Canary wireless has announced the HS-20, its second generation of Wi-Fi detectors.

Devices in the same family are quite commonplace, ranging from items such as the Vunex Wi-Fi Walker which is both a USB adaptor and hotspot finder, to the dirt cheap LED Wi-Fi dongles frequently re-branded and available everywhere.

Canary's product measures 3.19" x 2.13" x .65" and runs on 2 AAA batteries, making it just as small as the simplified dongles, but offers the features of more sophisticated devices.

It provides an LCD screen which not only alerts the user of a signal strength in a given area but also whether nearby 802.11b/g/n network is open, WEP, WPA, or WPA2, along with its SSID.

With EV-DO and W-CDMA already in common use, and WiMAX not far off from worldwide adoption, the value of such devices to the nomadic computer will undoubtedly decrease. Local wireless networks will likely hang around, however, giving such devices a comfortable spot in relevance for at least a little while.