Wi-Fi & connectivity

[bruhmoment]

I just moved into my dorm and my mom bought me a small Roku TV so I can watch TV, the news, & Youtube (thank you Mom <3). Whenever I try to connect to my college’s wifi, it asks me if I’m staying in a hotel or dorm, which I answer yes to. Then it takes me to the Hotel & Dorm Connect screen where it tells me to go to my phone or laptops wireless settings and connect to the TV via bluetooth and enter a password. 

The problem is that the TV does not appear in my wireless settings/bluetooth devices, at all. Not on my phone, not on my laptop. I’ve tried getting closer to the TV. I’ve tried restarting my TV. I’ve tried restarting the network settings on my TV. I’ve tried turning the bluetooth on my phone on and off again. I’ve been trying to connect to the internet for days now. Nothing is working.

How am I supposed to connect to a wireless device that isn’t showing up at all? How am I supposed to connect to the internet? What use is a TV without wifi these days? 

Additional but slightly unrelated problem: my school has public and private wifi, but when I try to connect my TV to it’s private wifi (that requires a username and password), Roku only lets me enter a password, which obviously doesn’t work. Since it’s a private network, I don’t even get the prompt asking me if I’m in a hotel or dorm, so I don’t get the option to log in with a username and password via my phone, so I have to use the public wifi. I don’t like having all these passwords and information on public wifi. 

[makaiguy · Accepted solution]

To help you understand how this works...

Many hotels, dorms, etc, are set up with a WiFi system that you connect to by logging in via a web page accessed by the web browser on a computer, tablet, or phone. When you have logged in with whatever information the system's web page requests, it establishes your internet connection for that device.  Any additional devices must be logged in separately.  The institution may place a limit on the number of devices you may connect.

But the Roku has no web browser, so how can you log it into such a system?

In order to log the Roku into the net's web page, Roku provides a Hotel and Dorm mode in which you still use your computer or mobile device, but you connect it to the web page through the Roku using a WiFi Direct connection to the Roku (@bruhmoment - note NOT Bluetooth).  Your browser submits the login data like normal, but it goes through the Roku and thus establishes the Roku's net connection.

This Roku page explains in detail how to access and use the Hotel and Dorm capabilities: https://support.roku.com/article/215058118

For this to work, your Roku must already have been set up and linked to your Roku account.  If need be, you can set it up by connecting through a WiFi hotspot on a phone, then disconnect and use the Hotel/Dorm protocol to connect through the dorm's wifi.

[bruhmoment]

Thank you! I misunderstood wireless connection as bluetooth. Thanks for explaining :^)