Retro Cell Phone
Ok, the headline’s a bit of a terse mouthful and this has undoubtedly been covered “Somewhere” on Teh Intarweb (Not that couple of haphazard google searches would reveal at least), But I wanted to have a concise record for next time I forget how to do this.
What we’re doing here:
This short howto will conver the rudiments of connecting a computer to The Internet through a bluetooth connection to a mobile phone on the Australian Three (Hutchison) 3G celular network.
The Phone:
The phone being used must have Bluetooth capability. Given that Three’s network is 3G, the phones tend to be of the “newe/pricier” variety and so just about all of them will have Blutooth. It’s really up to the reader to be sure though.
Many people leave Blutooth off for security and battery-life issues, so the functionality obviously now needs to be turned-on (again, this is a phone-specific procedure, so it’s up to you to figure it out).
The Computer:
Again, the computer too needs bluetooth. It’s pretty uncommon for most desktop computers to have this built-in but most modern laptops have it already. If your computer does not have Bluetooth, you can buy many little USB blutooth modules all over the place (try eBay). Unfortunately the cheaper ones tend to have nasty driver/support software, but they should be good enough for this purpose.
Bluetooth pairing:
As a wireless protocol that aims to surplant wired communications, there are special considerations made in Bluetooth to ensuring the communication is secure (Specifically encryption and authentication of connections). As it is a fairly involved process to establish this security, it’s only done once when devices first “meet” and the credentials saved for future connections. This procedure is called “device pairing”. When pairing a computer to a phone, usually either the computer prompts the user to enter a random number sequence, or it generates one itself. This digit sequence is sent to themobile phon, which then prompts the user to type them in. If the numbers match, then the devices are paired and “truest” each others identity.
Dial-up networking profile:
Bluetooth carries many different types of informationeach specific function is called a “profile”. The profile we’re interested in is called “dial-up networking”. Through your computer’s Bluetooth configuration tool, you need to start the dial-up networking profile. Once started, your computer should prompt you to entter login details will include some of the following details:
- Access point: “3netaccess” (or you could try 3services, but i think that’s for Planet3 services only)
- Phone number: *99# (Star,ninety-nine, hash)
- User name: leave blank
- Password: leave blank
So, I can get mobile broadband without a card/key?:
Well, the broadband’s not that “broad” going through Bluetooth for a start. Also, mobile phone companies charge a premium for “thethered” Internet access (Using a phone as a modem for a computer). The dedicated cards/keys are much cheaper, but still a lot more expensive than DSL or other wired Internet options.
So, hope that all helps, good luck!