Question from Sean N.:  My wife and I rented out a spare bedroom to a college student a couple of years ago, and once while we were on vacation our wireless went out.

Not wanting to have to do without Wi-Fi until we got back, our renter purchased a replacement router and installed it.

When we got back from our trip he gave us the password he had put on the new router’s wireless network and we used it to log on to the network.

When our renter left he told us we could keep the router, and we were very grateful. The problem is we never wrote down the Wi-Fi password and we have long since forgotten it.

5 months ago my wife and I bought matching HP laptops. My wife’s laptop had to be replaced under warranty and now she needs the Wi-Fi password in order to sign into the network with the new laptop.

I told you all of that to ask you this: Do you know of any way to retrieve the password from the router? I’d hate to have to go out and buy another new router if I can avoid it.

If I have buy a new router I might just use the wireless without a password to avoid running into a situation like this again.

Rick’s answer:   [Read more…]