C:Amie gets WiFi

Greetings all

I am currently standing infront of the hemel hempstead phone exchange, in the freesing cold of a British winter eve, talking to you on 802.11b. Nothing new in that, but it is my first time with WiFi on a H/PC.

Yea, yea, I'm slow...

anyway, here I am. As cmonex and Colint know, I got it yesterday, but couldn't fiddle. So tonight I went on a war drive with it, and after finding many nodes, actually found one were I could park. lol.

Anyway, I will pick up on this at home, as my fingers are about to fall-off - it's that c...c...c...cold.

Nice one, I have never been on a war drive

Maybe on Christmas day?

Nick

woooo

I'm still c..c..c..cold

brrrrrr


Anyway, I am home now.
That was fun (but cold)

All the Friday night drunks wondering what it was I was doing standing an O2 store with a 'child size laptop'

I posted from a 720, Clint, just for you I took Pinkie.
There are NO residential WAP's in the South East of England that are unencrypted. I'm convinced of this!

I could not find a single one.
Pub's, petrol stations, fast food joints all had them. Lots of offices and shops - I had one or two "Back offices" - people need to get imaginative with their SSID's... to shame... "BTACCESSPOINT", "BOFFICE"

oh and it was cold...

The 802.11b adapter is a Pretec CompactWLAN - as in the HCL - I installed the driver from the HCL, it worked first time and went and detected my next door neighbours encrypted WAP.
Out on my war drive the built in scanner was useful - although you have to manually press the rescan button if you want to get anything in good measure as you're going past.

When I could park near a open WAP, I had to get a bit closer to get in range, but it saw the AP, I switched off the WEP and two second later it was registering against their DHCP server. Unfortunately that one didn't offer me a DNS server, so I walked up closer to the Exchange, and found another one... and couldn't for the life of me get it to connect.

It took me a couple of min to realise that when I moved away from the O2 AP, it hadn't released the IP info. So I popped the card, put it back and bingo. I posted the above and ran back to my nice warm car.

Nick, you have to go on a war drive, it's fun… more fun if I hadn't actually been driving the car at the same time mind...

Did I mention that it was cold?

Yea! Way to go. You're going to love and hate having wifi. The freedom is great, never getting away from the hpc is questionable. Wardriving is a riot. So many folks have open access. If they only knew...

I'm like you. I attend most parties fashionably late after the louts have passed out

Edit: Come wardriving with me in mid-February. It will only be, oh, -35C or so ....

Edited by wallythacker 2005-12-23 4:45 PM

Actually, I misrepresent Hemel Hempstead.

There were only two drunks. Other than that it was families out having a stroll with the kids, couple out holding hands and younglings out having a nice time.

and a wardriving n00b

Tell me when and where and we will be n00bs together

Welcome to the world of wifi!

What stumbling program do you use? I use NetStumbler on my lappys for wardriving, but nothing really fancy.... :-)

I use "wifi fo fum" on my PPC. I don't recall if there is a HPC version.
Its neat! It has a radar screen interface that can give you the general direction of the ssid's, if you don't move.

I just drove from my Texas home to my Kentucky home yesterday and this morning. When I pull off the interstate for gas I just check the motel signs for free wireless internet, BINGO! NO HASSLE, OPEN ACCESS!

Last night I stayed in a little town in Alabama, Fort Payne, I could access 4 open networks from my motel room. I was checking my Ebay stuff this morning while eating breakfast at Waffle House, I was accessing the Hampton Inn next door.

What? Unbelieveable! Chris, you run the most comprehensive HPC site in the world and are only now using a WiFi card in your J720?



Will wonders ever cease?

Rich

One's first WiFi experience is pretty similar to another kind of "first time"--a lot of fumbling, a lot of "what do I do now," but once the connection is made, there's no denying the sensations of quiet pride and outright relief.

I guess you know what I'm talking about: the first time you rotate the tires on your car.

You mean my mechanic is having all the fun?

If that is what equates to being your most cherished 'first time' memory... You know that centrifuges are for astronaut and DNA researchers right... your poor wife...

Sorry to disappoint, but this wasn't my first WiFi moment. You don't get to call C:Amie a newbie today

Congratulations on 200 posts Jake.