So there's a rumor floating around the internets concerning AT&T, iPhones, and tethering. The story goes something like this: the word tether is mentioned in an AT&T notice about users upgrading to a new iPhone and being forced into another two-year agreement. Apparently, some folks who've only quickly browsed the document made the mistake of assuming that AT&T used the word "tether" the way we all know it best: computer-to-phone, modem-style tethering. Unfortunately, this is a semantic problem -- what AT&T's talking about is using the dock connector to activate the phone, and sync with your computer... not the other way around. So next time you hear someone talk about AT&T's "tethering" plan feel free to set 'em straight.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
jimmy @ Feb 13th 2008 9:12PM
yeah, my buddies iphones are nice and all, but one trick they are all jealous of on my blackjack II is BT ICS (thank you rom cookers)
Nathan @ Feb 13th 2008 10:37PM
I still have to wonder who would want to tether an iPhone with only EDGE data speeds? I mean, yeah sure it's one step up from a 56k modem, but it's a really small, small step.
Reid @ Feb 14th 2008 2:49AM
Nathan,
Exactly what I came to say. But then, I have an EVDO data card sticking out the side of my thinkpad right now ;)
JLTate @ Feb 13th 2008 9:14PM
Oh good. Thanks, Engadget.
Now that we have the obligatory iPhone news out of the way, can we get back to interesting things?
Blake @ Feb 13th 2008 9:22PM
Hey JLTate,
Let me tell you something, my friend...my best friend's sister owns an iPhone. We definitely need these news reports so I can tell her about "tethering."
Thanks igadget..oops I mean Engadget.
BEETROOT @ Feb 13th 2008 9:38PM
Its been said a million times... but why read the post if you don't find it interesting? Why comment? Every item on Engadget is not required reading.
JLTate @ Feb 13th 2008 9:39PM
Hahahah. Oh man, I'm surprised that my post got modded down to the lowest, and that quickly! But in retrospect I suppose it makes sense. Relax guys, I was kidding.
Blake @ Feb 13th 2008 9:45PM
Take a chill pill BEETROOT.
I have nothing better to do with my life but to comment about iPhone posts - there I said it. I have a problem.
AA anyone?
Blaktornado @ Feb 13th 2008 9:45PM
Well if you don't make it LOOK like you're kidding then people just think you're a troll and thus you get ranked low... Although normally saying anything bad about our lord and master gets you ranked low ;) Best just to keep your "jokes" to yourself.
Don Wilson @ Feb 13th 2008 9:46PM
JLTate, thanks for the obligatory "I'm jealous of the iPhone so I'm going to bash Engadget for posting interesting news about it so they can go back to talking about my phone that has been cloned a thousand times, none of which are 1% more original than the last" comment. As BEETROOT put it, don't read any iPhone posts. =)
Blake @ Feb 13th 2008 9:48PM
Wait...I live in America. I have freedom of speech. Whoa!
Go Obama!
Reader @ Feb 14th 2008 12:19AM
Now I'm not normally one to get into a politics debate on Engadget, but I have beef with the common Obama follower (no, not those educated in politics that know why they're voting for him, just the people that say go Obama and don't know why).
What does Obama have to do with free speech? Has he ever stood up to promote free speech...Oh I know when he voted for the Patriot Act? If you're gonna scream free speech, it better be followed by Ron Paul :D
Please, for the sake of my sanity, learn why you like the person you're voting for and not just follow the crowd.
Mike @ Feb 14th 2008 12:30AM
i cant believe anyone claiming to be educated in politics actually made mention of ron paul as someone who matters
Reader @ Feb 14th 2008 1:23AM
Did I sat he matters? I made a reference to free speech, not to if he was going to win or not. Obviously he hasn't even broke 10% on the polls and has absolutely no chance of winning, but he is the most pro-liberty candidate around; hence the comment about free speech. I was talking ideals, not polls.
