What are the comparative advantages and disadvantages, when needing a hotspot to connect several devices, between choosing to use a dedicate hotspot (MiFi type) device versus using a dedicated smartphone that has a hotspot feature?
If using the smartphone option, the smartphone will be dedicated for hotspot use only and will not be used for any other purpose (such as voice calling, texting or even using data directly on the smartphone itself.) The smartphone will remain plugged into a power-outlet at all times and remain unmoved.
Some thoughts to consider are whether there are different limitations on the number of simultaneous connections between a dedicated hotspot versus a smartphone hotspot. Do devices built as a dedicated hotspot generally give a larger WiFi range coverage than the hotspot feature of a smartphone. Do one of these two options tend to have a higher speed connectivity for attached devices. Is there any downside to purchasing a used device. And, of course, cost-wise which can be procured least expensively and/or is a better cost-value. And any other important or relevant factor worth considering.
Whichever device is chosen would be LTE capable. (In this case to be used over the Sprint network.)
Which LTE capable (Sprint) smartphone with a built-in hotspot feature would be most suited for use as a dedicated device that will only be used as a hotspot (and have no other use)? The phone will remain in one place, attached to a power outlet, unmoved.
I would like to use the device on the Sprint network on an account without the hotspot feature enabled on the account level. So I would need to modify the device to be able to work in this manner. What modifications would I need to make on the phone so that it can be used as a hotspot (either directly on Sprint or on an MVNO such RingPlus or FreedomPop) without hotspot being active on the account? And how difficult would it be to make those modifications?
And what will be the effect on the battery considering the phone will remain connected to the wall plug 24/7, and how best to mitigate any battery issues?
Which LTE smartphone models are known to have better reception or range for hotspot use, in terms of best WiFi range, speed for connected devices and number of devices capable to connect to it? If desiring to keep costs for the device at a minimum, would a used device work any less well than a new one? And, of course, which specific models have the best cost/value proposition for use for this purpose? (Or, perhaps, for LTE hotspot only use there is little differences between most models?)
Moe Ginsburg said:
Which LTE capable (Sprint) smartphone with a built-in hotspot feature would be most suited for use as a dedicated device that will only be used as a hotspot (and have no other use)? The phone will remain in one place, attached to a power outlet, unmoved.
I would like to use the device on the Sprint network on an account without the hotspot feature enabled on the account level. So I would need to modify the device to be able to work in this manner. What modifications would I need to make on the phone so that it can be used as a hotspot (either directly on Sprint or on an MVNO such RingPlus or FreedomPop) without hotspot being active on the account? And how difficult would it be to make those modifications?
And what will be the effect on the battery considering the phone will remain connected to the wall plug 24/7, and how best to mitigate any battery issues?
Which LTE smartphone models are known to have better reception or range for hotspot use, in terms of best WiFi range, speed for connected devices and number of devices capable to connect to it? If desiring to keep costs for the device at a minimum, would a used device work any less well than a new one? And, of course, which specific models have the best cost/value proposition for use for this purpose? (Or, perhaps, for LTE hotspot only use there is little differences between most models?)
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If you intend to only use the device for WiFi, you are better off just buying something like MiFi.
The phone uses more power from the wall, doesn't have a dedicated antenna (so less coverage), may use it's network for checking for messages or calls, is more expensive, has useless components for it's purpose (speaker, BT, mic, camera, screen...)...
Benefits of a phone: you can program it to turn on/off hotspot at different times, ban someone for a specific amount of time, dynamic password changes (for ex. per day), capture traffic and analyze it (make sure this is legal)...
The decision is up to you really.
janekmuric said:
If you intend to only use the device for WiFi, you are better off just buying something like MiFi.
The phone uses more power from the wall, doesn't have a dedicated antenna (so less coverage), may use it's network for checking for messages or calls, is more expensive, has useless components for it's purpose (speaker, BT, mic, camera, screen...)...
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How much of a difference in a) power usage and b) WiFi range coverage is there between a phone hotspot and a MiFi?
janekmuric said:
Benefits of a phone: you can program it to turn on/off hotspot at different times, ban someone for a specific amount of time, dynamic password changes (for ex. per day), capture traffic and analyze it
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How can the phone be programmed to automatically shut off the hotspot at certain times or ban certain devices and automatically change the password or capture traffic logs?
How much of a difference in a) power usage and b) WiFi range coverage is there between a phone hotspot and a MiFi?
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There is no way to tell because different phone models and different WiFi Access Points all have different antennas and designs, however WiFi APs are designed strictly for the purpose of sending WiFi signal so it's expected that they are giving out different results.
