Public wifi connects okay but no internet
Hi, I'm suffering a total inability to connect to the internet via public wifi. The problem is not confined to one wifi network, I've tried on at least three around the local area. However, I encounter two types of wifi when I'm out and about, and only one of them causes the problem. Allow me to clarify:
Type 1: the establishment (a café, for example) hosts its own wifi and internet connection and makes it available to its customers, either with password protection (like my local Costa Coffee) or without (like my local Starbucks). (Sorry about the brand naming, but it's the easiest way to show what I mean). As far as I can tell, these places are running their own internet connection, and simply making it available by wifi. I have no problem connecting in these places.
Type 2: the establishment hosts the wifi, but the functionality is "…powered by AwesomeCorpZone" or something – in North London the main providers are BTOpenzone and TheCloud. These are the ones that I have problems with.
I don't have any problem connecting to the wifi network itself; it's the internet bit that falls down. The type 2 kind of connection should redirect any web page request that I make to the provider's own page allowing me to log in or sign up. But this never happens. If I point my browser at www.google.com for example the browser just shows with “contacting google.com” in the status bar, and nothing happens.
My iPhone has no such problem; in the local Virgin Active gym, for example, wifi internet is provided for members via The Cloud; it is set up so that the first time that one connects to their wifi it redirects web requests to a Virgin-branded web page where members just need to input their gym membership number to get access. On subsequent visits it remembers you and although it still sends you, initially, to the Virgin-branding page that page simply has a 'continue to internet' button that send you on your way to whatever web page you wanted. (An annoying extra step, but that's corporate brand enforcement for you).
On my phone this works fine. On my Macbook Pro, however, I never get sent to the Virgin page, so I can't enter my membership number. (The workaround is to log in with my phone and then tether the phone to the MBP with USB or bluetooth. But it's a kludge).
So that's the situation. Anybody have any advice on what I can change in my settings to allow the MBP to connect the same way as the iPhone?
Sorry for the long post.
Thanks in advance.
MacBook Pro (15-inch Early 2008), Mac OS X (10.7.4), 2.6 GHz, 4GB RAM, 256 GB SSD