Calling all the Techies

I was reading a thread over in Welcome Wagon, and it raised a question for me.  The poster asks several different questions about life in the UK, one is concerning a computer.  The answer that was given brings me to my question.  I have a laptop and have it set up for wireless connection.  My gf has a laptop as well.  Would it be worth it to bring my router etc with me?  Gf says that my laptop will work fine with an adapter, what about all this stuff?

Anyone???

I'm on my US laptop right now.  All I needed was the plug adapter so that the prongs would fit in the electrical outlet.  I see no reason why a router wouldn't work, since most computer peripherals seem to have standard USB or ethernet connections.  Check the router to see if it's dual-voltage.  It would say something like "100-240v" on it.

Yes, definitely worth it, and quite easy.

However, if she has a wifi card, and you have a wifi card, you don't need the router. It takes two seconds to set it up as an "ad hoc" network, meaning the two machines communicate with one another as peers. So one of you has the DSL or cable modem or whatever, and the other connects via wifi and pinches it.

I got three Wireless B (the old tech) cards on woot.com for $10 (if you're not checking woot every morning, you oughta). Popped one in my laptop and one in his at Christmas, and voila! We had a functioning network. Okay, it took fiddling with a few settings and a couple of reboots, but it was very slick! We didn't fight over the connect for the holidays.

A router will work just fine, subject to the usual 120 vs. 240V power issue.

Okay!  I'll put it on the "to-pack" list.  I have to say, I'm a bit nervous.  I did melt my curling iron on the last trip.  Sam is pretty good about conversions etc, so I think we'll get it going without blowing up laptops. 

Thanks for the replies!

I did melt my curling iron on the last trip. 

I'm not surprised!   

Connect a 120V curling iron to 240V and you have double the voltage and double the current.  That equates to four times as much heat!