Use of a laptop

[Slyfox16]

If you have internet credit, can you use your laptop, in your room or else where, without any additional fees?

[Colo Cruiser]

If you have internet credit, can you use your laptop, in your room or else where, without any additional fees?

 

 

Internet credit as in extra minutes to use?

 

If so Yes.

[dforeigner]

If you have internet credit, can you use your laptop, in your room or else where, without any additional fees?

 

Absolutely. Connectivity may be slow or non-existent in some areas while out at sea due to poor satellite reception though.

[Lucky TGO]

I use my iPad Pro all over the ship and in my cabin with no problem at all. I think your laptop should work fine.

The ship I was on was the Royal Princess 3 separate cruises 60 days total.

Tony

[EastBay Cruisers]

Just disembarked from the Emerald 2 weeks ago. Tried to use our laptop in our cabin while at sea,but couldn't connect to the internet. Took the laptop down to the Internet Cafe, and the Internet Manager said while at sea, internet service at sea was limited to Decks 5,6,and 7 in all-passenger spaces like the Piazza or the dining areas.

 

We had some photos stored on our laptop, so we wanted to use the laptop to write e-mail in order to attach the photos.

 

Hopefully, you'll be able to connect to the internet from your cabin. -- EBC

[Thrak]

Just disembarked from the Emerald 2 weeks ago. Tried to use our laptop in our cabin while at sea,but couldn't connect to the internet. Took the laptop down to the Internet Cafe, and the Internet Manager said while at sea, internet service at sea was limited to Decks 5,6,and 7 in all-passenger spaces like the Piazza or the dining areas.

 

We had some photos stored on our laptop, so we wanted to use the laptop to write e-mail in order to attach the photos.

 

Hopefully, you'll be able to connect to the internet from your cabin. -- EBC

 

Doesn't sound right to me. I have never heard of such a thing. I can use any device anywhere on the ship. Some places have better access than others but it certainly has never been limited to specific portions of specific decks. There would be no reason to limit service "while at sea". That makes no sense at all. I can see it now, "We are now at sea. I guess I'll turn off most of the repeaters onboard because........???"

[EastBay Cruisers]

Hi Thrak,

 

What happened to us was that we could not log on to the internet in our cabin. So, we took the laptop down to the Internet cafe on Deck 5. We met the Internet Mgr., a nice man named Serge, from Serbia. He may still be on the Emerald when you sail next week.

 

Serge told us that the we probably would not be able to access the internet in our cabin, and the best place to connect to the internet was in the public passenger places of Decks, 5, 6, 7, On the Emerald, those are the 3 decks of the Atrium and the Piazza. Since it was our first time cruising, we didn't want to argue about whether the repeaters were on or not, so we just took him at this word and set up our laptop in the Internet Cafe. It worked fine there.

 

When we were working on our laptop in the Internet Cafe, a number of other passengers came in and asked the Internet Mgr. the same question --- "I paid for internet minutes, but I cannot connect to the internet in my cabin." We were sitting right by his desk, so we heard him give the same answer about a dozen times.

 

I don't know why he would give that answer -- but I do know that we clearly heard him about a dozen times. Now, maybe there was some kind of technical glitch on board the Emerald at that time? Not sure, but I do know that he gave the same answer to each passenger who came in with that problem.

 

Have a great cruise on the Emerald, and let us know how the internet access worked for you. For us, once we logged in, it worked kind of slow, like a dial-up connection. But, we were grateful to be able to read e-mail, send some photos, etc. ( I compressed the photos, so we weren't trying to send 2 MB photos and taking up a lot of bandwidth). - EBC

[dforeigner]

Hi Thrak,

 

What happened to us was that we could not log on to the internet in our cabin. So, we took the laptop down to the Internet cafe on Deck 5. We met the Internet Mgr., a nice man named Serge, from Serbia. He may still be on the Emerald when you sail next week.

 

Serge told us that the we probably would not be able to access the internet in our cabin, and the best place to connect to the internet was in the public passenger places of Decks, 5, 6, 7, On the Emerald, those are the 3 decks of the Atrium and the Piazza. Since it was our first time cruising, we didn't want to argue about whether the repeaters were on or not, so we just took him at this word and set up our laptop in the Internet Cafe. It worked fine there.

 

When we were working on our laptop in the Internet Cafe, a number of other passengers came in and asked the Internet Mgr. the same question --- "I paid for internet minutes, but I cannot connect to the internet in my cabin." We were sitting right by his desk, so we heard him give the same answer about a dozen times.

 

I don't know why he would give that answer -- but I do know that we clearly heard him about a dozen times. Now, maybe there was some kind of technical glitch on board the Emerald at that time? Not sure, but I do know that he gave the same answer to each passenger who came in with that problem.

