Wifi Living aboard?

[Loafer]

Not necessarily. I've had free wifi at two different long-term moorings over the last 5 years.

Sorry. My reply made the assumption that the OP moves about. I've found nothing as good as a MiFi doodad.

 

BT's wifi is probably fine if you have a BT account. How many CCs have that?

 

Probably very few.

[by'eck]

Sorry. My reply made the assumption that the OP moves about. I've found nothing as good as a MiFi doodad.

 

BT's wifi is probably fine if you have a BT account. How many CCs have that?

 

Probably very few.

 

See post #22.

[Clifford]

There are two different problems being discussd here. 1 How to create a wifi hotspot to connect to the internet via a mobile phone company. 2 How to connect to public wifi from inside a narrowboat.

 

I solved 1. in the same way as lots of other people. Three's One Plan allows my tablets to do unlimited tethering via my smartphone's hotspot.

 

Last weekend, I solved 2. as well. I can now connect to a Marina or pub's wifi, Cloud, FON, etc from inside the boat.

 

Our marina provides a free and fast Wifi. It is broadcast from the marina pub. Boats near the pub can get it easily. Our boat is about a hundred yards away from the pub, with the sharp end pointing straight at it. If we use a tablet or laptop in the well deck, the signal is strong enough to use iplayer for instance. But INSIDE the boat the internet is very slow and keeps dropping out.

 

My first guess at a solution was to use the laptop with a lead to an external wifi aerial. But That was a nonstarter because the laptop doesn't have an aerial socket!

 

So I tried the USB WiFi dongle solution. I hung a dongle from the cratch board, and ran a long usb lead in through through the open door to the laptop. NOTE The dongle is NOT the type that uses a phone sim, just the ordinary dongle that you can buy to connect your PC to your home wifi. PC world and Maplin have loads of different ones.

 

It works perfectly, the dongle just plugs and plays and (under "WiFi2") lists all the wifis it can see. This is the same list that still shows under the original laptop's "WiFi" list, but much stronger. I just picked the marina's wifi from the new list and clicked to connect.

 

If you just want to use your laptop on public wifi, this is all you have to do! If your well deck isn't covered, or if you need to hang the dongle somewhere else to get a good signal (tv aerial?), you can put the dongle in a plastic bag. And for a permanent solution we might run the usb cable through a mushroom or a hole in the bulkhead.

 

What about using tablets to connect to the public wifi?

 

A bit of googling turned up something that surprised me - apparently Windows has a function to turn your LAPTOP into a wifi hotspot. I found the instructions all over the web. It took me a little while to make it work, because most of the posters seemed to have copied from each other and duplicated one wrong step. But I found the right version in the end, and the process is fairly short and almost straightforward.

 

With the laptop still connected to the marina WiFi, I created a hotspot and called it XYZ. The tablets just connect to XYZ like a normal hotspot. But they are then connected to the internet via the marina's wifi. XYZ is so strong that the tablets can play Iplayer at the other end of the boat.

 

Happy to explain further...

 

(edited to say that the tablets are now connected to the internet)

Edited March 20, 2014 by Clifford

[Jambo]

What about using tablets to connect to the public wifi?

 

A bit of googling turned up something that surprised me - apparently Windows has a function to turn your LAPTOP into a wifi hotspot. I found the instructions all over the web. It took me a little while to make it work, because most of the posters seemed to have copied from each other and duplicated one wrong step. But I found the right version in the end, and the process is fairly short and almost straightforward.

 

With the laptop still connected to the marina WiFi, I created a hotspot and called it XYZ. The tablets just connect to XYZ like a normal hotspot. But they are then connected to the internet via the marina's wifi. XYZ is so strong that the tablets can play Iplayer at the other end of the boat.

 

Happy to explain further...

 

(edited to say that the tablets are now connected to the internet)

 

That's interesting. I was under the impression that laptops typically have a single wifi card so you would only be able to set it up as a wifi hotspot if you had the laptop hooked up to the internet via a wired connection. How do you set it up?

ETA: Oh sorry I'm being thick. Wifi dongle to usb in is the wired connection!

Edited March 21, 2014 by Jambo

[by'eck]

 

That's interesting. I was under the impression that laptops typically have a single wifi card so you would only be able to set it up as a wifi hotspot if you had the laptop hooked up to the internet via a wired connection. How do you set it up?

ETA: Oh sorry I'm being thick. Wifi dongle to usb in is the wired connection!