How can the phone be programmed to automatically shut off the hotspot at certain times or ban certain devices and automatically change the password or capture traffic logs?
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You can do it with Java. You can create Android apps with Java and install them on the phone, it's not easy and it's definitely a learning curve, but once you know how to use it you will find it very useful.
janekmuric said:
You can do it with Java. You can create Android apps with Java and install them on the phone, it's not easy and it's definitely a learning curve, but once you know how to use it you will find it very useful.
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There aren't any generally available apps in the Play store that can do this?
Moe Ginsburg said:
There aren't any generally available apps in the Play store that can do this?
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Not really. Not sure if it's because nobody thought of that before, or it's banned (changing passwords and stuff). There are definitely APIs for this.
Related
I have just setup a wireless network in my home. Compared to bluetooth it is absolutley brilliant, I have fast internet on my laptop downstairs, wifi card in ipaq working great and it was a doddle to install, whereas bluetooth presents nightmares to configure, wont work with lots of devices, is short range and very slow. For anybody who is in 2 minds I would suggest wireless is the best by far in all ways.
Hi,
Apologies if I misunderstood you, but I think you missed the point of Bluetooth/WiFi. They really are completely different technologies.
Bluetooth is designed to be short range and lower power and to be able to communicate a multitude of devices wirelessly (i.e. keyboards, mice, GPS, headsets as well as forming mini networks). It's also not really designed to be "high speed" as in the same sort of levels of WiFi.
WiFi on the other hand is ONLY for networking and compared to Bluetooth it IS much faster as you've realised and it is designed for bigger distances, but the power drain is also considerably more as well.
That's why your device has both technologies, so that you can choose which method suits you best. Personally I use the WiFi for networking, but the Bluetooth for talking to my GPS and Handsfree. I've ran a Bluetooth network before and found them quite stable (driver/firmware versions will assist here) and they're okay in an emergency, but they're really not that speedy at all.
So wifi is limited in its capabilities? So no chance of wireless gps or wireless headsets for phones?
I wouldn't say it's limited. Wireless Fidelity is wireless networking. That's what it was designed for and that's what it does.
You do get network webcams as well as network printers etc which could directly or indirectly take advantage of WiFi, but that's about as diverse as I think it goes and even then it's not really WiFi doing the work. The devices themselves have built in network cards.
Technically you could have a headset with a built in network card/wireless tranceiver, but I think since they can already do that with Bluetooth in very small sizes/low power/low cost... I can't see a WiFi implementation happening anytime soon, if ever. More likely it'll skip WiFi and that sort of thing will go in whatever wireless technology comes out next.
But aside from possibly a headset with longer range and faster networking, what else would you want to use with a range more than 10m or needs faster speeds?
I suspect mobile phones will start including 100m Bluetooth when they work out how to get the power down, but I don't believe that'll increase the speeds. But hey I didn't write/design the spec, so who knows?
I was also quite surprised and pleased by the simplicity of setting the wireless network, on the desktop I took about 1 minute, no added software, just a couple of clicks and a reboot, on the laptop I installed the software, plugged in the card and it immediately found the network and asked me politely if I would like to use it, brilliant implementation of a superb system. I also saw an advert for a long distance network connection, 3 miles I think, that would be a cheap way of all your family using a single high speed broadband connection in the same town.
The answer is simple:
Can you use high speed WIFI for more than 3 hours with any PPC with standard battery? BT does that well.
You should compensate the high speed of connection and simplicity in configuration (not very sure about this) to the longer usage time.
Hi guys,
I am new to amdroid platform. I've been using symbian before this. I want to know as to how do I auto use wifi when. Available without manually turning it on. Below is a use case scenario.
I have configured wifi as well as gprs. I have turned off background sync so as to conserve battery and the wifi is off. Now when my active sync want to connect to server to synchronize emails, it should auto check if I have a nearby wifi already configured. If yes, then turn on the wifi, sync the data and close the connection thereby disconnecting from wlan. If a known wlan network is not available, use the data plan of my service provider to get the job done.
Now I know for sure that when I've wifi turned off, the phone is not always connected to 3G. It uses it only if requested by an application. But when I turn ON wifi, it always remains connected to the known network. I want to avoid this for saving battery.
Please let me know if there is an app for that. I am using HTC DESIRE Z running Froyo (non rooted). I dont mind rooting the phone for this thing but only if a standard way is not available.
Thanks in advance,
Karan
Sent from my HTC Vision using XDA App
I think Juice Defender does exactly what you're looking for.
Or Tasker if you really want to customize and make it location-based.
