Do you need to set priorities for Windows 7 about which wireless networks to connect to, automatically? Do you need to make it stop connecting each time it detects certain networks? Do you want to modify the connection settings for a wireless network? Answers to all these questions are found in this article.
Opening the Manage Wireless Networks Window
In order to access and modify your settings related to wireless network connections, you need to open the Manage Wireless Networks window. First, open the Network and Sharing Center. There, on the left side column, click on Manage wireless networks.
In the Manage Wireless Networks window you can see all the wireless networks to which your computer connected in the past. For each of these networks, you can edit their connection settings.
Setting the Order in Which You Connect to Wireless Networks
One of the very cool things you can do is to set the priority between networks. Simply select each network one by one and use the Move up and Move down buttons to arrange their order the list of priorities.
What does this means? If a network is at the top of the list, Windows 7 will connect to it automatically, even though others from the list are available.
However, in order for this to work, you need to open the properties of the less important networks. Simply double click on them and, in the Connection tab of their Properties window, check the box which says "Connect to a more preferred network if available".
Other Advanced Wireless Network Settings
When accessing the properties of a wireless network, you can change also some more advanced settings.
For example, in the Properties window of a wireless network, you will find a tab called Security. There you will be able to change the security and encryption type of the network, plus the security key used to connect to it.
However, make sure you are changing these settings for good reasons. If your connection to a wireless network is working fine, do not change them. If the settings need changing for valid reasons (e.g. you changed the password on the router broadcasting this network), change them and click OK.
Clicking on the Advanced settings button will allow you to check if your network needs to be compliant with the FIPS security standard used for sharing sensitive information (valid only for government networks).
As you can see from this tutorial, the Manage Wireless Networks window gives you access to lots of cool options about managing wireless network connections, that can help in many scenarios. If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to use the comments forms below.
