How to Turn Your Windows 8 Laptop into a Wireless Access Point

A lot of companies are starting to sell portable 3G routers that you can take with you when you go out, but what happens when you forget, luckily How-To Geek is here to save the day with this neat command line trick.

Creating Your Own WI-FI Hotspot

Press the Windows + R key combination to bring up a run box, type ncpa.cpl and hit enter.

When your network connections open right-click on your Wireless network adapter and select properties from the context menu.

Now switch over to the Sharing tab and allow other devices to use your machines internet by selecting the first checkbox and then unchecking the second before clicking on the OK button.

Now right-click in the bottom left of your screen, to launch an administrative command prompt.

The first thing we need to do is set up the wireless network, this is done using the netsh command like so:

netsh wlan set hostednetwork mode=allow ssid=”How-To Geek” key=”Pa$$w0rd”

Where ssid is the name of your network and key is the password you want users to connect with, its also worth mentioning that the access point is created with WPA2-PSK (AES) encryption.

Now we are ready to start broadcasting our network:

netsh wlan start hostednetwork

The last command you will need to know is the show command, it will tell you things like the channel you are on as well as the number of clients connected to your network:

netsh wlan show hostednetwork

Using Third-Party Wi-Fi HotSpot Creator

If you don’t want the fuss of having to manually configure a wireless ad hoc connection, then previously featured WiFi HotSpot Creator provides the best solution. It’s a zero-configuration software, designed to quickly create an ad hoc connection. It basically turns your PC into a virtual router, enabling all nearby Wi-Fi enabled devices to use your PC’s internet connection. All you need is to enter SSID name, passkey, and specify network interface to share the internet. Clicking Start will turn your PC into a Wi-Fi hotspot.

If you’re looking for a tool to configure the ad hoc connection and manage the connected devices from a unified interface, Connectify provides you with what you’ve been looking for. It’s an application that transforms your PC into a Wi-Fi hotspot, allowing you to share the internet connection with others. Apart from transforming your PC into a WiFi hotspot, it allows you to view and manage all connected devices, and set internet access permissions for each connected device.

It’s worth mentioning here that virtual WiFi creators require virtualization-enabled Network Adapter for creating WiFi Hotspot. So, if none of above methods work out for you, then you may need to install a NIC that supports virtualization feature.