Summary
Do you live in a big city where the number of wireless connections exceeds the number of people living there? On the one hand, you can use this to your advantage by always being able to find a free wireless signal when going through the city. On the other hand, too many WiFi connections can be a problem when you are surfing the web from the comfort of your home. That’s why it’s important to have a reliable tool that can manage all of your wireless connections. WiFi Manager is up next on our “operating table”.
Features & Use
WiFi Manager may come across as nothing more than just a simple list of all the available wireless networks. And that’s at least partially the case.
Listing all available WiFi signals
WiFi Manager can search for networks either automatically or with your click.
The list of WiFi networks can be sorted by:
- Live networks: shows all available networks
- Known networks: shows all previously accessed networks (whether they are within range or not).
In another drop-down menu you can list your networks:
- By signal: displays the strongest signals first
- By name: in alphabetical order
- Open first: Frankly, I still can’t figure out what this option is about. Please comment if you have any ideas! :)
Connecting, Disconnecting and Canceling Networks
With just one click on the network, you can manage any given connection. Once you’re connected to a specific network you can:
- Disconnect: No duh!
- Forget: Clears both connection and password
- Cancel: Self-explanatory.
Additional important information is also displayed for those people that are interested in that kind of stuff: connection security, network channel and signal strength.
Functions via the menu button
Most things can be accessed by pressing the menu button:
- List: Displays the default network list
- Radar: A cool graph of all the networks around you displayed in the form of colorful ellipses. It gives you a good perspective of each network’s range.
- Add network
- Disable Wifi and close: Stops WiFi and closes the app
- Settings: Some additional minor adjustments can be made.
Don’t forget the widgets!
There are two different widgets that making using WiFi Manager much easier:
- WiFi Manager: Allows you to quickly and efficiently turn WiFi on/off
- WiFi Network Switcher: This lets you switch between several different networks.
Bottom Line:
If all you need to do is manage just one WiFi connections – this app isn’t for you. For those of you that use different WiFi connections throughout the day, however, this app could come in really handy. For example, in the office where I work, we have a ton of different WiFi connections. Using WiFi Manager I could finally visualize which networks where using which channels. That really helped us out here at work to clear up the WiFi confusion. The widgets are practical and useful, but nothing too exciting.
Screen & Controls
Like many other Android Apps, WiFi Manager fails to live up to its expectations.
Menu Button Problem
I am not a fan of having to press the menu button to be able to access important features. There is no way of going from one screen to the other is impossible without pressing the menu button. Not cool!
No Clear Buttons or Explanations
WiFi Manager is supposed to let you quickly and painlessly find wireless networks. There are two buttons available to do this: a magic wand and magnifying glass. With the magic wand the app checks for networks automatically and the magnifying glass searches for networks once.How the hell am I supposed to figure that out just by looking at them? It’s just plain confusing and annoying. Does anyone actually need to permanently search for wireless networks? Very odd indeed.
Speed & Stability
WiFi Manager works perfectly. It even manages to detect networks with extremely weak signals.
Price/Performance Ratio
WiFi Manager can be downloaded for free from the App Center.
Developer
Russian FederationTop App:
Find, connect, manage WiFi networks. Improve connection quality with a graphical channel (...)
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I don't checked out this option (open first) personally yet, but i think it allows to show all networks without password as first
Thanks, Maksim! We need that kind of commitment and dedication.
Feel free to post suggestions or comments. We'd love to hear your input!
good