Well, there are many reasons why people dislike Windows Vista and which keeps them away from upgrading from Windows XP, and indeed - as Steve Ballmer said in his MVP Global Summit keynote today - "Windows Vista is work in progress". Nevertheless, there are these kind of "hidden" but very usefully features available as well, like setting up a wireless ad hoc network which can be quite useful in hotels.
I'm currently staying at the Westin, downtown Seattle and the Westin offers in-room high-speed Internet access through CAT5 and WiFi. Unfortunately the Westin is charging its "guests" for Internet access.

As quite typical for most hotels, if you buy access, this access is good for one PC only, not for several which you might have with you (okay, an uncommon scenario for most travelers but anyway - I will come to this later). And I've decided through CAT5 for a good reason, it leaves the inbuilt WiFi available for different use, in this case for creating an ad hoc network which allows me to operate my Tablet PC as a kind of access point for other WiFi enabled devices I have with me, like my HTC Shift or my Samsung SGH-i600. And since more and more smartphones have WiFi built in, the scenario I've described above isn't that uncommon anymore, that a traveler might has more then just one WiFi enabled device.

Anyway, with Windows Vista it's quite easy to create a new wireless ad hoc network and giving this network Internet access through the wired LAN:

So thanks to this configuration, which isn't anything special but unlike in Windows XP, very simple to create and to configure, I've connected both, my Windows Vista powered HTC Shift and even my Windows Mobile powered Samsung SGH-i600 to the Internet, without paying for an additional Internet access in the hotel or paying any international roaming fees for UMTS:

As I said, that's nothing special but sometimes its good to know that these kind of options are available, especially if you are travelling.

Cheers ~ Arne