Need a "NEWBIE" question answered!
 

Hey Everyone-
This is my first post. For the past few days I have been checking out the N800. Looking for something I can use at work. (3rd shift at the local hospital). I am currently using my son's laptop but he wants it back so I started checkng out the N800.

We have a public hotspot at the hospital and have no problem picking it up with the laptop.

My question is:

Will I have any problems picking up the public hotspot with the N800.
Is the strength of the WIFI for the N800 just as powerful as a laptop.

I tried it once with my son's DS (he has the web browser) but the signal strength was aweful and I could not connect. I just want to make sure that the N800 has the power to pick up the WIFI, thats the whole purpose of the purchase. To surf the web, check e-mail and read the news.

Anyways, I am glad I found this forum, great info and an awesome "newbie" section.

Once again, thanks!

Re: Need a "NEWBIE" question answered!
 

I can safely say this device has a very impressive Wifi capabilties. It picks up almost twice as many signals as my laptop.

Hope that helps

Re: Need a "NEWBIE" question answered!
 

I agree. When I got my N800, I started picking up hot spots wherever I went. I'll enter my apartment complex and before I get to my parking spot, my N800's mnotify will "CHING" connected perhaps 60'-80' away from my Linksys 802.11b router inside my apartment (that always brings a smile to my face). When I visit my brother's house the N800 automatically connects to some neighbor's wi-fi that my laptop barely registers if at all. At work I can connect to a public hotspot from the business next door that none of my coworkers can get in (I can listen to streaming radio at work now).

Re: Need a "NEWBIE" question answered!
 

thanks for the responses, looks like the n800 will be just what I need!

Re: Need a "NEWBIE" question answered!
 

I agree too, my N800 was picking up a signal in the same place as my friend's P990 couldn't.

Re: Need a "NEWBIE" question answered!
 

agree here to. This is something nokia got extremely well in the n800. I pick signals at home and at work that I never knew they were there before. even with my laptop that has a pretty good wi-fi card I cannot see/use so many hotspots.

Re: Need a "NEWBIE" question answered!
 

Yes, the N800 is very very good at picking up wi-fi signals. It picks up more networks than any smartphone I've used, and it easily matches my laptop as well.

Re: Need a "NEWBIE" question answered!
 

Once again, many thanks-
just ordered me my N800!!

Re: Need a "NEWBIE" question answered!
 

Beats my laptop, too.

Re: Need a "NEWBIE" question answered!
 

You'll love it. I'm a hospital worker as well, and it picks up our public hotspot jes' fine. Better than my old Zaurus SL C860 handheld, in fact.

Re: Need a "NEWBIE" question answered!
 

This thread also seems relevant to your inquiry.

Re: Need a "NEWBIE" question answered!
 

It's has much better wi-fi than my laptop as well.

Re: Need a "NEWBIE" question answered!
 

I am just wondering but how do you guys know if the spots you are getting are free or not?.. I am thinking of getting one but would not want to get in trouble for stealing or what not ...

Re: Need a "NEWBIE" question answered!
 

Free public hotspots are usually include a "HotSpot" in it's label.

Other than that, most wifi routers of individuals are password protected using WEP, WPA, etc. so unless you actively use a hacking tool on the NIT, you won't be able to access them.

Any private wifi routers that are not protected could be considered fair game IMO. Either the owner wants to share the signal or doesn't know how to implement basic security.

Re: Need a "NEWBIE" question answered!
 

AFAIK there's no way to tell, nless the WiFi provider puts up a banner page that says it's free (I don't and yet, my WiFi cloud is free). The whole legislation around this issue is totally f*cked up, with people coming up with bogus analogies of "unlocked front doors" ilk.

Re: Need a "NEWBIE" question answered!
 

The hotspot's name (SSID) is a good place to start. If it's named something like "Anytown Public Library", it's a good bet it's free. If not, you'll know as soon as you connect because it'll ask you to log in. If the network name is something like "SpongeBob Square Pants" (to use an example of someone's network in my apartment complex), it's probably a private network. It may be unsecured, but the legality of using it without permission is ambiguous at best.

Re: Need a "NEWBIE" question answered!
 

Actually trespassing on private property might be a better analogy (obviously it's not equivalent to "breaking and entering" if there's nothing to break). If you needed to step onto someone's private property for a trivial purpose such as retrieving a ball, or just stopping to tie your shoelace, that might technically be trespassing, but obviously not a major concern unless it was repeated abuse. Perhaps unprotected WiFi access could be considered in a similar way. If you access a unprotected WiFi link momentarily to check your email without knowing exactly where it's coming from, that's a trivial trespass that isn't doing any harm to anyone. If you did it all day every day using your neighbour's WiFi instead of getting your own internet access, that might be worth getting annoyed about. If you were using it download massive amounts of warez and porn, that would certainly be criminal trespass.

Re: Need a "NEWBIE" question answered!
 

I'd rather compare it to the right of passage. If you don't want people to trample over your grounds, put up a fence. OTOH, fair use is presumed (and sanctioned! at least where I live): You can't go hiking through a farmer's wheat crops days before the harvest.

I'd like to see this kind of common sense applied to WiFi: If you don't have an unlimited access plan, close up your network; otherwise, let people walk through it. But they, in their turn, aren't allowed to use someone else's free WiFi cloud to P2P 50 terabytes of German Scheisse-pr0n.