If you have a new wireless network (or one that your have been using for a while) and you see that your computer is able to get online, take the next step of optimizing your wireless connection.
If you live in an area with several wireless networks in the vicinity, chances are that your wireless connection is going to suffer from interference. Interference affects your throughput (quality of internet connectivity). What you should do is to check the throughput of your internet connection after changing the wireless channel on your router. Go from Channel 1-11 and check the throughput after each channel change (check your router manual one how to do this – usually all your need to do is to visit an IP address like “192.168.1.1” enter the admin username and password and change wireless settings using only your browser).
There is a good online internet speed test here:
http://www.speedtest.net/
Test the upload and download speed using the same test location (the application will recommend the best location to test from) with all the wireless channels available on your router and then set your router to use the one that provides the best throughput. The speed test will tell you the channel that gives you the best upload and download speeds.
There are other techniques also to improve your internet connectivity and that involves messing with your TCP settings. Search for a product call Dr. TCP to explore that avenue.