Windows 7: Turn Your Laptop Into A WiFi HotSpot
2009 October 31
Stumble it!Windows 7 users might have noticed a nifty feature known as “Virtual Wi-Fi” which allows a user to group multiple Wi-Fi connections together for better coverage and speeds. Keeping that feature in mind, a software has been released specifically for windows 7 called “Connectify” which turn your laptop into a Wi-Fi hotspot.
Connectify runs in the Notification Tray next to the system clock. And to get started, you need to click on the Connectify logo in the Notification Tray.
- Select the Internet connection you wish to share
- Choose a name for your new wireless network
- Choose a wireless passphrase
- Press the Internet Sharing button to turn on your wireless network
- Now, from your other devices, you can see your wireless network. Choose to join it, and enter the wireless passphrase to connect.
Good thing is other users don’t need to have Windows 7 to connect. Any WiFi enabled device can connect to your network without any additional configuration or software.
Thanks for writing about Connectify. We thought you may want to know that today Connectify 1.0 is now available as the first production ready release. We believe that we have fixed all of the issues that were seen in testing. Some older wireless cards do not yet have full Windows 7 support, and for those devices Connectify will act as an Ad Hoc connection manager, instead of a full blown Wi-Fi Access Point.
Changes since Beta 4 include:
• Improved Notification tray icons (including a warning icon if the selected Internet connection is not currently working)
• Support for even more wireless cards and configurations
• Improved memory and CPU management
• Recover from sleep/hibernate
• Support for machines where multiple users install Connectify and log on at same time
• Ability to remove clients from the Client History list (right click to get menu)
• Auto-hiding of the Mode box. By default we hide the “Mode” box to choose between AP or Ad Hoc mode. If your wireless card supports both, then we default to Access Point mode. To keep the mode box visible, there is an option on the Option menu (right click on the Connectify logo to show the menu).
Thank you again for your support.