[Samba] Samba in a Mac OSX client

[H. Patz]

I'm new so please pardon a repeat as I suspect my question has 
already occurred.  I would really appreciate if someone could clear 
up my confusion or steer me in the right direction with the following:

I want to link together a Mac Titanium powerbook running OSX with a 
PC running Win 2000.

I am under the impression you can do this by connecting them 
physically via ethernet ports.

I am also under the impression that using "Option K" from the Mac 
desktop allows you to type in a syntax (smb://.......) that will let 
you see the PC's shared folders.

I cannot get this to work at all and have seen conflicting recommendations.

Does this only work with OSX server or can it be done as a 'client to 
client' (peer to peer) relationship?

The most frustrating part is that both machines successfully 'ping' 
the other but I just can't get the PC up in the 'Connect' window.

CAN ANYONE HELP ME OUT?

H. Patz