Internet

Another thing you mentioned. Just because you have to buy fuel at T/A's and Loves, doesn't mean you can't stop at other truck stops for your breaks or eating.
Verizon just announced on Monday an Unlimited account with phone hotspot for $80 a month plus taxes. You said you can't do hotspot? Is it because of your phone or the plan you are on?

 

I just switched to Verizon new unlimited plan. 92 with taxes in for 1 phone. Unlimited with LTE speed to 22 gig then throttled as necessary. 10 gigs through hotspot. Throttle happens when network is busy, otherwise LTE speed....so he tells me.

I gave up my old unlimited plan for this one. Old one was costing me 197. I can go a bit easier and stay under 22 gigs. I also use pfj wifi cost me 100 for 365 days. Works pretty good, it is accurately priced. I will do my Netflix downloading on that or other places as much as I can from here on out. Verizon coverage is excellent.

 

Doubtful.
The only secure WiFi you will have is using a dedicated device that you have set the security on.

And I have monitored many of the truck stop systems. (As in signal strength and channel usage.)
Most of them have overlapping channels, which degrades performance on all those channels.
Some are using multiple networks, all using the same channel with the same result.
And the more people that connect, the less bandwidth there is to share.

If you have your own device you can switch what channel it is using at will, so you can avoid the most used ones.
I have been in places that a certain primary channel is not used at all, but they are all clustered on one or two of them.

And example would be when no one is using channel 1, but there are dozens using channels 6 and 11.
Every connection on a certain channel shares the bandwidth with every other connection on that channel, so many connections mean less speed for everyone on that channel. (It does not matter the internet provider, they all have to share the channel with each other.)

But the channels are not totally isolated from each other. They overlap - channel 6 will overlap with 4,5 and 7,8.
Any overlapping channel usage is worst than sharing a single channel, because the overlapping channels don't communicate with each other. They just get in each others way.
That is why it is best to stay on the primary channels of 1, 6 or 11. None of those overlap with the others.
And that is why so many apartment complexes have such poor internet performance. Too many connections over every single channel, and they all interfere with each other.

There are programs, like inSSIDer, that allow you to see exactly what is going on in that area.
It will let you see all the WiFi activity in your area. Which channels are being used my which connections, signal strength of each and so on. Also, which are open or secure.
Truck stops are usually open.

 

Root your phone and then you can use a tethering app. Put a password on it though, unless you want multiple other people using it.

 

My sister and I share a family plan. Her son and 2 of my daughters are included.
A total of 11 lines cost us $280 per month.
Each line has 10GB of data, with the exception of my 4 5GB data only lines.

 

No, it's not secured enough to call it secure. For example, I would not use it for banking, and especially accessing retirement account info. But you can make it secure by using or subscribing to whats called a Vitrual Private Network (VPN). You can use a free VPN or pay for one, which will be better. Cost might be $40/year. Your connection to VPN could be watched, but once you log into the VPN only you and the VPN can see your data. The NSA probably can see it if they decide to look so don't plot any coups or call them poopyheads.

 

Can you swing a phone payment with you issues ? The truck will have elog for company messages and loads.

 

Streaming videos? Rarely. General surfing? Yes