Ok, this is like Whitta’s thread about the Ipod only sans the cool topic title.
On my trip to LA last week, I borrowed a laptop from work, which had a wifi card. My brother in law had a wireless router at his place and now I am officially hooked.
No big deal, I suppose for you guys who have been doing this all along. But for me it was just huge. I guess I got turned off laptops because I can’t deal with the compact keyboards and funky pseudo mouse functionality. All that stuff pales into insignificance with the mobility that wireless allows. We traveled up the coast about mid-week to my mother-in-laws house, which does not have a wireless network. I was not out of luck, though, because even in the sleepy town of Los Osos there are plenty of unsecured wireless networks named linksys to be found. Basically a wireless card, a laptop, and the willingness to walk around the neighborhood are all you need to get a decent Internet connection. As an added bonus, I am now hooked on stand by mode with a laptop. My previous experience with this was on W98, which really sucked. Whenever the computer woke up, I would get some sort of problem. Not sure if it’s an improvement in the OS or the hardware, but I love being able to shut the lid to make the computer go to sleep.
Anyhow, now I am shopping for a wireless router with NAT and a couple extra wired ports for the few desktop computers I have. Anyone have any favorites?