 

Have a great cruise on the Emerald, and let us know how the internet access worked for you. For us, once we logged in, it worked kind of slow, like a dial-up connection. But, we were grateful to be able to read e-mail, send some photos, etc. ( I compressed the photos, so we weren't trying to send 2 MB photos and taking up a lot of bandwidth). - EBC

 

I am not disputing what you experienced. By I have used the internet from my room in deck 8 all the way in the back (E728). Perhaps they had some issued with the internet when you were on board.

[Steelers36]

There must have been an issue. I have been on Emerald, CB, Ruby, Regal - and most often on Baja and internet worked. Now they have more wireless repeaters. But still some cabins get poor signal reception. We usually have Insides. I have propped door open part way with a life vest or couple of towels. And it makes a tremendous improvement in signal strength and response. Still have privacy with partial door open for a short period. But sure the open Piazza area is going to be good for wireless.

[paul929207]

I use my laptop in my cabin and have little problem. I have done this for a number of years.

[tailspintom]

There must have been an issue. I have been on Emerald, CB, Ruby, Regal - and most often on Baja and internet worked. Now they have more wireless repeaters. But still some cabins get poor signal reception. We usually have Insides. I have propped door open part way with a life vest or couple of towels. And it makes a tremendous improvement in signal strength and response. Still have privacy with partial door open for a short period. But sure the open Piazza area is going to be good for wireless.

I believe that if you leave the door partially opened and wear an aluminum foil hat while grounding yourself to a water pipe, the signal is improved. It does make it difficult to type, though.

[easyboy]

We keep our door slightly ajar when we experience weak reception.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

[Clampram]

I've used my laptop on the Emerald, Royal and Regal. No problems other than it's a bit slow so it can be easy to eat up your minutes. I use the Princess Intranet to view my bill while on board and any other items pertinent to the cruise that I am on. That requires no internet hook up but it really helps to make sure that your bill is correct. Have found issues with that on nearly every cruise but they are promptly fixed at the customer service counter. We've been billed for others dry cleaning, bar bills and gift shop purchases.

[Thrak]

Hi Thrak,

 

What happened to us was that we could not log on to the internet in our cabin. So, we took the laptop down to the Internet cafe on Deck 5. We met the Internet Mgr., a nice man named Serge, from Serbia. He may still be on the Emerald when you sail next week.

 

Serge told us that the we probably would not be able to access the internet in our cabin, and the best place to connect to the internet was in the public passenger places of Decks, 5, 6, 7, On the Emerald, those are the 3 decks of the Atrium and the Piazza. Since it was our first time cruising, we didn't want to argue about whether the repeaters were on or not, so we just took him at this word and set up our laptop in the Internet Cafe. It worked fine there.

 

When we were working on our laptop in the Internet Cafe, a number of other passengers came in and asked the Internet Mgr. the same question --- "I paid for internet minutes, but I cannot connect to the internet in my cabin." We were sitting right by his desk, so we heard him give the same answer about a dozen times.

 

I don't know why he would give that answer -- but I do know that we clearly heard him about a dozen times. Now, maybe there was some kind of technical glitch on board the Emerald at that time? Not sure, but I do know that he gave the same answer to each passenger who came in with that problem.

 

Have a great cruise on the Emerald, and let us know how the internet access worked for you. For us, once we logged in, it worked kind of slow, like a dial-up connection. But, we were grateful to be able to read e-mail, send some photos, etc. ( I compressed the photos, so we weren't trying to send 2 MB photos and taking up a lot of bandwidth). - EBC

 

Thanks for the clarification. There must have been some weird issue going on. Kind of a drag since there is supposed to be access everywhere. Princess is supposedly pursuing major upgrades to their Internet access. It's normally so very sloooooooooooooooooooooooow that it can be pretty frustrating. Fortunately we don't use it a lot.

[cb at sea]

I've been in hotels where I couldn't get internet in my room...but I could on another floor or the lobby....wi-fi is odd like that! If there was a wired connection...then no issue...but wi-fi is temperamental!

[Thermy]

Well I didn't get internet in my cabin on the Grand last year, but I didn't question it. It was the first time I had an internet minutes so I didn't realise this was unusual (until reading this thread right now). I would type up my emails in the cabin and then pop down to a public area (usually deck 7, outside the Wheelhouse Bar or the Explorers Lounge) to sit, connect and send my emails and upload some photos.

[LizSydney]

Doesn't sound right to me. I have never heard of such a thing. I can use any device anywhere on the ship. Some places have better access than others but it certainly has never been limited to specific portions of specific decks. There would be no reason to limit service "while at sea". That makes no sense at all. I can see it now, "We are now at sea. I guess I'll turn off most of the repeaters onboard because........???"

 

I also haven't heard of that. When I was on the Emerald a few months back I could use WIFI anywhere.

[SwissDave]

If you have internet credit, can you use your laptop, in your room or else where, without any additional fees?

Yes, if you already have internet package/loyalty benefit then there are no additional charges to connect to the internet via the ships WiFi network.

