full speed connection, the desktop downloads at MAYBE 2KB/sec (kilobytes) per file if that. Browsing the web, however, doesn't seem too bad.

I tried Internet Connection Sharing, but the desktop was unable to connect to the internet using ICS. If anyone knows of a solution or a better way to do this, I'd really REALLY like to hear it because, like I said, it works SOMETIMES.

I think I fixed the problem.

After posting, I tried:

Restarting the desktop - no effect
Restarting the router - no effect

Then looked on the laptop at the status of the network bridge and the wired connection (laptop -- desktop). The wired was reporting "10mbps" and the bridge reported "24mbps" which did not look good enough to me at all. These are both gigabit cards!

The problem was the crossover cable. Guess maybe the fact that it's a crossover cable should've been a clue as to why it's not getting full throughput. And it has crimps in it from folding, as well as the clasps that hold it into the network ports were broken off.

I got out my NETGEAR 100Mbit switch, and my two faithful patch cables, and now I am seeing the difference. I know there is some speed limits due to the overhead of going through the laptop, but 2kilobytes per second is ridiculous.

If anyone has any other ideas as to what may have caused this problem, it's probably a good idea to share them, so other people can see.