Free Wi-Fi?

[Starclassic]

I know Disney has been adding free wi-fi in a lot of places, but can someone tell me if it's in the Value resorts yet (particularly All-Star Music)? Thanks!

 

[Mousemommy1]

I know Disney has been adding free wi-fi in a lot of places, but can someone tell me if it's in the Value resorts yet (particularly All-Star Music)? Thanks!

Yes, it's in all resorts now.

 

[Starclassic]

Yes, it's in all resorts now.

Awesome! Thanks so much!

 

[matthewclabaugh]

we just got back and the resortwide wifi sucks, and we stayed at music

 

[Starclassic]

we just got back and the resortwide wifi sucks, and we stayed at music

How so? Is it slow or difficult to connect, etc.?

 

[Mousemommy1]

How so? Is it slow or difficult to connect, etc.?

We used it this summer (at WL) with my iPad and we thought it was fine. I mean, not as fast as at home, but fine. I had to reconnect a couple of times but that was pretty fast.

 

[Starclassic]

We used it this summer (at WL) with my iPad and we thought it was fine. I mean, not as fast as at home, but fine. I had to reconnect a couple of times but that was pretty fast.

Okay, doesn't sound too bad. I'm just trying to decide if I'm going to bring my wi-fi only iPad down with me....since its free wi-fi, I think I will. Worse case scenario is I can't connect and can't use the iPad. No big deal. Plus, our trip isn't for another 4 months so maybe it will improve by then.

 

[Sandmanswife9]

I know Disney has been adding free wi-fi in a lot of places, but can someone tell me if it's in the Value resorts yet (particularly All-Star Music)? Thanks!

My question is will the iPad fit into the in room safe? I would be Leary of leaving it out for fear of being taken. What is your thought?

 

[Starclassic]

My question is will the iPad fit into the in room safe? I would be Leary of leaving it out for fear of being taken. What is your thought?

I was thinking we could probably just lock it in our suitcase during the day.

 

[PeachesDoesHair]

Our experience at AoA Sept 22-29 was that the wifi connection was not sufficient to connect to any of our devices (kindle fire, laptops, cell phone). We were in the Cars section. I have read, however, that there were several people in the Nemo section who were able to connect with their devices, though the connection was a bit slow. Just be prepared it may or may not work.

I went enrolled into a five week college course (online) and due to the wifi not connecting, I missed two deadlines and ended up having to drop the course due to the penalties for turning work in late bringing my grade down too much. Just want to throw that out there. I wish there would have been an ethernet cable, as I would have gladly paid $10 to connect rather than the loose part of my tuition from dropping a class. Apparently, my instructor did not believe the inability to connect to the internet at Disney World constituted as an "emergency." The nerve!

 

[JennyDrake]

It is VERY slow. Easy to connect but I would never reply upon it for surfing--just checking email.

 

[2Tiggies]

We were at POFQ for 18 nights last month - long enough to get a fair feel for the wifi. I found it fine for the most part in the room and speed was pretty okay. The parks? Well that was another story all together So many 'black spots' and had to keep accepting the terms and agreements to reconnect.

Also at the resort it was great around the main building but again, as soon as we ventured towards the pool I lost connection on my phone. It was hit and miss for the most part, but usable since I was only relying on it to keep in touch with family.

One word of advice, using any mobile devices, if you are going out for the day and want to use wifi, make sure your battery is always fully charged. Mine lasts a good 1-2 days with fairly heavy use at home but I was recharging every time we came back between parks while there due to the drain of continual attempts to reconnect to the signal

 

[kjetjl]

We just got home from All Star Movies. We were in the Herbie section. We successfully used WiFi on our laptops but could never get it to work with any of our cell phones or kindle fire.

 

[B-Ride]

We were at the Poly in August and we were constantly losing our connection and needing to reconnect. Still it wasn't that bad and it was free. We were certainly able to get the few things we needed done.

 

[Micca]

We were at AKV last week with no problems with the web connection. We didn't do anything complicated, but for email, surfing, etc. it was fine. I can't imagine there would be any difference in the quality of the connection from one resort to the next?

 

[lylone]

Our experience at AoA Sept 22-29 was that the wifi connection was not sufficient to connect to any of our devices (kindle fire, laptops, cell phone). We were in the Cars section. I have read, however, that there were several people in the Nemo section who were able to connect with their devices, though the connection was a bit slow. Just be prepared it may or may not work.

I went enrolled into a five week college course (online) and due to the wifi not connecting, I missed two deadlines and ended up having to drop the course due to the penalties for turning work in late bringing my grade down too much. Just want to throw that out there. I wish there would have been an ethernet cable, as I would have gladly paid $10 to connect rather than the loose part of my tuition from dropping a class. Apparently, my instructor did not believe the inability to connect to the internet at Disney World constituted as an "emergency." The nerve!

Wow! I just graduated from technical school and missed a week every semester with no issues. I just let my teacher know ahead of time and handed in assignments and took tests early.
I would never rely on wi fi for school projects. There are wired connections available at the convention resorts at disney.

 

[Fuhnuh]

I would have gladly paid $10 to connect rather than the loose part of my tuition from dropping a class.

I am also in the camp that would rather have the option to pay for a reliable connection, but I am sure that Disney would get a lot more complaints about the free wi-fi if there was a more reliable paid service available. We stayed at AKL, GF, BC and the Disney dream for 25 days last August and had a lot of problems staying connected on the free wi-fi at the resorts and parks. I had problems getting the small amount of business that I couldn't put off done (just emailing small pdfs). Just getting emails was a problem (not all the time) and surfing more than a few minutes was spotty. I had better luck on the Dream. Thankfully we had devices that had poor, but adequate 3g and 4g connections.

I hope that Disney's wi-fi services are just going through growing pains and the service gets less spotty in the future. I would rather have a real slow connection than getting kicked off so frequently. This is just my experience with my family's internet needs. I thank everyone who is keeping us updated with their experiences as I plan for next August's trip.

 

[waynesgirl]

As a hotelier who offers free wi-fi, we do get a lot of complaints that our connections time out or are spotty. However, being free does not mean that it is enough bandwidth to allow ( at my hotel) all rooms to utilize ALL aspects of the internet or their devices.

Example: if 100 rooms are full, and just 15 of those rooms are using Skype and/or streaming video, then it eats up all the available bandwidth so other guests get nothing. Free wi-fi doesn't mean free to the hotels.

Also, peaches...sorry for your issues. It really stinks. Not that you did, but a lot of times, I have guests that complain about being thrown of the internet and how bad our service is but it is really the security on the computer itself. I have spent a lot of time helping guests fix their settings. I know...your problem happened to me too.

 

[lanejudy]

I am also in the camp that would rather have the option to pay for a reliable connection, but I am sure that Disney would get a lot more complaints about the free wi-fi if there was a more reliable paid service available.

When they added wifi did they do away with the option to purchase a wired connection? All resorts used to have that available for purchase, but I think you had to bring your own cables.