If you’re like most people, you probably use your laptop to do a lot of things. From working on the internet to streaming video, your laptop is a great tool for doing all of these things. But what if you want to use your laptop as a WiFi hotspot? There are a few ways to do this, but the best way is probably using Connectify. Connectify is a free app that lets you turn your Windows 7 laptop into a WiFi hotspot. You can use it to connect to any WiFi network in the world, and it works with most routers. Once you’ve installed Connectify, open it and click on the " Hotspot" tab. You’ll see a list of networks that are available to connect to. Click on one of them and your laptop will start connecting automatically. You can also manually connect by clicking on the “connect” button next to each network name and then entering the network’s address into the “address” field. Once your laptop has connected to the network, you can access its internet connection from anywhere in the world! And if you ever need to disconnect from an existing WiFi network, just press " disconnect" at the bottom of the screen and your computer will automatically reconnect!

You might be at a location where there is only one Ethernet connection available (hotel room, office or meeting room etc.) and you need to share the Internet connection with other people or devices. Connectify is a free utility which is light on system resources and makes it easy for you to set up your Windows 7 machine as a secure WiFi hotspot.

Note: Connectify only works with Windows 7 Home and above, Starter is not supported.

Connectify

Installation is quick and easy, and once complete, you can access Connectify from the icon in the Taskbar.

Under settings, type in a name for the WiFi network, a password to access it, then decide the type of internet connection you want to share. It allows LAN, VirtualBox Host-Only, Wireless Network Connection, and no Internet sharing. When you’re ready, click on the Start Hotspot button.

Now you’ll see it running and can begin connecting your other wireless computers and/or devices.

Now that Connectify is running on the Windows 7 laptop, In this example we go over to an XP laptop and connect it. Open up Wireless Networks and you’ll see the new hotspot we just created that you can connect to.

You’ll be prompted to enter in the Network Key (password) you set in Connectify twice, then click on Connect.

Wait for a moment while a network address is acquired…

Here you can see the XP machine is connected to the Geek-fi network we created on the Windows 7 machine.

When you go back to the Windows 7 machine you can see the device(s) connected. It also keeps track of devices that were previously connected as well.

Right click on the Connectify icon in the tray to get different options for running it.

In our tests, the signal strength and connection speed was adequate, but may be a bit slower than your used to. Results will vary based on the type of hardware you have sending and receiving the signal. Overall though, if you need to create a Hotspot in a pinch, Connectify is more than capable. If you’re looking for an easy way to share your Windows 7 wireless connection with other devices, and want it to be secure, Connectify get’s the job done.

Download Connectify