Okay, I just downloaded Netstubler and will read up on that tomorrow. It's getting late here and I gotta get up in a few hours to go to school, but I just wanted to say thank you very much for all the info you provided, especially for the additional research objectives that you suggested. The original assignment is to pick something you have never done before or experienced, such as going to a mosque, volunteering in a nursing home, volunteering for communitty service, etc. then writing about your experience. As I said, my only main objective was just to simply determine how many signals I picked up were unencrypted; how many people I could find that don't realize that they are broadcasting to the world, then write about the dangers of them doing so. I had never thought about comparing the ratios to upper and lower class neighborhoods and industrial areas. That would work out real well seeing how it is Sociology I am doing this assignment for. I apprecaite those suggestions. Thanks much

Oh yeah, sorry about that, I forgot to mention that I am using an XP os.

You'll get a beter signal with external antennas. I've noticed a world of a difference between pcmcia cards that sit on my car seat and usb cards with usb extention cords that I can wrap around my rear view mirror.

If you can get a card that you can attach an external antenna, that'd be great. But then you need to build/buy a cantenna. There are directional antennas and omni directional antennas. But, to start... just use what you have and you'll find out what you need to build if the hobby progresses.

You may want to invest in an inverter for your car... so your laptop can stay powered... You can pick one up pretty cheap. Autozone, radios shack, pep boys, etc. They all have them. You'll find your battery on the laptop dies out pretty quickly. Especially when you increase your scanning.
How much do the usb card and extension cords, as well as the gps card go for? And with the usb and gps cards, will I have to have these installed internally? lol, you already answered my other question about whether or not there was a power adapter that I could plug in to into the cigarette lighter in the ash tray. I was assuming there was, but didn't know for sure.

Yeah, I know all about directional and omni directional antenna's from the military, lol, had extensive experience with that and how to build field-expedient antenna's, but if I was to build one for wardriving, where would I connect it to the laptop and would/should I and how would I ground it? For now I am just going to go with a store bought one, but later on when I have more experience and knowledge of antenna's in relation to laptops I will build my own. I am assuming both have it's advanteges, and imagine that you would use an omni directional antenna while driving around just to pick up on a signal, then you could switch over to a directional antenna once you pick one up and zero in and/or triangulate on the signal to find the source?

Is an encrypted network broadcasting the signal from the router sort of in the same sense as if I was to key the handset on a radio with an encrypted frequencies? But I am guessing that the signal that is coming from the router is one continuous signal after the encryption kicks in, where as with a encrypted radio sending digital traffic it is sent out in burst transmissions to reduce the chance of being triangulated, and the encryption kicks in each time you key the handset.

Oh... if you can... get someone else to either come with you, or to drive. Keep your eyes on the road. No point in smacking up your car. A 6 pack of mountain dew, some good music and some company never hurt any war driver... except for the constant bathroom pit stops.
lol, yeah, I was thinking about that, that is one of the reasons I was kinda thinking WiFi dectection device, so I wouldn't have to keep looking over at the laptop. That, and I wasn't sure if they had adapters for laptops or not.

Okay, thanks a lot again for all the info you provided, and I have been bookmarking and reading up on everything I can find in regards to wireless. I read this link here, about how to build a wireless sniffer, and downloaded the program because I thought that it was one that would just install itself, but when I opened it after downloading it I found it was way beyond my understanding for me to install myself.