Category: wifi

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WiFi, wot WiFi?

One of the real benefits of running Froyo (and now Gingerbread) on my Google Nexus One has been the facility to use it as a portable wifi hotspot. Despite often been in locations with free wifi, more often I have reverted to the Nexus One as the quality of the free wifi connection has left a lot be desired.

The other day for example I was in my local Costa coffee shop which has free wifi for customers.

It seems to take ages for my non-3G iPad to connect to the wifi and an age for the wifi login screen to come up. You have to create an account (which means I need to remember that account), you then need to enter your credentials and the “code” you are given when you bought the coffee. By which time you have drunk the coffee… The connection isn’t that good either, sometimes a little flaky, and if the connection drops, you need to go through the process again. So if I am rushed for time, I will probably use my Nexus One and turn on the wifi hotspot feature whilst I am queing for coffee, so that when I sit down it is up and running and my iPad will connect automatically. Now I know you could say, why didn’t you get a 3G iPad then you wouldn’t need this, well in reply I would say that I was already paying for 3G on the Nexus One and why would I want to spend more money on another 3G connection? I have a legacy T-Mobile Web’n’Walk Plus account that allows me to use my phone as a modem (or as I can now as a wireless hotspot).

Another time I do use it is at conferences. Most conferences I attend now actually have had decent wifi so haven’t had to worry… however recently at a conference in Harrogate, the conference wifi, which though free, would normally cost £4 per hour, was somewhat flaky, basically I don’t think it could cope with the number of delegates who had multiple wifi devices, iPads, phones and laptops.

Not quite full #uksg

As a result I got a better connection from the Nexus One than I did with the conference wifi. This is something I have written about before on my e-Learning blog. That though was written in 2007, here we are four years later, the iPhone has proved quite popular, we now see more smartphones with wifi and there is of course the iPad.

You would think that conference venues would know that decent robust scalable wifi is not just an extra these days, but a standard requirement for events.

Till that happens, I am pleased I can continue to get my own wifi through the Google Nexus One.

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No more wifi

An interesting article from LA about how some coffee shops are not just getting rid of free wifi, they are getting rid of wifi full stop!

Coffee shops were the retail pioneers of Wi-Fi, flipping the switch to lure customers. But now some owners are pulling the plug. They’re finding that Wi-Fi freeloaders who camp out all day nursing a single cup of coffee are a drain on the bottom line. Others want to preserve a friendly vibe and keep their establishments from turning into “Matrix”-like zombie shacks where people type and don’t talk.

I do like to go to coffee shops and have been known to use the wifi. I agree though that sometimes you go into some coffee shops and everyone is huddled behind their laptops using Facebook or similar. Coffee is about the conversation.

Photo source.

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O2 WiFI Authorisation Error

One of the reasons I like the iPhone (and my O2 contract) is that it gives you free wifi access when you are in the vicinity of a wifi hotspot.

From O2

You can use Wi-Fi at home or in your office if you have it, or at any of BT Openzone and The Cloud’s hotspots.

This has the potential to be really useful, especially with data limits when using 3G.

The problem is too often these days this happens.

So what’s the solution. Well you have to revert to 3G.

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How many wireless networks do you need?

Both the iPhone 4 and the iPad can connect to the faster 802.11n networks, but it is not as clear cut as that.

Whilst the iPad can connect to a 5GHz 802.11n wireless network the iPhone 4 can only connect to an 802.11n wireless networking using 2.4GHz.

Whilst that is much faster than connecting to an 802.11g network one reason for having a 5GHz is to avoid the often crowded 2.4GHz spectrum as the rest of the world has discovered the advantages of wireless networking.

So if you if you only have a single 802.11n wireless network you will need to ensure it is either running at 2.4GHz or add a new network just for the iPhone, which is a little bit over the top.

I can see myself adding a 2.4GHz 802.11n network for my new iPhone 4 in the main so I can stream video over my network using the AirVideo App.

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The end of free wifi

So it’s looking like that we may see the end of free wifi with no strings attached.

Ofcom is warning providers of free wifi that they will be held liable for the actions of anyone connecting to their network.

I don’t think this will mean the end if free wifi as such, but certainly the free wifi with no strings will go. Free wifi providers will need to ensure that not only do users of their network know what the consequences of what they do on the free wifi, but they will need to provide personal details or even credit card information.

It’s a pity that the majority have to suffer the consequences of the actions of a very small minority.

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Wi-fi owner fined for lax security in Germany

BBC reports on a court ruling from Germany.

German citizens are responsible for the security of their own private wireless connections, a court has ruled.

The ruling comes after a musician sued the owner of a network connection that had been used to illegally download and file-share music.

The owner had proof that the householder was on holiday at the time but the court ruled that the network should have been password-protected.

Is your wifi protected from others misusing it?

