Windows 7 to Turn Your Wi-Fi Card Into Two

By Marcus Yam
published

Windows 7 will turn your single Wi-Fi card into two. Magic!

One of the things that we love most about Windows 7 right now is the much-improved taskbar. But as much as we love it, it’s not allowing us to do anything radically different than from before. Much of what we’ve reported about Windows 7 centers around small tweaks and changes that make us enjoy our computing experience more, but now we’ve learned about something that could change the way that we use our portable computers.

According to istartedsomething.com, Microsoft has been researching since 2002, a technology that would allow a wireless adaptor to appear as more than just the single piece of hardware that it is.

Windows 7 will allow through clever virtualization software a single Wi-Fi card to appear as two. For the way that most of us use Wi-Fi today, this doesn’t sound like a big deal – but with two ‘virtual’ adapters, now we can connect to two hotspots at once.

The revolutionary part comes in when you want to use one virtual Wi-Fi adapter to connect to a hotspot and the other one to share the connection with other laptops. This could be useful for paid connections at public places such as hotels. Only one paid-internet pass would be needed, which can then be shared through the second virtualized adapter. You could even take it a step further by using the second adapter as a repeater.

The feature is already integrated into Windows 7, but the reason why we’re not all running virtualized adapters now is because there needs to be specific drivers written to take advantage of the feature.

Microsoft’s documentation reads:

“On Windows 7 and later, the operating system installs a virtual device if a Hosted Network capable wireless adapter is present on the machine. This virtual device normally shows up in the “Network Connections Folder” as ‘Wireless Network Connection 2’ with a Device Name of ‘Microsoft Virtual WiFi Miniport adapter’ if the computer has a single wireless network adapter. This virtual device is used exclusively for performing software access point (SoftAP) connections [...]. The lifetime of this virtual device is tied to the physical wireless adapter. If the physical wireless adapter is disabled, this virtual device will be removed as well.”

Support for virtual wireless adapters is supposed to be part of the Windows 7 driver certification program, so hopefully we’ll be rocking dual Wi-Fi soon.

Marcus Yam
Marcus Yam
Marcus Yam served as Tom's Hardware News Director during 2008-2014. He entered tech media in the late 90s and fondly remembers the days when an overclocked Celeron 300A and Voodoo2 SLI comprised a gaming rig with the ultimate street cred.
36 Comments Comment from the forums
  • leafblower29
    but with two ‘virtual’ adapters, now we can connect to two hotspots at once.

    Cool! I always wondered how that could be done.
    Reply
  • hellwig
    This could be useful for paid connections at public places such as hotels. Only one paid-internet pass would be needed, which can then be shared through the second virtualized adapter.

    So you're saying this is pretty much only useful for cheating businesses out of money by stealing internet access for your friends? How many people in your hotel room need to access the internet at one time anyway? And if you're on a business trip, shouldn't your employer cover the cost of internet access if its necessary for business. And what hotels are you staying at that charge you for internet access? Airports, truckstops, etc... might be another matter, but hotels?

    You could even take it a step further by using the second adapter as a repeater.
    Ah, now there's a good, law-abiding use. Rather than wire a WAP to another part of your house (why are Linksys WAPs more expensive than their routers?), use the computer that sits inbetween, assuming its on all the time.
    Reply
  • Ya know what? Do you all pay for radio?

    Noppppppeeeeeeee

    Reply
  • Zoonie
    I think this is great. Any useful feature is a good feature!
    Reply
  • tenor77
    Wi-Fi Mitosis? Where's my tin foil hat?????

    Awesome idea, but you've still got a bottleneck in data transfer rates. Still hard to knock. Don't like it, don't use it.
    Reply
  • ses27
    didn't OLPC do this with there system
    Computers chaining to each other to get to hot spot
    Reply
  • Harby
    hellwigSo you're saying this is pretty much only useful for cheating businesses out of money by stealing internet access for your friends? How many people in your hotel room need to access the internet at one time anyway? And if you're on a business trip, shouldn't your employer cover the cost of internet access if its necessary for business. And what hotels are you staying at that charge you for internet access? Airports, truckstops, etc... might be another matter, but hotels?Ah, now there's a good, law-abiding use. Rather than wire a WAP to another part of your house (why are Linksys WAPs more expensive than their routers?), use the computer that sits inbetween, assuming its on all the time.
    Take a chill pill, are you a hotel owner or something?
    Reply
  • kelfen
    hellwigSo you're saying this is pretty much only useful for cheating businesses out of money by stealing internet access for your friends? How many people in your hotel room need to access the internet at one time anyway? And if you're on a business trip, shouldn't your employer cover the cost of internet access if its necessary for business. And what hotels are you staying at that charge you for internet access? Airports, truckstops, etc... might be another matter, but hotels?Ah, now there's a good, law-abiding use. Rather than wire a WAP to another part of your house (why are Linksys WAPs more expensive than their routers?), use the computer that sits inbetween, assuming its on all the time.theres something called security you should look it up; aka password on wireless connection
    Reply
  • pharge
    I wish I can have 2 physical WiFi cards (G/N)on my laptop and double my WiFi speed...lol

    Guess that will never happen...>_
    Reply
  • wkcar
    So theoretically, if I'm connected to a network that limits bandwidth to like 1.5 MBit/s per connection, can I create a virtualized card to connect to that same network to have twice the speed to download files/surf the net? or is this just limited to using the network and creating ad-hoc connections at the same time?
    Reply