Simplified site frustrates fast wireless surfer

Q For the past several years, I've often used my phone rather than a laptop computer for online access. Because my current phone has a Wi-Fi high-speed Internet connection, it's even more convenient to do this. But one of my great frustrations is that www.startribune.com automatically redirects me to www.startribune.com/mobile, which has very limited graphics and other Web page functions such as search. Websites such as Google give me a choice between the regular Web page and the "mobile" version. Is there a workaround I can use to access the full resources of the Star Tribune website?

JOEL MARTY, MINNEAPOLIS

A You make a good point, and the StarTribune.com staff is studying ways to give cell phone users a choice between the minimalist and regular versions of the website.

Today, cell phone users are redirected to the minimalist version of the website because most phones have relatively slow Internet connections. On average, a cell phone user downloading the regular version of StarTribune.com would wait from 40 seconds to two minutes, our online staff says. On a broadband connection, the same download takes about eight seconds.

How does the website "know" you're using a cell phone? It detects your operating system and Web browser; if they belong to the cell phone world you're automatically rerouted to www.startribune.com/mobile. One exception: iPhone users (who potentially are using Wi-Fi) are sent to the full website in the belief they want to see the graphics.

But there are two reasons to change this minimalist approach to cell phone Web surfers: More cell phones are being equipped with Wi-Fi capability that delivers broadband speeds. In addition, StarTribune.com traffic generated by cell phone users is up 36 percent from last year, although it is still less than 1 percent of total website traffic.

Q I would like to use my Windows XP desktop PC and my Windows Vista laptop to exchange files and share a printer over my home Wi-Fi network, but the two PCs don't recognize each other. Any suggestions?

JEROME STURGELESKI, MINNEAPOLIS

A The Windows Vista and XP operating systems use different methods of connecting to a home network. For example, they use different default names for a wireless network and different settings for allowing file sharing and for specifying file-sharing folders. You can learn how to synchronize these PCs so they can "see" each other on the network by going to www.startribune.com/a4177.

Steve Alexander covers technology for the Star Tribune. E-mail your technology questions to tech@startribune.com or write Tech Q&A, 425 Portland Av. S., Minneapolis, MN 55488-0002. Please include a full name, city and phone number.