The Domino Chick

Using a BlackBerry as a tethered modem

Thursday, July 5th, 2007

Though I swore up and down that I'd never do it, I finally bit the bullet and got a BlackBerry Pearl. I needed a new phone because my last one's pure awfulness had reached an all-time high and I just couldn't deal with it shutting itself off during important calls anymore. I chose the Pearl for two reasons - it has a camera, which is essential for me, and I can tether it and use it for a data connection when I am in a location with no internet access (which happens frequently, since I'm on the road all the time). There are two ways to use the BlackBerry for this purpose. With my service provider, AT&T, I can use their Communication Manager application, which automatically detects a connected data-capable device and use its connection. However, my home internet connection is completely b0rked at the moment, so I couldn't download the application when I needed it, which meant I had to use the Pearl as a tethered modem instead. Setting this up requires a few tweaks to the modem properties on your laptop, and some specific settings in the Internet Connection wizard. I'll walk through how to set this up, since there doesn't seem to be a cohesive document on how to do so (at least with AT&T - I had to cobble it together from several internet sources and finally had to call in for the modem initialization commands).

Assumptions here are Windows XP with AT&T as your carrier. Items that need to be modified according to the carrier will be noted.

First, you need to set up an internet connection for your device. To do this, go to Control Panel - Network Connection - Create a New Connection. Click Next. Select "Connect to the Internet" and click Next. Then select "Set up my connection manually" and click Next. Choose "connect using a dial-up modem" for the next option. On the modem choice screen, choose "Standard Modem". Before you actually connect, you may need to adjust the settings in the Modem Properties, which I will discuss in the modem properties section. On the next screen, if you are an AT&T/Cingular customer, enter "gprs" as the ISP name (other carriers will vary). On the next screen, for the phone number, for AT&T/Cingular customers, type in *99# (other carriers will vary). For the login name and password, for AT&T/Cingular, enter ISP@CINGULARGPRS.COM as the username and CINGULAR1 as the password. These are both case sensitive. Once you have completed this setup, you will also need to modify the network connection properties.

To modify the network connection properties, go to Network Connections in Control Panel and right-click on the gprs connection you created and select Properties. Make sure Standard Modem is selected in the "Connect Using" section and click Configure. Ensure that none of the boxes are checked in the Modem Configuration dialog (usually, hardware flow control is on by default - this needs to be turned off). Click OK. Before closing the Properties dialog, go to the Security tab and verify that "Allow unsecured password" is selected in the Security options section.

Next, you need to modify the modem properties for the default modem on your machine. This is located in Control Panel - Phone and Modem Options. Go to the Modems tab, select "Standard Modem", and click Properties. On the Advanced tab, you will need to enter the following in the "Extra initialization commands" field if you are an AT&T/Cingular customer (other carriers will vary): AT+CGDCONT=1,"IP","isp.cingular"



Once this is all complete, you can connect your device using its USB cable and launch the gprs network connection. You will see a dialog like this:



Click Dial, and you should be on your way to happy surfing!

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Posted by: Kathleen McGivney at: 12:51:08 PM
Location: Los Angeles, CA