[Msxp]

I just have a quick question regarding the use of the hotspot browser on wifi.

I have a wifi network set up and connected on my Blackberry, so to browse the internet (without a data plan and without being charged) I use the hotspot browser, correct?

Thanks in advance, and sorry if this has been asked before.

[sedalia066]

I believe the answer is yes. You will not have BBM and push e-mail. Some apps will not work. Good luck.

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

[ajcook]

I've been doing a lot of Googling on this topic and have been very frustrated that none of the information (even very thorough explainations) have answered one basic question that I have had....What are recommendations for setting the default browser? When should one set it to Internet Browser, and when should one set it to Hotspot Browser?

I have found tons of information on what they are (Internet Browser goes through BES/BIS server, Hotspot goes through WiFI).

I found a fair amount of info that indicates that if you [I]want[I] to go through WiFi, you should make Hotspot the default. (The implication being that if you want to go through BES/BIS, use the Internet Browser as the default).

But, my question is, what if you don't want to force either connection, but just want to use the best (i.e., fastest) available? Use BES/BIS when you aren't connected to WiFi, use WiFi when you are connected.

So, I conducted an experiment. I turned off my phone radio (cutting me off from my carrier's data channel), and connected to a WiFi. I then set Internet Browser as my default browser. Guess what? It connected just fine, at WiFi speeds.

What I don't know is, if you have both your phone radio on, and are connected to WiFi, and you have Internet Browser set as the default, then what does it choose? I'd love it if someone that knew the answer to that would pipe in.

But, based on the fact that sometimes I see blazing fast web rendering, and sometimes I don't, my conclusion is that when you have both phone radio on, and WiFi connected, that the Internet Browser option will use either....I just don't know how it chooses which when. I would hope it would be based on signal strength/data throughput (what network guys sometimes refer to as "costing"...the channel with the least "cost" at the moment....i.e., the best response time).

So, here is my conclusion:

You would select Hotspot Browser if you wanted to force your browsing to ignore your carrier's data channel, and use WiFi exclusively, but wanted to leave your phone radio on (to take calls, etc.)

If you want the best available (i.e., most "automatic", and flexible), you should choose Internet Browser as the default, and trust that it'll use the WiFi when available and strong enough to be a better path than the carrier's phone channel.

If anyone knows any better with any authority, I'd love to hear from you.

[ajcook]

P.S. I can tell you, based on the aforementioned experiment, that you absolutely will have BBM, and push email when on a WiFi-only connection (no phone radio). I did. It worked very very well. And, I'm pretty sure I can tell you that the default browser setting has nothing to do with that at all (I had BBM with both Internet Browser and Hotspot Browser as the default browser...I'm pretty sure those only affect the browsing experience, and nothing else).