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Eye-Fi, oops


Virtually every digital camera I have bought has been a Sony and therefore I have almost always used Memory Stick. My first digtial camera was a HP PhotoSmart that used a proprietary memory card format, all the Canon DSLRs I have used have used Compact Flash.

I recently got a Kodak Zi8 and this uses SD cards, so as a result I was tempted to get an Eye-Fi, as I really quite liked the idea of uploading my images automatically.

I was in the Apple Store a couple of days ago and saw the Eye-Fi Geo, a 2GB SD Card with wifi capability that can also geo tag your photographs. Whilst I was in the store I did do a price check; I always think it’s nice that Apple have full internet access on their computers. The price was good so on an impulse I bought it.

I have now regretted that decision.

The main reason is that I didn’t check camera compatability and the Kodak Zi8 is not compatible.

So it doesn’t work!

Other reason, is that it only shares with my computer over wifi, it doesn’t automatically upload to Flickr or other photo sharing site, you need to pay $9.99 a year for that. That I didn’t mind as the Eye-Fi with that included was about £30 more, however the site assumes that you are only in the US or Canada!

So…

I should have done some more online research.

I should have checked camera compatability.

I shouldn’t have bought it!

So deciding whether to sell it, or sell the Zi8 and buy a new digital camera that uses a SD card.

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Printing from your iPhone

So the iPhone has a really nice camera…

Okay so the iPhone has a camera! It doesn’t take bad photographs and ascamera phones go it ain’t bad!

Now with the Nokia N95 which does have a very nice camera, 5MP compared to the iPhone’s 3MP, and a Carl Zeiss lense, it is relatively simple to print images from the phone without needing to dump the photographs first onto a computer. I have printed the images via Bluetooth and USB.

With the iPhone it has been a little more challenging.

I first saw hope with the HP iPrint Photo (iTunes link) however your HP printer needs to be connected to a wifi network. Alas my A618 Photo Printer which is excellent for printing photographs, is not wifi capable; it does memory cards, USB and Bluetooth, but not wifi.

I then heard about the Canon Easy-Photo Print for iPhone (iTunes link) and as the owner of the wifi capable MP600r I thought ah ha a way of printing from my iPhone.

IMG_0242

Alas the application only works with the Pixma MP990, MP640 and MP560. As a result it couldn’t find my printer.

IMG_0241

Of course I am not going to change my printer so I can print from my iPhone.

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MiFi

So you want to be connected to the internet on the move? Or you need connectivity at a conference without wifi?

Yes you could get a 3G USB dongle or stick, but that only allows a single computer to connect.

What happens if you also want to connect your mobile device, a second laptop, what happens if there is more than one person and only one dongle?

In the past the solution I used was Joikuspot which was an application which ran on my Nokia N95 phone. It acted as a wireless access point, it connected to the internet via 3G and then shared that connection over the phone’s wifi connection with other devices. It was a very clever technology which made life easier for me. There were a few downsides, the main was battery life, it drained battery from the N95 really fast, so was only useful for an hour or two or when the phone was plugged into the mains. Of course this meant that I couldn’t use the N95 as a phone, as the battery would be drained. Another problem I had was with devices such as the Nokia N810 and Sony PSP which would not connect to the Joikuspot wireless network. The reason was a limitation in the Symbian software which meant that the phone acted in ad-hoc mode for wireless rather than infrastructure. The N810 and PSP had issues with connecting to an ad-hoc network. It did however work fine with the iPod touch which was how I mainly used it.

I was very interested to hear from Andy Ihnatko on MacBreak Weekly about the MiFi. A battery powered 3G wireless router. Using a 3G SIM it would connect to the internet and then allow  up to five wireless clients to connect and share that 3G connection. With a four hour battery life, could be charged via USB and about the size of a credit card, it seemed ideal. Of course I didn’t expect to see it in the UK, probably only available in the US on Verizon or Sprint…

I did an internet search (as you do) and found it on sale at Expansys (without a contract). Ordered and delivered.

Using a SIM from a Vodafone 3G USB dongle it was  very simple to set up and configure and I would recommend that you use the details from Ross Barkman’s excellent website on connection settings for GPRS/3G to save having to work out where the information is on your providers’ website.

You can configure it wirelessly, and the first things I did was rename the wireless network and add WPA2 security.

Once configured it is simply a matter of turning it on, waiting for it to connect and then connect your laptop (or other device) to the wireless network.

It works very well and felt faster than using the USB dongle!

One problem I have had is the MacBook Pro losing the wireless connection and being unable to re-connect with the result the only solution was to reboot the MiFi. I am now trying just WPA as I think it is a MacBook Pro wireless issue rather than a MiFi issue. Or it could be an issue with the fact I was on a train!

I do like the MiFi and it does what it says on the tin.