After the research of almost a decade the researchers from the Microsoft support has released a new technology in the Windows 7 called as V WiFi (Virtual Wi-Fi). It is a technology which virtualizes wireless adapter into as many wireless adapter depending upon the requirement, and make the machine to think that it has many wireless adapter in it thus provides the ability to connect to multiple hotshots simultaneously i.e. it allows a single wireless adapter to act like two, two NIc in one machine.
This Virtual Wi-Fi feature will make it easier to set up a mesh network where every system in the network act as a repeater i.e. one adapter grabs a signal and another passes it another.
The Virtual Wi-Fi (VWIFI) feature has been included in Windows 7 for the first time which is in its RC1 Phase of evolution. Although no drivers are reportedly available to take advantage of the feature so this feature is still waiting to come out and play.
Some users wonder why more than one wireless card would be needed inside your computer. There are a very few circumstances where multiple wireless adapters would be needed. For instance, users could connect to one wireless network and use the virtual adapter to turn their machine into a hot spot that other computers could connect to and share the internet access.
Another good usage scenario for the technology would be connecting to a wireless network while also connecting to a wireless ad hoc network at the same time. Istartedsomething reports that supporting Virtual Wi-Fi is going to be a requirement for WLAN drivers sporting the Windows support Certification Logo. The drivers will be coming to add support for the feature.
The feature is described as, “On Windows 7 and later, the operating system installs a virtual device if a Hosted Network capable wireless adapter is present on the machine. This virtual device normally shows up in the “Network Connections Folder” as ‘Wireless Network Connection 2’ with a Device Name of ‘Microsoft Virtual WiFi Miniport adapter’ if the computer has a single wireless network adapter. This virtual device would be used exclusively for performing software access point (SoftAP) connections. The lifetime of this virtual device is tied to the physical wireless adapter. If the physical wireless adapter is disabled, this virtual device will be removed as well.”
The caveat to the technology is that only one virtual adapter can be created.
Source:
http://www.articlesbase.com/computers-articles/new-feature-in-windows-7-virtual-wifi-technology-940097.html
