I'm thinking of purchasing a laptop, not anything great, but something that will get me basic internet. I'm not too well informed when it comes to these kinds of things, thats where you guys come in

 

I see people all the time in airplanes, public places etc. using wireless internet on their laptop. Can anyone explain to me how this works? I'm assuming you have to subscribe for it, but I just wanted to clariffy...

 

also, any relatively cheap brands you guys recommend that are reliable?....(not anything like Sony or Toshiba) but something cheap that will just cover my basic needs (Internet, AIM, Word)

 

So any laptop owners out there (or anyone else who has an answer to this), If you could let me know how you go about getting your wireless web, good brands, what to stay away from...etc. that'd be great

 

Thanks

I actually just got a Dell laptop. It came with a free wireless internet card with it. It was a deal that was going on at the time...I don't know anything more though...

when you see people online with their laptops in public places, it's because those places have a wireless hub that they let people connect to. sometimes they charge, sometimes they don't. i've never done it so i don't know the specifics, but i've seen signs for it at starbucks and panera

Wireless works great on UF's campus. I've never had a problem with it. I have a 802.11b wireless card in mine, and I heard that was the best possible for my laptop.

also, any relatively cheap brands you guys recommend that are reliable?....(not anything like Sony or Toshiba) but something cheap that will just cover my basic needs (Internet, AIM, Word)

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dude, you're getting a dell.

 

make sure you look up some coupon codes first though.

when you see people online with their laptops in public places, it's because those places have a wireless hub that they let people connect to. sometimes they charge, sometimes they don't. i've never done it so i don't know the specifics, but i've seen signs for it at starbucks and panera

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not always true

 

you could have a wireless card hooked up to your laptop that can be used almost like a cell phone

 

you slide it into the adapter that comes standard on most new dell laptops (i believe)....it sticcks out an inch or less where the antenna part is....its pretty small

 

my dad owns one through sprint....

All major cell phone companies have the "wireless" internet card. I know for instance that Cingular's card is 200.00 and service is like 80.00 a month for unlimited wireless internet. If I were a businessman that did lots of traveling that is what I would use. The connection is faster than DSL, but at the sametime its like cell phone service so when youre in a dead zone it doesnt work too well.

 

I have a Gateway Tablet convertible Labtop for about a year, and I have had nothing but good things to say about it.

ok, wireless web uses your existing internet subscription, and you just have either a atttached external, or internal, wireless card. if you subscribe to AOL, you can have them help you along to set it up for use with your wireless card.

 

as for the thing at airports and starbucks and stuff, i have heard that you can access the wireless access points, which basically is like a big radio antenna that broadcasts information to the wireless card mentioned above. i went to JFK airport on a trip, along with the local tallahassee airport, but could not get mine to hook up to it.

 

wireless cards: the best for a notebook.laptop computer is a pre-installed internal card. i have that in my computer and it works great. all wireless transmitters/recievers will, on average, not go over 50-60 feet from your base "radio antenna". otherwise, if you want to buy one seperate, you should go with linksys, which i have found to be the best.

 

i dont know if i helped or made it worse with all the technical talk, i tried to make it as basic as possible. good luck!

Dont get a Dell unless you get a huge discount. Both my dell laptops had problems. Check bensbargains.net for dell coupons. Every once in a while they give 20% off laptops.

they are called WiFi areas. areas with high concentration of wireless activity that transmits signals. as long as u are in a WiFi area then u should have no problems picking up a wireless signal. these areas include college campuses,huge apartment complexes,some high skools,airports,and certain stores(starbucks) that have their own wifi networks.

If you get a laptop with a wireless card, you can connect anywhere that has wireless, depending on the security they have setup. At places like airports, etc, Fishywishy was right. They may charge and they may not... You also do not use your internet ISP. You connect to their server and authenicate with a user name and password they give you. I've done this hundreds of times. We are also in the process of setting this up at work, on the ships ( I work for Royal Caribbean ).... We're installing wireless and the way it will work is people with wireless cards can connect to our server and we get them to the internet from there. For people with no wireless cards, we're renting them out as long as they have a PCMCIA slot. So, if you buy a laptop without an internal wireless card, make sure it has a PCMCIA slot. You can always buy an external wireless card down the line.

 

Most wireless cards and access points use 802.11b. That's pretty much the standard nowadays. Most laptops nowadays come with wireless capabilities, so you should be ok there.

 

You can get a very basic laptop. Internet is done through your ISP, so you can't look at that. Word, Excel, etc. are all Microsoft Office products which should come installed as well, so if that's all you're looking for, you can get yourself a cheap Dell or whatever. Sounds like you don't need a whole lot...

Thanks alot guys for all of your tips/suggestions :notworthy ,

 

 

however, just a couple more Q's...

 

for what I'm going to be using it for (internet and basic word processing)

 

what spec's do you think something adequate for my needs would have?, particularly how much RAM (would 128mb be enough?), also Processor speed and Hard Drive capacity.

 

Thanks again fellas

I got an Averatec for our business and it works great!

 

http://www.averatec.com/

 

They have thin & light, widescreen, convertible, and mobile theater models.