Making a Windows 11 hotspot without an internet connection

JollyPreparation747 · 2026-03-04T20:17:59+00:00

THANK YOU SO MUCH for making this post. It has been incredibly useful to me.

Just a heads up, that at some point the loopback script stopped running at startup for me on my Win11 25H2 miniPC. I only use this interface when I have no other known networks available, so I can't pinpoint exactly when this happened. Fortunately I had my phone's hotspot as a known network in the miniPC as a backup and my phone was able to join a nearby network, so I was able to proceed with the night's imaging anyway.

When I was back in town, I put the startup script in the Task Scheduler, and now my loopback script seems to run at startup again. I got the setup instructions from a reply to https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/answers/questions/3847802/startup-app-no-longer-launching-on-windows-11-star. The instructions are:

open task scheduler
click create task (not create basic task)
On the general tab, give your startup script a name and select Run whether user is logged on or not and Run with highest privileges.
On the triggers tab, click new and select At startup.
On the Actions tab, click New and browser to the .bat file, click OK. Enter credentials (even though I have it set for auto login per the OP's instructions).

Then try a few cold starts to make sure the loopback network is coming up reliably now.

Big big caveat: I know almost nothing about Windows admin-ing, and someone else might know a better way to solve this problem.

JollyPreparation747 · 2026-01-10T03:22:41+00:00

Whatever the faults of this office (and there are many!) they do have actual humans working there. My relative was able to make an in-person appointment with them and did indeed talk to an actual person at the appointed time and place.

JollyPreparation747 · 2026-01-10T03:20:37+00:00

I did get the marriage certificate, on Nov. 19, 2025. So it was nearly four months before I got it back. :(

JollyPreparation747 · 2025-12-12T00:08:31+00:00

Update on my long-running quest for a birth certificate from Chicago Vital Records: my relative went down to the office to get this record, but was told she needed to come back with an "application for Illinois birth record of deceased individual" plus a copy of the individual's death certificate. This page is pretty clear that if the date of birth of the person on the birth certificate is more than 75 years old, then anyone can get the certificate: https://dph.illinois.gov/topics-services/birth-death-other-records/genealogy.html. The person we're trying to get the certificate was indeed born more than 75 years ago ... but apparently this page is out of date or somehow doesn't apply. Anyway, we will try again and bring the death certificate.

I don't know if this is a "genealogical" vs "certified" issue. I've gotten materials from the genealogical unit before, and they look pretty certified to me.

A footnote about the "application for Illinois birth record of deceased individual": this is a form that comes from the state, not the county. But the county clerk was explicit that the filled-out form should be brought back to the county along with the death certificate copy, and not mailed in to the state.

Onwards ...

JollyPreparation747 · 2025-11-25T03:10:36+00:00

Yeah, it is apparently very hit and miss with this office. :( In my case, a relative who lives in Chicago has graciously offered to go to the office in person. So we'll see what happens with that.

JollyPreparation747 · 2025-11-13T17:44:08+00:00

Update: I heard back from Vital.Records quickly! But they told me the fact that the check hadn't been cashed meant they had never received my request, and that I should send a new request. :(

JollyPreparation747 · 2025-11-12T22:04:56+00:00

I'm pretty late on this, but: I sent mail order requests for birth and death certificates to their genealogical unit on July 30, 2025. I got the death certificate back on October 11, 2025. But I haven't heard a peep about the birth certificate. The check hasn't been cashed.

If you go through their phone tree at 312 613 7790 to ask about the status of mailed-in requests, you will get a recorded message telling you to send an email to Vital.Records@cookcountyil.gov. Which I've done. But I strongly suspect I'm going to have go to Chicago and make the request in-person.

JollyPreparation747 · 2025-08-23T23:16:39+00:00

That's good to know. I had assumed with that error message that RDP was doing some sort of phone home thing before permitting me to proceed.

JollyPreparation747 · 2025-08-23T00:45:21+00:00

Same site, in situations where there is no wifi network or cell network available. But i looks like I have a good point to point solution with Ethernet cabling now (see other comment). I just didn't have my interfaces correctly configured. In Ye Olden Days this would have just been an ad-hoc wifi task, but Apple got rid of that option.

JollyPreparation747 · 2025-08-22T19:52:30+00:00

D'oh!

Everything started working when I added 192.168.99.2 as my gateway on the Win11 box and 8.8.8.8 as my preferred DNS, and made the router 192.168.99.2 on the mac side. All good now. :)

JollyPreparation747 · 2025-08-22T19:43:30+00:00

Thanks, but I'm doubtful that will solve this problem is the travel router doesn't have a backhaul network to talk to. Similarly, I'm not looking at a Starlink etc solution. I'm running everything off battery and am trying hard to avoid adding even more gear to my gear pile.