Might as well add that out of the three top candidates (McCain, Hillary, Obama), I prefer Obama. I would just like people to know why they support their choice and not just go with the guy that sounds cool.
audioeric @ Feb 13th 2008 9:25PM
This is one of two things I'm waiting for to get an iPhone. Tethering and 3G coupled with 16GB and I would be ALL over the iPhone. I'm currently happy with my 8830 Blackberry with its bluetooth tethering..
Amanda @ Feb 14th 2008 12:29AM
Me too. If I could tether the iPhone, I'd be all over it. Right now, my blackjack is so much more usable, just because of that.
I've been told that if I had an iPhone, I wouldn't have the need to tether, but I use an actual computer (now an EEE pc) a lot on the "road" and I don't think an iPhone would accomplish as much.
audioeric @ Feb 13th 2008 9:25PM
This is one of two things I'm waiting for to get an iPhone. Tethering and 3G coupled with 16GB and I would be ALL over the iPhone. I'm currently happy with my 8830 Blackberry with its bluetooth tethering..
Justin B @ Feb 13th 2008 9:40PM
I'm waiting for engadget to enable comment editing.
Ryan Block @ Feb 13th 2008 9:58PM
Justin, me too. :) Lord only knows when the software engineers will build that glorious feature in, though.
rtdunham @ Feb 13th 2008 11:37PM
what about a feature to prevent duplicate posts?
Shannin @ Feb 13th 2008 9:49PM
im going to say that with the SDK (depending on what you have access to) just around the corner we will see a tethering app
Mike Morris @ Feb 13th 2008 10:01PM
That's exactly what i thought when I read the post. After all, February is almost half way over - that SDK is bound to hit sometime (ok, sure, fine, it'll probably be March, despite what Apple said).
Paul @ Feb 13th 2008 9:52PM
what is tethering?
Gnaget @ Feb 13th 2008 9:54PM
It lets you use your phone's internet access on your computer. IE, Internet access where ever you are.
The big question I have, why would someone want to tether an iPhone? I can understand it (and do it myself) with 3G, but with EDGE?
joshuaschoer @ Feb 14th 2008 8:35PM
Anyone know the limits of the 3G bandwith wise? Is it possible to use this (assuming they ever enable true tethering) to connect an xbox and play online, or too much lag? Also, I'm on the outskirts of the 3G coverage, does it drop off quickly or gradually to EDGE speeds?
thethirdmoose @ Feb 13th 2008 10:10PM
I have played starcraft over EVDO, without a tethering plan, and, while not perfect, it's still bearable and bandwidth efficient. EVDO rev. A would be better.
Munford @ Feb 13th 2008 9:59PM
This would be pretty much useless. It's already possible of sharing the EDGE connection on unlocked iPhones by running a webproxy on iPhone and share the wifi connection.
If you can do web/email etc. just as well on iPhone directly, why bother take out your PC and mess around? It won't be good to do much serious web surfing on EDGE speed anyways.
Chris @ Feb 13th 2008 10:30PM
I'm confused, what does tethering mean? (and for that matter what are people thinking they said)
Chris @ Feb 13th 2008 10:43PM
Nevermind, wikipedia told me everything about tethering
Russell @ Feb 13th 2008 10:41PM
why bother tethering with edge?
SirMasterboy @ Feb 13th 2008 10:57PM
I don't know why you guys think EDGE is so slow. It's not. I personally have an iPhone and get on average 200k on EDGE. I also tether occasionally and for browsing the web, emailing, and IM it works prefect. Pages like engadget load up in about 5 seconds on EDGE. It's 5x the speed of "good" dial-up. I mean comeon, It can stream 192kbit radio and youtube like a champ so its not that bad.
stupidnoduhdude @ Feb 13th 2008 11:17PM
I believe that people are being more critical of EDGE speeds with respect to tethering an EDGE-only device to a PC, not using it as a connection on a smartphone.
As an owner of an iPhone, I'll admit that EDGE is fine for basic web browsing, widgets, and email--however, pretty much all other applications render it essentially useless.
