Internet via mobile phone connected to laptop

[Guest JudgeMental]

while away this summer (Croatia/Italy) I discovered that I could get a reasonable browsing connection by plugging my blackberry 3G phone into my laptop!

 

I now learn on my return that this is called tethering and the service providers dont allow it! why is this and how do they do you are browsing on a laptop or a phone..... *-)

[duetto owner]

we do it all the time our smartphone [htc desire]has an option to create wifi, we then connect our netbook to the phone via its wifi and get excellent 3g internet browsing. providing you do not watch a lot of video it does not use up much of your internet allowance. Not tried it abroad as it my be expensive.

[francisgraham]

I too tether my netbook using a wi-fi zone that is set up using my Samsung Galaxy S2 smartphone. It makes web browsing much easier having the larger screen and keyboard.

You need to be very careful about possible charges though as it's a bit of  grey area. I'm with T-Mobile and have never been charged for data used whilst tethering and in my opinion, I shouldn't be charged as data is data whether it's downloaded using your phone as a modem or by using the phone itself.

Some people will tell you that providers can't tell if you're tethering but that isn't the case. If they really want to know they can tell the difference. I haven't tried it abroad yet but I anticipate no problems. T-Mobile does a data package for most of Europe, which is 50MB for £10 and I suspect that they'd have an even harder job of detecting tethering when data is being downloaded via a third-party provider.

My first advice would be to check if your provider allows tethering. If it doesn't and it does check, you may be in for a big bill. I note that you've just been to Croatia and I have noticed that call charges to and from that country are much more expensive than other EC states. I suspect that this price differential will also apply to data costs.

Have you checked your bill since returning? I'd be interested to know if you've been charged and what the costs are.

[Guest JudgeMental]

Hi Francis

 

we are with T mobile. You pay additional £15 a month to use blackberry service in Europe, and a charge for each additional day...

 

Correct re Croatia, it is very expensive compared to rest of Europe. £1.50 a minute for calls *-)

 

we got a bigger bill then usual because we went over our call allowance package...Waiting for itemised bill to check. Wife spoke to them on phone re bill and they said nothing regards data usage, and I was using laptop most days as we went under offer on our house while away, and trying to negotiate on new property at the same time......

 

like you say this data thing is a bit of a grey area, but after struggling with various rubbish campsites wifi connections it was a blessed relief to get a half decent connection. BUT you need a 3G phone or else it is painfully slow

 

I also asked this question over on AV forum but no answers as yet. I am with orange, wife and kids T mobile, I called t mobile saying I was thinking of going contract with them, and got a firm "it is not allowed" when I asked about tethering......

[derek500]

When in the UK I take my GiffGaff sim, which has unlimited data for 10 quid a month, out of my smartphone and stick it in my unlocked 3 dongle, which I plug into my laptop. It works fine.

 

I don't think I'm supposed to!!

[Basil]

Don't know about other networks but we are with 3Mobile and they do allow tethering, in fact if you read the info for the 'All you can eat' data plan they suggest that you do it.

Interesting that you said you had plugged your Blackberry into the laptop, because It is very and easy to tether with the Android smartphones we have as you can set the phone up as a WiFi hotspot so it is just like using your laptop at any other WiFi point but going out through the phone.

This is good in the UK and we use our dongle less but as others have said, it is expensive to use abroad though they have reduced the charges recently, so we use the dongle in prefferance as it is PAYG so we know what we are spending.

 

Bas

[Guest JudgeMental]

Basil, what dongle and sim do you use abroad?

[Basil]

It is a ZTE MF 627 dongle on 3Mobile network so it is a 3 sim. As it is PAYG we normally load it with around £20 and use it until it runs out, however that has not happened yet.

The reason we use the dongle abroad rather than the phone is so we know what we are spending as unfortunately the cost per Mb is still £1.28 whereas some others are now down to £0.60 per Meg this is better than the £4.00 per meg it used to be and some still charge, however the cost is supposed to be reducing by EU requirement but I don't know the time scale.

Since having the dongle there has never been a place that we have not been able to use it hence our decision to change our phones to that network.

 

Bas

[francisgraham]

As I said earlier, suppliers' European packages work out much cheaper. T-Mobile does 50MB for £10, or 20p per MB, and this lasts for a month. On a dongle with £20 of credit you'll be getting much less data for your money than anyone tethering and using a European package.

I accept of course that I'm talking about EC Europe, which doesn't include Croatia.

T-Mobile's T&Cs theoretically preclude users from using their phones as modems, and the staff are duty bound to tell you that tethering isn't included in data packages, but I and everyone else that I've discussed this with on an Android forum, have never been charged for our tethering use.

