Is this possible? Cruise ship w/ WI-FI/ Mobile Phone/Skype

[TheDempster]

I am going on a cruise in April, and the ship has WI-FI access on board. I will be subscribing to a week long internet rate with the cruise line (will use with my laptop). I also want access the on board WI-FI service using my HTC Touch Pro's WI-FI capability, and use Skype for making calls to land lines in the US.

Has anyone done this? Can you access the ships WI-FI via your Cell phones WI-FI connection? If you can,will you be able to use Skype via that connection?

If it is possible, it would be a great way to avoid all those heavy at sea phone calls.

Any one had experience with this?

Would love to here from anyone who has figured this out.

[TheDempster]

A lot of views, No takers?

[snowplow54]

Well, i dont really have any experience using wifi on cruise ships, but i would imagine this would work. Ive used skype on my diamond through various different wifi connections while I was travelling through England last summer, and didnt have any problems. I think you should be fine.

[gcianc]

wi-fi on the ship will require a logon so lets assume you can use your brower and authenticate your connection. Even though for the phone that is a big if.

once connected you might not even have enough data rate for skype. i've used internet on ships that are slower than 14.4 baud modems back in the day.

so even if you had a laptop and perfect wifi connection you might find the ship's internet pathetically unusable for plain text email.

there is a huge YMMV as it depends on the location, system, satellite, weather, etc.

worst case at port find a Starbucks or wi-fi location with good connection rate.

Originally Posted by TheDempster

I am going on a cruise in April, and the ship has WI-FI access on board. I will be subscribing to a week long internet rate with the cruise line (will use with my laptop). I also want access the on board WI-FI service using my HTC Touch Pro's WI-FI capability, and use Skype for making calls to land lines in the US.

Has anyone done this? Can you access the ships WI-FI via your Cell phones WI-FI connection? If you can,will you be able to use Skype via that connection?

If it is possible, it would be a great way to avoid all those heavy at sea phone calls.

Any one had experience with this?

Would love to here from anyone who has figured this out.

[RobDFW]

Originally Posted by gcianc

wi-fi on the ship will require a logon so lets assume you can use your brower and authenticate your connection. Even though for the phone that is a big if.

once connected you might not even have enough data rate for skype. i've used internet on ships that are slower than 14.4 baud modems back in the day.

so even if you had a laptop and perfect wifi connection you might find the ship's internet pathetically unusable for plain text email.

there is a huge YMMV as it depends on the location, system, satellite, weather, etc.

worst case at port find a Starbucks or wi-fi location with good connection rate.

Agreed. Internet on ships is slooooooow. It will probably work, but don't count on good quality.

[Laos101]

Nope, its satellite internet, AKA 200kbps, you'll be lucky if you get a ring tone

EDIT: better chances in port with local wifi.

[gprimr1]

There will also be a delay due to the distance involved.

If you want to make phone calls, you should look at satellite phone rentals. They can be cheaper than cruise ship calls.

[Laos101]

Originally Posted by gprimr1

There will also be a delay due to the distance involved.

If you want to make phone calls, you should look at satellite phone rentals. They can be cheaper than cruise ship calls.

something tells me if you're gonna be on cruises enough to need to think of an alternative to their services, maybe you can afford the calls :P

[TheDempster]

Well thanks for the feed back. I just like a challange. From what I understand after doing some research, the ships block the Skype ports on their firewalls (Magic Jack too). I have heard conflicting detail about the internet speed. Obviously this has been tried by other people.

[GirlGoneGeek]

I would assume they do have a place where you could probably access the internet. Or as mentioned above I'd wait until we reached a port. But you will find more answers in your research.