Portable WiFi Worth It?
 

I had a friend working for the airlines who had a $200 cad portable wifi router to use it while travelling. As I also travel often (5-6 times per year), I wanted to see whether others are on the fence of getting the portable router as well?

I don't know if we are talking about the same thing, but I use a RAVPower WD009 from Amazon. There is a recent app update that corrected the lack of function that ios 16.XX caused. I have been testing it again with the new app and it's better than ever. It logs into any Wifi 2.4Gb network and rebroadcasts it's own WiFi network on both 2.4 and 5Gb with support for up to 5 devices. It has it's own internal 6700 mah battery that doubles as a power bank, and I get 10+ hours of stand alone service on a full charge or you can run it with a USB power input.

My home 2.4 service tops out at around 80Mbps and the unit registers up to 70Mbps down. Range is around 50 ft. max, but solid for a hotel room, cruise cabin, or auto, motorhome, etc. I have used it on cruises where you pay by device, so having one line shared saves a ton of money, and you can run it in Guest Mode if you choose. I intend to try it out on airlines with the free T-Mobile in flight service so that I can use my iPads instead of only my phone for service.

There is a newer version called NewQ, on Amazon for $80 that looks identical with great reviews. My unit is at least 4-5 years old and still working fine. Here's an Amazon link:

Thanks for the description and the link.

How does it connect if the network requires some kind of authentication? Hotel Wi-Fi often requires name and room number or an access code; how would this device handle that? Thanks.

I open the app and choose the network. It then prompts for the password. I don’t recall if there is an issue with two or more entries required to connect, like a name AND room or code number. It also has a secondary method of logging in with the your device the app is on if you cannot get in with just the password. Sorry I haven’t used it in a while since the software update is fairly recent, allowing me to use it again. Many 2 stage login’s are sequential though and you can step through the procedure. I assume the method of using your phone to connect may address that issue. I believe once your phone the app is on connects, it passes through the login. No promises though. I hope this is clear. I have used it on several cruises in the past and they typically have the two entry login.

I haven’t used it in the past two years.

Thanks. I completely glossed over where you mentioned the app in your first post. I would expect that to be able to solve most problems that arise.

As I mentioned, I have used it several times on cruises in the past. If memory serves, most if not all ship net services do require a two entry login. Either a cabin number or username and then a code, birth date, booking number, etc. to connect. So, I'd say the simple hotel logins should not be an issue. Great for sharing WiFi with travel companions at the dinner table or other meetings. We travel with other family at times and they are thrilled to be able deal with emails once or twice a day. Not to mention free WiFi calls to the US if their carrier has that feature like T-Mobile.

Main thread: https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trav...tel-rooms.html

What is your use case for such a device?

If you're talking about traveling abroad and cutting down on roaming costs, if your phone supports e-sim I would just get such a sim and use the hotspot function of the phone to connect further devices to the internet.

I don't see what the point would be of having a router taking a WiFi signal and then broadcast another (besides not having to connect each device individually).

There are numerous applications. Some places charge per device. Some devices don't work properly with captive portals like the ones you find in hotels and some other places on the road (firestick/appletv/etc) - some people like to travel with such devices and this way they automatically connect to your preprogrammed SSID, and you just have to connect your travel router to the internet and you're up and running.

malmostoso,

In addition to the good points covered by Pesos, my next goal is to be able to use the free, unlimited in flight WiFi provided by T-Mobile on my plan. Currently it only allows the use of your log in phone for internet access. Using that small of a screen gets tiresome pretty quickly. I usually travel with an 11" iPad Pro and an iPad Mini 5 that I hope will now be able to use the plane service. So far the new app for my old device is working amazingly well. I don't have a flight until April, but I may do some field testing locally just to get comfortable with the setup and log in procedure. I see this simple system as a real game changer to my travel connectivity.

At first, I thought you were saying that the portable hot-spot could spoof as the phone, but then I thought that the portable hot-spot would connect to the phone and allow other devices to use the internet. But if the phone allows the portable device to connect, then it would probably allow other devices to connect, and the portable hot-spot would be unnecessary. Please clarify.

Your statement about the small screen is correct but understated.

This thread is not about a portable
hotspot. It’s about a travel router. The device has no internet connection of its own. You connect it to whatever WAN is being provided to you and it in turn routes for multiple devices you connect on its LAN side.

That assertion would be more useful if you defined the terms. The title of the thread does include "Portable WiFi", which to me implies a hot-spot.
That is consistent with both scenarios that I suggested.

wifi does not mean hotspot, portable or otherwise. Wifi is simply local wireless communication - nothing to do with internet. Hotspot generally means a place where internet is provided. A portable hotspot is a device that typically has cellular WAN capability and wireless LAN capability.

the type of travel router being discussed typically has wireless WAN capability (sometimes wired as well) and wireless LAN capability. No cellular involved/no internet of its own.

Thank you. I had thought that hot-spot was simply Wi-Fi availability. If internet is included, nice. I see Wikipedia agrees with your definition of included internet.

I agree with "no internet of its own" and I don't believe I implied otherwise. In the context of my post to which you responded, I thought that draver was clearly talking about internet usage, and my question was how the device (RAVPower WD009, if I understood correctly) obtained internet to distribute to, in this case, iPads of various flavors.

If we are talking at cross-purposes, I apologize, but it seems that you are emphasizing a point that I am failing to grasp.