Again, I suspect that it is even harder for them to detect tethering when one is abroad and downloading via a third-party supplier.

If you have the facility to tether, before putting £20 on a dongle and paying a high price for data, it's worth checking out your provider's Europe packages. The fixed cost argument still applies because, when you've used up your 50MB, you are informed that it has expired and asked if you wish to renew. 

[Basil]

3 Mobile doesn't have a 'European' package the charge is £1.28/meg whether you use the phone or the dongle hence we use the dongle so that we know what we are spending. The dearer cost for us is an irrelevance, as so long as we can do what we need to do within our alloted spend, and we always have, that is all that matters.

The most important aspect for us is to be able to legitimately 'tether' and have true unlimited data, not with the small print fair use policy, when we are in the UK.

 

Bas

[duetto owner]

as mentioned above "3" network are ok with tethering. in fact it was a "3" store that showed me the simple steps to set it up. and the "3" helpline helped when i was in a blackspot with a very poor signal [densole caravan camp site nr folkstone]

[Mel B]

Francis - I note your comment about tethering your mobile phone ... as someone who hasn't a clue, how do you do this please? :-S

[Guest 1footinthegrave]

Your phone can depending on model act as a modem, you normally would need to instal specific software for the phone on your laptop, then connect to the internet that way using your laptop and the software. Different networks however have differing policies on it though and your best advised to read the details first. But you can read all about tethering here and be an expert in no time!.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tethering

[Dave Newell]

Most modern smart phones can be set to operate as a mobile WiFi hotspot, you then simply connect your pc via wireless to it and go browsing.

 

D.

[Guest 1footinthegrave]

Dave, you do not necessarily need a smart phone, some lowly models will allow connection through the mobile phone own networks and act as a modem as I detailed above.I have a Nokia N73 which will allow you to do this,handy if your sitting in the middle of a field in France without any wi-fi connection, but as I said the cost can be a bit prohibitive. But less so if using the phones built in browser rather than tethered to your laptop, or download and instal Opera mini on your phone, this eats up far less data.

[derek pringle]

Hi ,

As a side issue and somebody with a newish phone, is accessing your e mails through the phone included in the mb allowances or just browsing the net. Any help please as I am just about to change phone due to expiry of contract and was considering this facility for where there is no wifi.

cheers

derek

[Guest 1footinthegrave]

You will be accessing your email via an internet connection, it will be included and so it will take part of your data allowance just as if your browsing the net. I use 3, on pay as u go, and get 150Mb free data allowance every time I top up. Accessing my email ( Gmail ) barely dents the data allowance,and lasts me months, mind you I don't download any attachments. They now have an "all you can eat" data package which I think costs £15 a month, may be worth a look !

 

To answer Judgemental's question, of course when you are out of the UK you are obviously not using the UK service provider, so be aware you may incur some extremely high charges passed on to you from the "foreign" service provider to your provider, in some cases many hundreds of pounds, if you haven't, you've been extremely lucky or there is a gremlin in their works ;-)

[lennyhb]

T-Mobile appears to be the only provider that does not allow tethering but they do not appear to be able to detect tething on an Andriod phone and there are programs that you can download that hide tethering.

 

They detect tethering by the TTL associated to the IP packets each hop on a network reduces the TTL by 1. Smartpones have a different TTL to your PC, iphone for example is 64 your PC is likely to be 127 if you reset the TTL to 65 on your PC they won't detect the tethering.

 

Regarding Dave's comment of linking your phone to your laptop & using the phones wifi, not a lot of point as the RX/TX on the wifi card in the laptop will be more sensitive/powerful than the phone's. Also for better wifi reception there are long range USB wifi adaptors available.

 

I always use wifi abroad as I have seen some peoples horrendous bills for 3g like £1200 to download a 400meg file. Also I've just changed to Talkmobile good for the UK but data roaming in the EU is silly £12/meg.

[Guest 1footinthegrave]

Without wishing to cause offence,I think some people are confused by the terminology,and the technology.3g uses the mobile phone network to make a connection, Wi-fi is used to connect to a router of some description,most of which have encryption and you would need a "key" to connect, this can also be true in some "free" public networks such as M/way service areas and the like.

BT open zone is another option for folk that have BT as their ISP, but very few of these in Europe we have found, but supposed to be adding more all the time see here

 

thttp://www.btopenzone.com/find/roaming/going-abroad.jsp

 

 

:-|

[Barryd999]

Vodafone Data Traveller is by far currently the best option for internet usage abroad. I have used it every day on our recent five month trip in Europe. It costs £10 a month for up to 25MB a day.

