Changing location of favorites

I have a laptop (IBM Thinkpad) and frequently use it at home and when
I do I want to change the location of the favorites as well as my
documents to point to those directories on the server in my house. I
have had two computers in my house for quite awhile and have been
doing this for my 2nd computer. The program I have been using is
TweakUI for Windows XP off of Microsoft's web site which has a place
that can be used to change these locations. I don't want to do it
permanently since when I'm on the road I will be copying important
files to the laptop and using that location.
The problem I had with my 2nd desktop computer for quite some time is
if you ever try to go into Internet Explorer while the server computer
is down it loses the location of the favorites and defaults back to
itself, not the server. I can of course reset this. I have never had
this probelm at other times so it's very uncommon and I don't have
this problem with the My Documents folder.
The problem I have with the laptop is it's very frequent with the
Favorites folder. The only thing I can think of is at bootup it takes
around 10 seconds. It seems to maybe default back to itself during
this time but yet I have been careful not to try to open Internet
Explorer until it has detected and logged onto the local wi-fi network
in my house (this wi-fi is only used for the laptop, the 2nd desktop
is wired). Any idea what is causing this and if I can fix it? Is it
another program I could use instead to change these locations?