Good luck, and welcome to Android! I also came from Symbian.
Technically the phone can't know if there is wifi available unless wifi is on..
However, a tool like Tasker can use various contexts in order to determine if Wifi is to be turned on. For example you could use cell tower ID's to determine if you're at a certain (fairly wide area) location, like "at work". Or you could use GPS to get more fine tuned information, however it doesn't necessarily work indoors.
Or Tasker could also turn on Wifi if ActiveSync is running, assuming it's a distinct program it can detect.
I see in the time I opened the thread and responded someone else suggested Tasker as well. It's several bucks but it's well worth it, it does a LOT.
You should try an app called "Y5".
JuiceDefender does this for me. It must use gps positioning to determine if you are in an area that you have as a familiar wireless network. When I am home my wifi turns on and connects automatically. When I leave it shuts it off. JuiceDefender is great for many reasons beyond this.
foppa78 said:
JuiceDefender does this for me. It must use gps positioning to determine if you are in an area that you have as a familiar wireless network.
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GPS uses tons more battery power than just leaving WiFi on would. It might be using cell tower triangulation for a rough area, but I doubt it. The most efficient way to detect if familiar wireless is near, is to turn the WiFi on for a minute or so and do a scan.
kmmerwana said:
Now I know for sure that when I've wifi turned off, the phone is not always connected to 3G. It uses it only if requested by an application. But when I turn ON wifi, it always remains connected to the known network. I want to avoid this for saving battery.
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Click to collapse
WiFi doesn't use power to maintain the connection until it's needed, or something wakes it and it realizes its no longer connected. 3G uses power to track cell tower connectivity and stay connected, but it is very little. WiFi only uses more power when you're in an unfamiliar location, since it actively scans for new wireless networks.
Hi my name is jacob and I am a new on XDA and i have started a new thread because I have been all over the internet looking for a solution to this problem and none of them work. After i waved through all of the b******* i decided to come and see if any of you veterans can solve my problem.
i have been messing around with root and custom roms here recently maybe for a month and so far its great breathed new life into my old phone. Although I am having trouble with hacking my mobile phones hot spot (phone specifications and model listed below) i have tried everything wifi tether by TreVe, (hope I'm typing that right) changing tethering.dun in global settings database, (worked great until T-mobile eventually found me out) and everything else related to that. I am looking for a hack into my hot spot where T-mobile wont know s*** and it will work indefinitely. Reason why is I need internet for school and work purposes at home but, I live with my father and hes is on parole and can not have internet service at his home. I am a beginner but do have a little bit of sense in what I am doing if someone would kindly walk me through steps on how to completely unlock and hide my hot spot usage from T-mobile it would be greatly appreciated.
Also new thread for hacking native hot spot methods on any rooted android device.
My phone
Samsung Galaxy S2
carrier: T-mobile
model: SGH-T989 Hercules
no custom kernel (I understand I need some kind of net filter but can not find that online)
custom rom version: carbon 4.4.2 nightly
Thanks XDA community :good:
It won't be wireless, but PdaNet+ and USB tethering works just fine with a computer as long as you select the "hide tether usage" option. The program on the computer side also has a feature that turns your computer's wi-fi into a wi-fi router, which'll allow you to connect other devices.
Planterz said:
It won't be wireless, but PdaNet+ and USB tethering works just fine with a computer as long as you select the "hide tether usage" option. The program on the computer side also has a feature that turns your computer's wi-fi into a wi-fi router, which'll allow you to connect other devices.
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yes i have tried PDAnet and that does not work for my needs as i also play the occasional online game with my PS4 I forgot to mention that sorry. I have tried to send out a wifi signal from my computer through CMD on my computer and none of my devices pick it up even though CMD says the signal is going out also done this with ADhoc networks with a LAN cable but did not work either. Thanks for the suggestion :good: I probably should have went into more detail with my post but I did not want to make it to terribly long sorry.
Planterz said:
It won't be wireless, but PdaNet+ and USB tethering works just fine with a computer as long as you select the "hide tether usage" option. The program on the computer side also has a feature that turns your computer's wi-fi into a wi-fi router, which'll allow you to connect other devices.
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May it possibly hide my online gaming if I figure out a way to get reverse WiFi on my computer working will it still hide that or will it be detectable. I see my self as a somewhat computer buff but I put myself to shame when i cant get a reverse WiFi connection going from my computer. seems like a lot of trouble to go to for internet i wish there was a way to unlock native tethering and not jump through hoops. It would seem that it would be a simple fix and should also be free anyway since it is dealt with the phone's hardware not through the carrier american cell network providers are greedy that is like getting xfinity internet but before you can send internet to your devices you have to pay thirty dollars extra.
