How to install the Microsoft Loopback Adapter on Windows Vista

Recently I've been trying to figure out how to install the Microsoft Loopback Adapter on Windows Vista since I couldn't find an "Add New Hardware" option for manually installing devices like there was in Windows XP and other legacy versions of Windows. Windows Vista caters to the plug-and-play world which will be great for most users, but it leaves those of us who need to do things like install the Microsoft Loopback Adapter scratching our heads. I finally figured it out, so I wanted to share my learnings here.

The trick is to open the Device Manager and then right-click on the root node of the device tree (which should correspond to your machine name). Then select "Add legacy hardware. " If you're used to the "Add New Hardware" dialog in Windows XP then the rest of the steps (steps 7-11 of this article) will be self-explanatory.

The Microsoft Loopback Adapter is very useful for doing things like getting two VPC's to chat or enabling Internet Connection Sharing with VPC's.