Well I finally got connected wirelessly on the road. I decided to go with the Flying J Wi-Fi "Hot Spot" High Speed Wireless service. (See my not-so-favorable review on my attempt to use TruckStop.net)
After an hour of attempting to get it working and a good experience with one of their customer service technicians via their 800#, I finally was able to effortlessly surf the web.
Was it worth it?
Yes and no. Yes--from now on it should fairly simple to connect wirelessly at one of the Flying J's. No--Unless your a wireless pro used to troubleshooting wireless networking challenges, plan on spending anywhere from 30-60 minutes (or more) getting connected. Here's what when down:
After pulling into a Flying J, I fueled and then parked my rig with my trailer facing towards the main Flying J building. That was a mistake. Using a Wi-Fi access point successfully hinges upon a good-to-great connection between your laptop's receiving antenanne unit and the building's signal-sending antennae unit. What was I thinking?! But I'm jumping ahead a bit. After parking the rig, I went inside and purchased a gift card that can be used for a zillion-and-one Flying J services. Since it's rechargeable, I put a 20-spot on the card intially. To celebrate my certain success on the wireless web connection, I stocked up on a pint of Double-Strawberry ice-cream and a Starbuck's Coffee Frappuccino. Why not get wired when you're getting unwired?! Off to the truck I trotted eager with the thrill of "reconnecting" to the world. But first I had to finish my truck log for the day and then plan the route for tomorrow. Once that was accomplished, I set off to connect to the Internet.
The first thing I noticed after firing up the laptop and plugging in the wireless network card is that I had four possible access points to the Internet. Two were from the Flying J, one was from the T/A (Truck Stops of America; they use TruckStop.net as their wireless provider) located about 1/4 mile away, and the last one was TruckStop.net which came from the Love's Truck Stop on the other side of the road. Well I picked the best signal from the Flying J, hit the connect button, and waited. After being connected I opened up my Internet browser and was taken to the Flying J's log-in page. So far so good. Since I was a new customer, I dutifully began filling in 4-screens of information. However, I was interruped a couple of times because the signal was lost. And, the TA wireless login page magically appeared more than a few times. It was then that my frustration level began to mount. It was then that I realized I would need to move the truck to get a better signal from the building. So, I did a quick u-turn in the parking lot and now my tractor cab faced the building (I probably received some interesting looks from other truckers as performed that manuever). I was then able to complete the information and logon to the Internet wirelessly. Cool!
Well my frustration level managed to boil over in about 5-minutes. I called customer service (waited less than 10-seconds) and impatiently explained to the in-the-know technician my problems with the T/A login screen appearing even though I was "technically" logged on to the Flying J's wireless network. He pinpointed the problem right away (I'm using Windows XP and a box on a wireless screen had to be checked and it was not. If I remember correctly, the wireless card manufacturer instructed me not to check that box. Don't ya love how manufacturers make sure their products work together seamlessly?!) After that, I had no problems whatsoever.
So, all-in-all, it wasn't that bad of an experience although there were moments of frustration (The cold treats--ice-cream and frappuccino-- made the irritations somewhat more tolerable!). The speed wasn't exactly high-speed like I'm used to at home using my cable service's high-speed access. However, it certainly is faster than a dial-up connection. If you are planning to go surfing all over the place using a wireless connection, be prepared for a slightly slower surfing experience if you are accustomed to wired high-speed access at home.
Keep in mind with any wireless provider, the first time you try connecting to the service, you most likely will experience some minor-to-major glitches. However, once you're connected, things should go fairly smooth for you the next time around.
PostScript: Later in the evening I found myself having to log repeatedly back into the network. And more traffic (more viewers) caused the network to become sluggish at times (at least that's my guess as to why the network was at a crawl). Finally, on the Flying J wireless network you will be logged off after 5-minutes or so of inactivity (probably no different from other wireless networks).
PostScript2: The next morning (Sunday) I connected effortlessly wirelessly to the web. My connection allowed me to go zippin' around which meant that I was probably the only user on the network at the time. Yikes -- I wonder how many people logged on at the same time actually causes the surf speed to decrease dramatically. My guess is that it only takes a couple of users to develop a traffic jam (especially if those users are gaming, downloading images, etc.). Well, since we're still in the Frontier days of the wireless Internet, things can only get better!
7:34:52 PM
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