What Is a Wireless Internet Access Point?

Have you ever sat at the airport watching the businessman over at the next restaurant table tapping away at his notebook keyboard? Did you notice that he was searching Google and checking his email? have you ever wondered just how he managed to do that? The answer is simple, chances are he was using a wireless internet access point to connect his notebook directly to the internet in the airport restaurant.

Wireless internet access points are not a new technology, they have been around for several years now, although few people actually carried a notebook around with them often enough to really exploit them. With the advent of the netbook, those cute little book sized notebooks we seem to see everywhere these days, wireless internet access points have become very popular and in high demand.

A wireless internet access point works by allowing a Wi-Fi enabled computer to connect to the internet through a wireless gateway. If you have broadband at home, with a small box called a router attached, then it is likely you are already using a wireless internet access point in your own home. Obviously, commercial Wi-Fi access points or Wi-Fi hotspots as most people call them, are much larger than these small home networks.

There are two types on wireless internet access point. There are free access points and paid access points. These two types can be further split in to several sub-types, lets take a look at them.

Free wireless internet access points

There are two types of free access points or hotspots. The first type are open wireless internet access points, which a notebook can be connected to with no password or any other form of authentication. Simply switch on your notebook, configure the Wi-Fi network adapter to access the hotspot and you are ready to go. The second type are password protected but still free to use. This simply means that you will have to ask for the password to access the Wi-Fi network, which is then either entered in to the wireless adapter profile for the access point, or entered through a web page.

Commercial wireless internet access points

Commercial hotspots charge for the time that a computer is accessing the internet through the access point. There are two types of commercial internet access points. The first type are a kind of pay as you go system, it is possible to buy chunks of time, usually automatically using a credit card. The second type are a form of monthly subscription service. Most usually a person will buy a large segment of time which can be used across any of the wireless hotspots operated by the access point provider.

Wireless internet access points are a great way to stay connected to the internet whilst you are on the move, and they are being installed in more and more places every day. Next time you need to check your email whilst waiting for a train or drinking a cup of coffee, try switching on your notebook, you may well be surprised.