After a cross-country trip in which I was unable to link up my laptop
because I had no wireless capability, and the hotels and airport lounges
(and even bookstores) all seemed to wireless-network-enabled, I am
considering the purchase of a wireless-network adaptor to plug into one of
my laptop's USB ports.

Any suggestions/warnings/stories?

Richard Henry wrote:

> After a cross-country trip in which I was unable to link up my laptop
> because I had no wireless capability, and the hotels and airport lounges
> (and even bookstores) all seemed to wireless-network-enabled, I am
> considering the purchase of a wireless-network adaptor to plug into one of
> my laptop's USB ports.
> 
> Any suggestions/warnings/stories?

I found on a recent trip to the US and Canada, I was far better off getting a 
roaming CRIC dial in account. It costs about $4USD an hour to operate, plus the 
price of a local call from your hotel room. This is a world wide service.

The wireless enabled hot spots generally want you to feed in credit card details 
to gain connection at about $10 an hour, and each airport seems to have 
different vendors.

Qantas lounges give you a free local call phone line, which is very handy. I 
assume most of the others do this also.

I only got to use my wireless connection once, which was at a Niagra Falls 
hotel, and is a free service. Just needed to call reception for a username and 
password.

This was after spending $15 on hotel local phone calls to find out that Niagra 
falls has different dial in numbers for GRIC roaming, as it borders on the US 
and CA, and I was hearing little old ladies answering my modem. After ringing 
reception for a bit of directory assistance, they asked me why I didn't use 
their free service. :-)

If getting email is mandatory during traveling, I feel hotspots need a lot more 
development before you can go without a global or national dial in account. Give 
it another year or two.


Don...


-- 
Don McKenzie
E-Mail Contact Page:       http://www.e-dotcom.com/ecp.php?un=Dontronics

RS-232 to VGA. Many resolutions http://www.dontronics.com/micro-vga.html
USB to RS232 Converter that works http://www.dontronics.com/usb_232.html

In article <3jo8q2Fqqe28U1@individual.net>, rphenry@home.com says...
> After a cross-country trip in which I was unable to link up my laptop
> because I had no wireless capability, and the hotels and airport lounges
> (and even bookstores) all seemed to wireless-network-enabled, I am
> considering the purchase of a wireless-network adaptor to plug into one of
> my laptop's USB ports.
> 
> Any suggestions/warnings/stories?

If you have the slot, get a PCMCIA wireless card instead.  They 
generally use less power, have better throughput, plus one less cable.
They tend to behave better when your laptop goes to sleep, also.

--Gene