[peety3]

There must have been an issue. I have been on Emerald, CB, Ruby, Regal - and most often on Baja and internet worked. Now they have more wireless repeaters. But still some cabins get poor signal reception. We usually have Insides. I have propped door open part way with a life vest or couple of towels. And it makes a tremendous improvement in signal strength and response. Still have privacy with partial door open for a short period. But sure the open Piazza area is going to be good for wireless.

For what it's worth, the units mounted to the ceilings here/there/everywhere are "wireless access points", not repeaters. The WAPs are wired into the network infrastructure, and are locally originating/receiving wireless signals from/to the wired network (and most likely tunneling your traffic back to a wireless LAN controller), not repeating the signal wirelessly to another device.

 

 

That said, I'd have to guess that there's a problem. Could you get intranet (i.e. "Princess @Sea") coverage from your room? Because the internet (metered by time) is merely a login on top of the same intranet service you can (usually) get everywhere, I don't think it's feasible that the deck 5/6/7 WAPs are in a different WAP group (you'd have to "roam" between groups every time you entered the deck 5/6/7 or left it).

[Steelers36]

For what it's worth, the units mounted to the ceilings here/there/everywhere are "wireless access points", not repeaters. The WAPs are wired into the network infrastructure, and are locally originating/receiving wireless signals from/to the wired network (and most likely tunneling your traffic back to a wireless LAN controller), not repeating the signal wirelessly to another device.

 

 

That said, I'd have to guess that there's a problem. Could you get intranet (i.e. "Princess @Sea") coverage from your room? Because the internet (metered by time) is merely a login on top of the same intranet service you can (usually) get everywhere, I don't think it's feasible that the deck 5/6/7 WAPs are in a different WAP group (you'd have to "roam" between groups every time you entered the deck 5/6/7 or left it).

 

Agree - I was being "sloppy" with my post and non-technical. Totally not repeaters.

[UpcountryTravelers]

I've used my laptop in my stateroom on every Princess cruise I've been on. No problem. (Yes, satellite internet is slow. Nature of the beast.)

[raisinhead]

For what it's worth, the units mounted to the ceilings here/there/everywhere are "wireless access points", not repeaters. The WAPs are wired into the network infrastructure, and are locally originating/receiving wireless signals from/to the wired network (and most likely tunneling your traffic back to a wireless LAN controller), not repeating the signal wirelessly to another device.

 

 

That said, I'd have to guess that there's a problem. Could you get intranet (i.e. "Princess @Sea") coverage from your room? Because the internet (metered by time) is merely a login on top of the same intranet service you can (usually) get everywhere, I don't think it's feasible that the deck 5/6/7 WAPs are in a different WAP group (you'd have to "roam" between groups every time you entered the deck 5/6/7 or left it).

 

Probably just need to power cycle those access points occasionally.

[Times Prince]

For what it's worth, the units mounted to the ceilings here/there/everywhere are "wireless access points", not repeaters. The WAPs are wired into the network infrastructure, and are locally originating/receiving wireless signals from/to the wired network (and most likely tunneling your traffic back to a wireless LAN controller), not repeating the signal wirelessly to another device.

The only wireless is from the user's device to the wireless access point (aka wireless router). From there on all the communication goes via Ethernet cable to switches. Ethernet switches talk to other Ethernet switches, eventually reaching the server(s) which control intranet/internet traffic.

 

If a ship has no access in a certain area, then it was highly likely they had a switch hardware failure somewhere in the chain of devices servicing the network traffic from that area, with insufficient redundancy. This was probably the original issue for the decks in question.

 

Moving around the ship brings you to different wireless access points and different switch networks. Unlike cell towers for phones which automatically switches your signal to the next network tower, this will likely cause you to need to log in again to the network from your new location, as your PC is no longer on the original path, and is automatically logged out.

[Thrak]

The only wireless is from the user's device to the wireless access point (aka wireless router). From there on all the communication goes via Ethernet cable to switches. Ethernet switches talk to other Ethernet switches, eventually reaching the server(s) which control intranet/internet traffic.

 

If a ship has no access in a certain area, then it was highly likely they had a switch hardware failure somewhere in the chain of devices servicing the network traffic from that area, with insufficient redundancy. This was probably the original issue for the decks in question.

 

Moving around the ship brings you to different wireless access points and different switch networks. Unlike cell towers for phones which automatically switches your signal to the next network tower, this will likely cause you to need to log in again to the network from your new location, as your PC is no longer on the original path, and is automatically logged out.

 

Like many IT issues a simple reboot of the affected device might well have "fixed" things - at least temporarily. Sometimes though Ethernet devices have issues. I've had switches with ports that failed. Heck, I've had brand new very expensive switches that seemed to have bad ports right out of the box. It was far too much of a hassle and too time consuming to get them replaced (I worked for the state of California) and the switch was total overkill for the office in question so I just used a different port. In many cases however that simply wouldn't work (In "real life" I would have replaced the switch in question but working for the state is very different from real life.)