 

I had an argument with Vodafone about tethering as they said it wasnt allowed abroad and my argument was why does it matter how I use my 25MB allowance be it on a laptop or smart phone. I didnt get anywhere but from what I can gather from various forums is they dont allow tethering abroad as they are now goverened by EU law so that the maximum data charge anyone can be billed is now restricted to just €50 in one month. Perhaps they dont want people going mad abroad and downloading films etc as the max they would be allowed to bill them for the month is €50 whereas years ago people had shock horror bill suprises in the thousands when doing serious surfing abroad.

 

So. Dont worry. No nasty suprises anymore. In fact unless you have agreed in advance with your provider to allow you to go over the €50 limit they are supposed to just cut you off when you reach it. There is a full article about it here

 

http://www.broadbandgenie.co.uk/mobilebroadband/help/will-i-be-able-to-use-my-mobile-broadband-account

 

 

Vodafone can tell if an iPhone is tethered but they cant detect if my old Nokia N95 is tethered and its still 3G so works a treat. However. I found that the iPhone (and I guess any smart phone with a big enough screen) was fine for browsing and its email facility is superb so I could stay in touch all the time. I hardly bothered tethering but I do have a superb wifi antenna which half the time got me connected where ever we ended up parked up. One other good thing about the Vodafone data traveller package is that it will use any local provider thats available so I always got a connection. Their passport scheme meant that I could talk for up to an hour anywhere Europe for 75p. The downside of this deal is that if I checked an answerphone or spoke to someone for ten seconds it was still 75p.

 

Vodafone send you a text when your at 80% of your daily allowance which could be reached quite quickly when tethered but when browsing on the phone it was almost impossible to reach it. I spent hours online and never went over.

 

So for us big bills and no internet abroad are now a thing of the past thank god! It makes a huge difference always having net access abroad. For one I can work should I need to but boring stuff asside it allows you to find places to see and facts about the area as well as planning places to park! I even walked around museums or attractions typing stuff in off the information boards into google translate!

[Clive]

I tether my HTC Tattoo (basic smart phone, free upgrade from a banana phone) to my Laptop with a USB linking cable. This also charges the phone as well. Vodafone have no problems with this either.

Contract comes up for renewal in February, what shall I get next?

 

C.

 

[Guest 1footinthegrave]

Clive - 2011-11-05 3:40 PM

 

I tether my HTC Tattoo (basic smart phone, free upgrade from a banana phone) to my Laptop with a USB linking cable. This also charges the phone as well. Vodafone have no problems with this either.

Contract comes up for renewal in February, what shall I get next?

 

C.

 

Judgemental was specifically asking about tethering abroad.

You obviously will not be on your UK providers network then, so be very wary about the cost unless you are VERY sure of what tarif or deal you are on. It's easy to be wise after the event........and have to cough up hundreds of pounds in the process..

[MattyR]

Apparently another advantage of using a USB cable to tether to some phones is speed - bluetooth and wifi connections to the phone are slower than cable.

 

I use my phone for emails and browsing when out and about and I tether when I need to access my work's terminal server - effectively, I can work anywhere as if I am in my office. It is fast enough for the tasks I need to do. If my mobile phone provider starts complaining about it, I'll find one that does not. I have 500mb a month and rarely use more than 80% of it. I do not see why the should worry about how I use my allowance.

[Dave Newell]

My previous reply was aimed directly to Mel as she has a nice shiny new smart phone according to a thread on chatterbox. WiFi connection to a smart phone for internet access is unlikely to be notably slower than via usb and neither is bluetooth, the limiting factor will be the mobile network connection. I've yet to see a mobile internet connection exceed 54 Mb/sec which is easily attainable via WiFi.

 

D.

[Basil]

1footinthegrave - 2011-11-05 1:28 PM

 

Without wishing to cause offence,I think some people are confused by the terminology,and the technology.3g uses the mobile phone network to make a connection, Wi-fi is used to connect to a router of some description,most of which have encryption and you would need a "key" to connect, this can also be true in some "free" public networks such as M/way service areas and the like.

BT open zone is another option for folk that have BT as their ISP, but very few of these in Europe we have found, but supposed to be adding more all the time see here

 

thttp://www.btopenzone.com/find/roaming/going-abroad.jsp

 

 

:-|

 

Hi 1foot,

I feel, from reading your above response, maybe you may have misunderstood what was being said as well. With a modern smartphone you can make the phone into a WIFi Hotspot, so you connect to the phone using the computers WiFi connection and the phone then logs onto the phone network to pass the data thus the phone becomes your own personal WiFi hotspot or router.

This is in fact still 'tethering' but in the same way as using a USB connection or even Bluetooth and some network providers allow you to do this others don't.

 

Bas