Un-Tethering your Windows Mobile Device

A couple months ago, my boss came to me and told me my work cell contract was eligible for a new phone upgrade. I did some research, and moving away from a hacked moto-Razr would only prove worthwhile if I were to pack in a few more features (like email, mobile internet, and maybe a better camera). I first asked for a BlackBerry Pearl because I already had a BlackBerry World Edition 8830 and I didn’t need the extra bulk. When he vetoed my request to add an additional BlackBerry Data Plan to the already pretty hefty data plan the company had, I went back to the drawing board.

Things I knew I wanted:

• Exchange Support
• WiFi and/or Mobile Internet that does not suck.
• Decent Camera (the BB8830 doesn’t have a camera)

The only decent mobiles out there that had Exchange Support for email were Windows Mobile 6.1 powered phones. I was also looking to not appear too greedy, so I tried to keep the budget for the new phone under $150. With our provider, the only real option at this point was the Samsung Omnia. I wasn’t upset with that, because it appeared to have fairly good user ratings. I received the phone and was pleased. It connected to Exchange without any trouble, it had an 802.11 radio, and a fantastic camera with more features stock than the iPhone.

Every few weeks I am the On-Call technician for the ISP/hosting company I work for. I’d like to be able to attach my cell phone to my laptop and be able to handle 95% of the work that I would typically be responsible for while on-call, which only requires a stable internet connection for RDP or SSH. I began to look for tethering options and came across WMWifiRouter in my searches. I was a bit skeptical because my wireless network has a reputation for disabling certain “features” that may allow the user to do more than they want to provide, but I gave it a go. Here were the necessary steps to make this work for my phone:

1. Enable Internet Connection Sharing on your windows mobile phone.
2. Restart the phone.
3. Install WMWifiRouter.
4. Restart the phone.
5. Run WMWifiRouter.
6. Connect to the wireless ad-hoc network it creates (see image) from your laptop or other wireless device.

From there, you should be able to browse the internet, download files, run a speed test, and connect to your office VPN to scare the night technician by printing to the network printer.

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Tags: 3G router, internet anywhere, omnia, samsung, tethering, WiFi Hotspot, Windows Mobile 6.1, WMWifiRouter