While having a netbook slightly decreased the hassle of whipping out your laptop to check for wireless nodes, it's still a pain. If you keep your PSP in your gadget bag, put it to work as a Wi-Fi scanner.


If you live in a city you're surrounded by free wireless nearly everywhere you go, the key is knowing what's available and open for use. Much easier than stopping every hundred feet and busting out your laptop is using your tiny PSP as a scanner. At MakeUseOf they cover two techniques for using your PSP to sniff out Wi-Fi locations. The first can be done with a stock PSP. You simply go into the network settings on the PSP and tell it to look for new wireless networks. That will work, but it won't look continuously just when you ask it to.

If you've set up your PSP to run homebrew software you have access to a superior option. Road Dog scans continuously, shows you the strength of the signal, and can even be set to alert mode where it will notify you on new finds even when you're not paying attention to the scanner. You don't need to write down the spots it finds, just press the NOTE button on the PSP and it'll save the information of the network you're looking at for later use.


If you're looking for novel things to do with your homebrew-enabled PSP, check out previous articles on how to use your PSP as a universal remote and how to use your PSP as a additional monitor in Windows. Have a favorite PSP application or trick for finding Wi-Fi without the hassle of booting up your laptop? Let's hear about it in the comments.

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Road Dog [via MakeUseOf]