PDANet puts iPhoneModem, Netshare to shame – Full blown Internet for Free – No proxies! Coda, AIM, Firefox and a lot more on the Go!
UPDATE : PDANet sneaked in an update ( v1.40) which restricts the functionality unless you fork out $29.99!
Temporary Solution :
- Download PDANet 1.33
- SSH that into your phone and drop pdanet1.33.deb into /var/root/
- Using MobileTerminal (get if off Cydia if you have to) type in “su,” then type in your password, which is “alpine” by default. Then type in the command dpkg -i /var/root/pdanet1.33.deb. Wait for it to get done.
- Then restart/respring your iPhone
I have been pretty busy lately – final semester of Masters and you can imagine! I finally took a small break and planned on a 4 hour bus journey (from Asbury Park to Camden on NJTransit 317!). I ordered a virgin 3G 16GB iPhone and I have my Macbook Pro, iPhone fully charged. While my previous story involved iPhoneModem from Addition, and a NJ – NYC train trip, this trip definitely is awesome given the no holds barred internet – not just limited to Safari this time around. I could accomplish some web development work on Coda, chit-chatting on iChat and blogging (writing this article!) on Firefox! Amazing isn’t it?
Even more amazing is the fact that the whole setup (Jailbreaking iPhone, installing PDANet, creating Adhoc network) took me no longer than 20 minutes! An even more funnier fact is that I used iPhoneModem’s free Mac client to create an Adhoc network on my Leopard mean machine! iPhoneModem costs $10 but their Mac client is free, I would suggest downloading it and soon after you launch it, it creates an ad-hoc network on your Mac and all you have to do is launch PDANet on your iPhone (Don’t forget to connect your iPhone to the network you just created via WiFi!). This makes my job much much easier while it comes to documenting the whole process for friends who likes to tap the maximum out of their Apple-Att’s iPhone offering!
My experience involved no proxy setups in any program, thats what excited me more which lead to me publishing this article while I am still on the bus!
Few Important Tips :
1) Try to decrease the brightness of your laptop and iPhone to a bare minimum since the whole process involves WiFi on both the devices.
2) Connect your iPhone to your Mac to facilitate charging on the go and make sure iPhone Screen is in sleep mode, WiFi still works – amazing right?
3) My Silicon case clad iPhone grew hot, may be since it is constantly being charged while transmitting packets at a rapid 3G pace! My iPhone stayed fully charged the whole time!
4) Spare battery, Solar laptop charger, …. bring em’ on, add your own recipe to the whole experience! Do you now see how spending a little extra on Apple products and ATT’s 3G service boosts your productivity tremendously?!
5) PDANet never dropped the connection. These guys definitely deserve a donation, be it small but a token of appreciation always helps 🙂
By the time I got down the bus, My Macbook Pro stood at 8% charge down from 100% (3 hours) and iPhone at 80% down from 100%!
[…] something we all crave for when it comes to iPhone 3G! I will put it to stress test soon by using iPhone 3G as modem to access internet on Macbook on the go, it will be interesting to see how well it handles the […]
I am using iphone 2.0 with, OSX 10.5.5 mackbook pro, and pdanet. But once connected via pdanet/adhoc, only my apple mail app will successfully connect. firefox and safari dont. I get
HTTP ERROR
: $CODE$
$MESSAGE$
RequestURI=/
What the dealio?
I’m using t-mobile, with t-zones hack.
Any suggestions?
thx
Justin : Frankly, I never used T-Mobile! Great to see that you are trying to squeeze internet from EDGE connection!! Never came across this error, did you try setting a proxy may be (since it is a t-zones hack)..
iphonemodem = hassle for windows users, spotty for ad-hoc. Plus non-registered versions nag you AND disconnect your data settings
pdanet = epic win for windows users; ad hoc works alot more seamlessly… now for some password protection (or, is this possible? did i miss something? If so let me know!). Well done.
FYI, on the iphonemodem’s side, ad hoc connections on Windows do NOT block any other programs (i.e, everything will work) though iv’e seen some Mac configs wig out on it. Not too sure why this is.
how does mobile terminal work? i need more detailed instructions since i fail. a little help anyone?
PDANet is a good app for tethering your phone however it greatly disappointed me when version 1.40 update sneaked in and contrary to what the application initially stated "Free", it restricted the functionality limiting it to HTTP traffic only.
If it were planned to be commercial, it should have been specified even at the launch of version 1.33, at least that would have more ethical & most users would have paid for it's functionality rather than looking for ways to hack it.
i agree with u javed here… the developer was greedy enuff to fool people by tagging it as free and then limiting it with ver update..to top it all…app wudnt even notify u of its limited functionality. shame on u developer..shame on u!!!
I have been using PDAnet, its a great software. If only the developers drop the price a bit, I dont mind buying it.
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