I also own an N95-3; as for web browsing, HSPA hardly makes a difference...when you're loading up high-quality videos in emTube or tethering to a laptop, the speed increase absolutely smokes EDGE. I pull around 1600kbps downlink and 350kbps uplink when I have a good 3G signal, which is about as a good as a cheap DSL connection.
Churma @ Feb 13th 2008 11:18PM
You can tether with bluetooth. Of course you need a hacked iPhone. But come on edge.... I can feel the need for speed! Engadget forum page loads in 1min hah! Pls don't buy the iPhone it sux!
blinkcowz182 @ Feb 13th 2008 11:28PM
You must be at least 14 to comment here. Thanks.
Churma @ Feb 13th 2008 11:33PM
Yay, 14 heh thats the best comment I have gotten all day. Thanks, The iPhone is garbage. No 3G, No 3rd party app support without hacking, No email push, No flash, Weak camera, I could go on but I will stop here for now.... Now go play with your tinker toys blink...
Jason @ Feb 14th 2008 11:02AM
Haha... this guy is a Sprint employee. Mogul ftw, right?
Nick Ritch @ Feb 14th 2008 12:46AM
Tethering is the only thing I miss about my samsung blackjack. Im sure eventually someone will come up with an easy way to do it with the iPhone... even though edge is kinda slow. I dont mind the edge speeds on my phone as I usually use it to view my email, and read news and blog sites, and get directions and phone numbers( the iPhone saves me a bundle using the maps widget to look up local businesses) but I don't know that I could get used to such slow speeds using my laptop's browser.
Wicker Basket @ Feb 14th 2008 1:18AM
"Hey JLTate,
Let me tell you something, my friend...my best friend's sister owns an iPhone. We definitely need these news reports so I can tell her about "tethering."
Thanks igadget..oops I mean Engadget."
I ABSOLUTELY LOVED EVERY WORD YOU SAID THERE!
Wow, right on the money...
Brian @ Feb 14th 2008 6:00AM
FYI, you *can* tether the iPhone.
You just need to:
- Jailbreak it
- Install SSH
- Set up an OpenVPN server somewhere (I used a Linux virtual server)
- Set up an ad-hoc WLAN network with your notebook
- SSH into your iPhone and port-forward to the OpenVPN server
- Start OpenVPN
I have this very setup, and I wrote a nice C# program which does all of the laptop-side things for me. I just run the program and select the right network on my iPhone, and it connects for me.
Transfer rates over EDGE (T-Mobile, Colorado) are around 190kbps, which is better than my Dash. OpenVPN has compression too which helps A LOT for websites and other text content. I also get pretty much end-to-end security with OpenVPN.
It's a good setup, but obviously it's really too complicated for most people.
w00t @ Feb 14th 2008 10:30AM
There's an easier way...
Jailbreak, install TinyProxy, connect to adhoc wifi and set up your browser to use your iPhone's local IP as the proxy address.
Works perfectly. And with ZiPhone jailbreaking even the latest firmware is a one click process.
I actually *prefer* this to an actual tethering option, because o2 gouge you for per the MB costs regardless of if you have an unlimited data plan (At least they do for unlimited data BlackBerry plans)
Karl Hackswell @ Feb 14th 2008 8:42AM
Honestly the iphone dosent really impress me much.
Peter Fattore @ Feb 14th 2008 8:13PM
Jeeze, keep your free speech talk for some other day. Don't say something and not expect a response of some kind. Free speech goes both ways.
Yeah, I'd be more worried about tethering a future 3G iPhone instead of the EDGE version. I'm hugging my Tilt (Kaiser) and blessing my 3G speeds tethered to my car computer (StreetDeck works wonders for my satellite data)
Quadrain @ Feb 24th 2008 1:52PM
I dunno, I'll still stick with a 3G phone (my 8525) and WMWifiRouter. Great program to turn a ppc phone into a router (it does work with multiple computers). EDGE isn't all that bad but 200kbs does lack a bit.
I bought the iPhone last year just to try it out and IMO it was more of a toy than anything else.