When you USB tether your phone to your computer with PdaNet+, all you have to do is select the "WiFi Share" option and set it up like any other hotspot (network name, password, etc). Couldn't be easier. I don't know how well this'll work for playing PS4 (or whatever) games, but I can use this setup to watch Netflix or youtube on my well enough.
There are ways to use the native hotspot on an Android phone, but all the "hacks" are done on the computer side. VPNs, browser masking, etc.
Planterz said:
When you USB tether your phone to your computer with PdaNet+, all you have to do is select the "WiFi Share" option and set it up like any other hotspot (network name, password, etc). Couldn't be easier. I don't know how well this'll work for playing PS4 (or whatever) games, but I can use this setup to watch Netflix or youtube on my well enough.
There are ways to use the native hotspot on an Android phone, but all the "hacks" are done on the computer side. VPNs, browser masking, etc.
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i will try this method browser masking right now unfortunately don't have the money to buy a VPN maybe one of the ad supported free versions will suffice will report back tomorrow.
jacobis16 said:
i will try this method browser masking right now unfortunately don't have the money to buy a VPN maybe one of the ad supported free versions will suffice will report back tomorrow.
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Method not working i still get the T-mobile up sell page through VPN's of all kind it masks the internet going through the computer but not the phone where the service originates. They still detect everything I am doing. I understand T-mobile has bots going through their lines that detects devices that are not mobile devices and shuts them down. If maybe there is a way to block T-mo completely from a mobile device and just sounds ridiculous but I know someone out there can find a way I have heard of peoples mobile data usage and their mobile hot spot gauge has not moved only mobile data was detected. I am not sure if this was false statements and was made up.
bump
Hi Jacob, I got my Note 3's native personal wifi hotspot connected to my ps4 with around 18Mbps Download and 6Mbps Upload, I adjusted the APN settings on my phone and managed to get around the data restriction.
I can post the exact settings I changed if you think it might work for you?
Hi guys
I do not own the watch yet but have just been informed that apparently the WiFi model still relies on a smartphone to connect to the internet, is this true?
(I was told that the WiFi in the watch is simply a WiFi direct and that it will not work when the phone is off.)
My use case is the following: I wish to write my own applications for it that can connect to WiFi networks independently of the phone and can make API queries from Javascript
without using my phone's internet connection but instead directly connecting to,say, my company's wifi. Is this possible?
I know that without my smartphone active, the watch obviously won't have access to my smartphone notifications, but that is not what I am looking for in a watch anyway.
My ideas are going more in the direction of querying my own API for my server(via json) so I can keep an eye on its status. Does such a thing work with the smartphone being off, or is this something that works exclusively with the 3G version of the S2? I would love to get the 3G model, but it isn't being sold in my country.
Nik
Yes, it is possible. The watch connects to the WiFi by itself... You don't need the phone for that
endeebee said:
Hi guys
I do not own the watch yet but have just been informed that apparently the WiFi model still relies on a smartphone to connect to the internet, is this true?
(I was told that the WiFi in the watch is simply a WiFi direct and that it will not work when the phone is off.)
My use case is the following: I wish to write my own applications for it that can connect to WiFi networks independently of the phone and can make API queries from Javascript
without using my phone's internet connection but instead directly connecting to,say, my company's wifi. Is this possible?
I know that without my smartphone active, the watch obviously won't have access to my smartphone notifications, but that is not what I am looking for in a watch anyway.
My ideas are going more in the direction of querying my own API for my server(via json) so I can keep an eye on its status. Does such a thing work with the smartphone being off, or is this something that works exclusively with the 3G version of the S2? I would love to get the 3G model, but it isn't being sold in my country.
Nik
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Click to collapse
Yes, using WIFI to connect other than the watch is doable, the problem that I had was the battery drain, it drained the battery in 3 hours when I have the WIFI set to on. so now I only use it Bluetooth to my phone, and with that, it lasts 2-3 days without a charge.
So this has been one of the annoyances I've had with android for awhile but never really put any research in to it to know if its normal, or more so - why this would be normal. If I want to connect to certain devices that run as a wifi hotspot, but don't provide internet access - android does not appear to use those connections. The workaround seems to be to disable cell data and then I can connect to the device. Currently on a Nexus 6p on 7.1.1. The wifi will connect, but i can't hit the device unless I wack cell data. I guess really the two questions that matter are 1) is this normal? and 2) is there a workaround? Tried it on the fiance's iphone and it works without issue.
-Chris