Wired networking not connecting in Fedora 12 with Windows Internet Connection Sharing
 

Please let me start off by saying that I am in no way trying to utilize Samba. I just want to use Internet Connection Sharing (ICS) to connect to the internet. I have done a massive amount of troubleshooting, but some of it seems to contradict itself, and the only two things that I know for sure are that it used to work, and that my Ethernet cable is not the problem. When I use Terminal utilities like ifup and dhclient it seems that it can not determine IP information, but when I try to put it in manually, the "Apply" button grays out right after I finish typing it in. When I try to connect normally, in KDE or GNOME, the icon acts like it's connecting, then instead of having the connected icon, I receive a notification that "the network has been disconnected", and it goes back to the disconnected icon.
Oh, and by the way, I know that I could probably find a workaround, but I have limited resources, and this used to work. The Linux is a Dell desktop with Fedora 12 and the Windows is a Windows 7 HP laptop.
EDIT: I hope that I didn't mess something up, but I accidentally used system-network-config to try putting in the IP address there, and ended up changing it back to the original settings, but the computer is now calling it Auto Ethernet in the taskbar icon, although sudo iwconfig in the terminal still calls it eth0.

first think about installing fedora 14

there has been NO SUPPORT for 12 since Dec 2 2010
There also will never be any support for 12 it is "End Of Life "
No security updates , NO nothing
but if you MUST use an non supported version
see:"EOL (End Of Life) Versions "
http://forums.fedoraforum.org/forumdisplay.php?f=75

OK, but if I install it with a CD, than will it fix the internet problem?