 

Instructions I wrote some time ago:

 

If you have Internet access to your laptop via LAN cable or any means other than WiFi, you can use your redundant built-in WiFi adapter to create your own hotspot. This is particularly useful if you want to share your Internet connectivity with another laptop or smart phone. These instructions are for bridging LAN & WiFi adaptors to achieve this. Haven't tried it with 3G connection but it should just be a matter of selecting that adapter instead.

Although some understanding of Windows is needed all your doing to achieve this is:

1) Creating an adhoc WiFi connection on your laptop that other devices can connect wirelessly to.

2) Bridging the adapter that already has the Internet connection with the wireless one.

1) On Windows 7 & I think Vista just go to Network and Sharing Centre/Manage Wireless Networks & click Add. Wizard starts & you can configure adhoc SSID & security if required. Your laptop should now show your new adhoc WiFi connection - press Connect & it should show "waiting for users".

2) Go back to Network and Sharing Centre/Manage adapter settings & select/highlight both LAN (or other adapter with Internet) & Wireless adapters. Right click on selection & choose Bridge option. Selecting this will create Network (MAC) bridge. Note any adapter you choose must have Internet sharing (ICS) turned off in order that it can be bridged although this is Windows default.

If you then connect phone/second laptop to previously setup adhoc Wireless connection, after connecting the Internet connectivity test should show positive & your in business. Note you may loose Internet connectivity on original laptop whilst bridge is active - it will return though when you disconnect Bridge. Bridge adapter once created will remain on your laptop & you have option to connect/disconnect any other adapter to it.

[Clifford]

Yes, Jambo, that's right. I could have been a bit clearer there. The wifi dongle brings in the public wifi (as a network called "wifi2" on my dongle) leaving the laptop's own wifi hardware free to be used as the hotspot xyz.

Edited March 21, 2014 by Clifford

[Clifford]

By’eck. I couldn't create a hotspot that way, because Win8 doesn't support 'adhoc'.

 

The Windows8 way was easy though, and might work on Win7 as well...

 

1. On the desktop, click on a 3-line batch file to create and start the hotspot as xyz.

 

2. On the networks screen, click on the wifi dongle and share its connection with xyz.

 

The batch file includes the WINSH WLAN command. It's easy to find with google, but I'm typing this on my phone at the mo, and in fatfinger mode it's not easy to give full details.

[by'eck]

Yes its a pain that on Windows 8 many of the wireless LAN GUI commands available on earlier versions were removed or at least hidden.

 

You are now obliged to use the command prompt method or run a batch file as you suggest.

 

For those not shy of such here is a guide which checks for WiFi adapter sharing ability, sets up ad hoc WiFi hotspot and then allows it to share the mainstream internet connectivity.

[Clifford]

Yes, Richard, That's how I did it. And that site has got the bit right that others get wrong (some tell you to click on your hotspot network icon and select SHARE, but it's the dongle network icon you click on).

 

I pasted the two Netsh commands into a file called hotspotclifford.bat on my desktop, with the network SSID (the hotspot name) and KEY (the hotspot password) changed.

 

To create the hotspot, I just have to right click on the desktop icon for hotspotclifford, and pick "run as administrator".

Edited March 22, 2014 by Clifford

[Supertramp]

Can this WiFi USB dongle be connected by cable to a WiFi router? - My marina WiFi is very weak, but usable outside the boat. I want to put a WiFi dongle outside cabled to a router inside, that can then transmit a WiFi network inside the boat for laptops, phones, ipad etc to use.

Is this possible?

[Clifford]

Supertramp, the "wifi dongle outside boat - long USB cable - laptop inside boat" method (above) will allow your laptop to get on the tinternet inside the boat for less than twenty quid. That bit is genuinely plug and play, a real cinch.

 

The slightly more technical "laptop as hotspot" stuff will then let your tablets and phones connect wirelessly for free. Not quite as straightforward, but a lot easier to do than to read about.

 

The only additional thing that a "dongle to router" solution would give you is to free your laptop from the usb cable. That is a legitimate reason for wanting to do it, but I don't know if a router has the software to connect to a usb dongle. I suspect not. I think you will need to bring the tinterweb into the wireless router via an ethernet cable from a different kind of device.

[Supertramp]

Thanks Clifford, I know some wifi routers have usb connectors, just not sure what their function is

[Jambo]

The only additional thing that a "dongle to router" solution would give you is to free your laptop from the usb cable. That is a legitimate reason for wanting to do it, but I don't know if a router has the software to connect to a usb dongle. I suspect not. I think you will need to bring the tinterweb into the wireless router via an ethernet cable from a different kind of device.

 

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