laptop connecting to pc???

Really easy one this guys (i think). Basically i need to do some work on a friends laptop but they have stuff on it they want to keep. The problem is the cd rom drive is busted so i cant ghost it and the amount of data they need to save is a couple of GB in size and i dont have a flash drive. SOOOOOO is there anyway of connecting the laptop to my pc so i can ghost it to there??? or a least so i can copy all the relevant stuff off? 1. is it easy to do and 2. what equipment do i need to do it. 3 where can i get the leads etc from?? I know this is probably stupidly easy but ive never had to do it before., thanks

have both got a network card? If so, a crossover cable between the two should sort it, even better if its a relatively new pc (intel after 855 ish, nforce3/4) in which case you can use a standard patch lead. Failing that you can get usb file transfer cables, but ive never used one, so i dont know how good they are.

Cheers for that, My PC is pretty new Nforce 4 board, but the laptop is pretty old still running windows ME i think - one of the reasons its such a pain to do!

Then you have no issues i dont think, assuming it has a network connection, a normal patch lead should work fine.