wifi

FON need to improve their router firmware

FON have a nifty little idea (and some investment from Google, Skype and Index Ventures, if memory serves). Their idea is that if you use one of their wireless routers, you get a login which you can then use on any other FON owner’s wireless router.

This gives you free wi-fi Internet access anywhere there is a FON user. Great.

One thing about this really bugs me though. Whenever my computer has to re-establish a connection with my router (whenever it wakes from sleep, or I return to the office from a meeting), if I try to browse to an Internet page, I am presented with the FON login page.

This wouldn’t be too bad, if the login page could remember the page I was originally trying to browse to and re-directed me there after successful login.

No, instead the successful login re-directs to a useless FON page.

Now, consider what happens when I re-start my computer. I shut down my browsers (I generally have 4-5 browsers running simultaneously with 30-40 tabs per browser). When I re-open any browser, I am presented with 30-40 FON login pages with no hope of getting back to the page which had been originally open.

AAAAAaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!! Totally infuriating.

This happened once too often this morning and I am now turning off my FON router.

FON, if you get this issue resolved, let me know and I will give you another try. Until then, hasta lluego!

5 thoughts on “FON need to improve their router firmware”

  1. May it be that you use the public signal of your FON-Router? If so, then you always have to login via the FON Login page. But if you use the private signal then there would be no need to login at all.

  2. Hi

    This is certainly very annoying. This was one of the reasons that led us build our fonera. A device with 2 SSIDs, one public and one for private use. As long as you use your personal fonera, connected to the private signal, you will not ever again be bugged by FON. You can go manually to http://www.fon.com to manage your access point, but you’re not forced to.

    When you’re roaming, you have to log in in each access point you connect to, that’s something very unlikely to change because of security and legal reasons. Still, we will soon come up with a network manager that will permit users not to have to log in manually through their browsers.

    If you’re still using an old FON enabled router, I encourage you to get a fonera and re-enjoy FON! You’ll notice a big difference!

    Thanks for sharing!

    Iurgi

  3. iurgi,

    thanks for the feedback.

    Twice FON have promised to send me a Fonera router and twice they have failed to deliver on the promise.

  4. Hi again Tom,

    Well, logistics is hard when you go through such a big increase at an international level, I guess. It would have been much easier if we only needed to deliver routers in 1 or 2 countries 😛

    Send me an email and I can make sure you get one this time 🙂

    Best,

    Iurgi

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