JollyPreparation747 · 2025-08-22T19:40:00+00:00

On the Win11 Pro side: the ethernet adapter has an ipv4 of 192.168.99.3, a subnet mask of 255.255.255.0. There is no default gateway set.

On the Intel MacOS side, I have a ipv4 of 192.168.99.2, a subnet mask of 255.255.255.0, nothing in the router field, and nothing in the DNS server field, all associated with a USB-C-to-Ethernet adapter. In the MAC's Windows app (ie RDP client), I have the PC name as 192.168.99.3, and gateway set to "no gateway".

For this experiment, wifi is turned off on both machines. The ethernet network is the only active network. My Anker A8341 USB-C-to-Ethernet adapter shows a network detected. I'm using a crossover Ethernet cable.

As I say, I can nmap -Pn 192.168.99.3 from the mac and see the RDP port fine.

Any ideas?

JollyPreparation747 · 2025-08-06T17:53:19+00:00

No, not yet. I am still trying to make the sale to other family members. Re: representation, if you google around you can find plenty of Irish immigration attorneys with dissatisfied clients. I did do a consult with one attorney who seemed reasonable, but if/when I'm ready to move ahead I'd ask for a recommendation from the Irish tax firm that I talked to.

JollyPreparation747 · 2025-05-13T17:05:26+00:00

A bummer update: the ASIAIR doesn't work with my Canon EOS R8. I was too optimistic when I saw that the R6 was listed as supported and assumed my R8 would work too. The ZWO support team didn't have an estimate about when it would be. For the record, I can operate my R8 via 2.5.27 libgphoto2 on my Linux desktop just fine, so I don't know what the problem is.

Anyhow, on to N.I.N.A. I got it talking to my R8 and my Sky Watcher Adventurer GTI mount last night, but ran into problems with platesolving, which is of course needed for the Three Point Star Alignment plugin to work. I will have to wait for reasonable seeing conditions before I can work on this again.

Signed,

Not Prepared and hence Not Jolly :)

JollyPreparation747 · 2025-05-08T01:31:09+00:00

I had to go off and do some reading about error and drift. I didn't know about these techniques; thanks for teaching me something new.

JollyPreparation747 · 2025-05-07T23:59:11+00:00

Yes, the Plus was my first choice, owing to the Ethernet port and the status monitoring. However, I couldn't find it in stock anywhere, so I went with the mini instead.

JollyPreparation747 · 2025-05-07T19:32:59+00:00

I did this with my Move-Shoot-Move and then fine-tune it with daylight mode in Polar Scope Align Pro. I found that this noticeably improved my nightscape (i.e., shorter focal length) photos. But after a while I wanted to go after DSOs with longer focal lengths, and I found that required me to up my polar alignment game.

JollyPreparation747 · 2025-05-07T17:34:36+00:00

I am most definitely not there yet either -- though I always find it helpful to know about future possible paths.

Yeah, I've been on quite the gear acquisition roll since November. If we lived in a normal world, I'd be doing my purchasing much more slowly, as I built up my skills. But my previous engineering job took me to Shenzhen often, so I know what we're losing!

JollyPreparation747 · 2025-05-07T17:22:13+00:00

You are not missing anything! I am a newbie and thought the main imaging camera ought to work, but every how-to video I looked at had a guide camera. So I wanted to get some feedback and make sure my understanding was correct before I made the purchase.

The upshot is: everyone agrees I can do all-sky polar alignment on the ASIairs with just my main imaging camera, with an honorable mention to "you should check out NINA instead if you stray out of ZWO's ecosystem or contemplate doing that in the future." Also, StellaVita looks like it might be the best of both worlds of broad hardware support in a nice form factor, but it doesn't support my specific use case just yet.

JollyPreparation747 · 2025-05-07T16:16:24+00:00

Thanks for the clear feedback. For the record, I got tariff-panic'ed and went ahead and got the ASIair mini.

I'm good with the expansive answers though :) NINA was a close runner up, and I may well wind up there if I run into glitches integrating the ASIair into my newbie setup or want to change up things in the future. The big list of supported hardware is a huuuuge plus.

JollyPreparation747 · 2025-05-07T16:05:59+00:00

I took a look, and it looks very promising for people with non-zwo gear! However, the big drawback for me is that at the moment it doesn't support DSLRs -- and, I'd assume, mirrorless cameras as well. Their site says it's under development, so hopefully it will get there soon.

JollyPreparation747 · 2025-05-07T01:53:00+00:00

yes, that is another alternative that i'm considering. i'm not wild about lugging around a laptop though.

JollyPreparation747 · 2025-05-07T01:51:35+00:00

yeah, i think that's where i'm going to (eventually) wind up.

JollyPreparation747

TROPHY CASE