Currently, I am
cruising along Route 40 en route to Arizona. Along the way, was a great
opportunity to test out some gear I have been saving for a special occasion to
use. This included a pair of noise canceling headphones by Audio-Technica and
the Windy 31  three in one USB adapter.
Some of the devices performed great (as noted in other posts) and others, well,
did not. This is their story.

Post # 1

 

 

                 The Windy 31 three in one
device- wireless router, access point and USB wifi card,  would be
an excellent product if it did all that it was suppose too. On a five hour road
trip to Arizona, I found myself tethering with help from the AT&T Communications Manager via BlackBerry.
A few hours into the trip, my brother who isn’t as fortunate to have tethering
capabilities on his laptop, asked if he could borrow my laptop to check e-mail.
But I had a better idea, luckily I had brought the Windy 3-in1 USB card to share my connection with him wirelessly.

 

                 The setup was
supposedly quick and painless. The Windy 31 had an auto run program that would
launch and install itself on Windows Xp and Vista systems so I could share my internet connection with my
brother within a few minutes. Turns out the windy 31 is very moody. After
insertion the auto-run program would appear, and during installation it would
decide to quit and disappear from existence. After a few tries, I consulted the
"quick" start guide. The guide suggested uninstalling the  card through device manager and re-running
the setup file. I did just that (plus a restart) and received the same result. Only
his time windows came up with a "Windows is searching for unknown device driver"
error.

  

                 I tried multiple times to
remedy this, i tried copying the items from the Windy 31 onto my desktop. Then ran the installation files from the desktop with no better  results. Proceeding, I tried installing it in safe mode, disabled firewalls, anti-virus programs. You name
it I tried it. I came to the conclusion it was not the computer interfering with
the installation so I put my honor aside and placed a call to tech support.

 

                 After a few rings, a
very knowledgeable (and kind) representative informed me that a special installation
package was needed to install on Windows 64x systems and directed me to their
homepage (www.synetusa.com) to install
the necessary files. She then told me I should be fine and if I had any other problems to
give them a call back. On a tethered internet  connection the 3.24 megabyte file took a
few minutes to download. The file was a bit fishy, named
"nanna2009021920401263" and on the web page I was instructed to
"Plz download the file and run." Installation of the file left me
with a bunch of "?!????" as the file installed.  Leading me to do a
full virus and spy ware scan after wards.  No surprise after wards, the Windy 31 still did not install with any
amount of additional success.

 

                 Eventually, my
brothers laptop died and my enthusiasm to setup the Windy 31 died with it. I
tried calling the support line again but was informed the person responsible
for Windy31 support was no longer there but would call me back. As soon as I get the Windy 31 to function properly, I will post again.

**Editors
Note: this device was tested on a system running windows Vista 64 bit,
an operating system the Windy 31 may not have been originally
designed to function with.

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