What is Wi-Fi? (part 2)
In last week’s post, I told you the good news. Wi-Fi is available lots of places, it’s inexpensive, it’s an easy way to connect to the Internet, and it’s fast. Now for the bad news: It doesn’t always work.
Wi-Fi is 2-way radio, creating a computer network. There are so many things that can go wrong - on both sides. Most RV parks don’t have a budget for a computer technician on-site, so they may not even know how to test their side of the Wi-Fi hotspot, let alone fix it! But, for purposes of this article, I’m going to assume that the hotspot is working properly.
If you are close to the Access Point (the hotspot’s side of the 2-way) the Wi-Fi capabilities built in to your computer will work fine. But, if you’re a distance away, or there are obstructions, you may have problems connecting. The most common cause is that your internal Wi-Fi adapter is not strong enough to make the connection. And, by ‘a distance away’ I’m only talking 100 feet or so. When you see a rating on an adapter for distances of 300 feet or more, realize that is referring to ‘unobstructed line-of-sight.’
Wi-Fi was never intended to operate in a large outdoor environment. The technology was developed to work in a small, indoor location like a home, an office, or a coffee shop. If you take your laptop (with built-in Wi-Fi capability) to a coffee shop hotspot, you should have no problem connecting. But, take that same laptop to an RV park where you are some distance to the antennas, and there are many obstructions in the way, and you’re going to have problems. This is why many RV parks just have Wi-Fi available at the clubhouse, or office. It’s much more reliable there, and so much easier to manage. If you’re willing to take your laptop to the clubhouse, it should work fine.
If you want it to work at your site (and the park claims to deliver it there) your built-in adapter/antenna may not have what it takes to connect thru the metal walls and over the distance required. All laptops are not created equal when it comes to their Wi-Fi capabilities. My husband, Jim’s, laptop has the best built-in Wi-Fi we’ve seen. It is a 3 year old Sony Vaio. When I went to buy a new computer earlier this year, I almost bought a Sony, but decided there were a few other features I liked better about the Toshiba. I assumed that the Wi-Fi capabilities would surely be as good in my new Toshiba than in his 3 year old computer. I was wrong. 
Ok, so what do I do now?
