The Bloog

I have been able in the past to enable Internet Tethering on the iPhone and use it to get internet access on the laptop, but only via a usb cable connection. I knew that this can also be done via Bluetooth as long as the laptop has built-in Bluetooth or if you have a USB Bluetooth adapter.

The problem I ran into was that while trying to pair the iPhone with the laptop running Vista, it would end up in a driver error. Fortunately, there is an easy way around.

1. On the iPhone, go to Settings/General/Bluetooth. This will set the iPhone in discovery mode.

2. On the computer, go to Start Menu and type Bluetooth. In the list you should see Bluetooth Devices. Click it.

3. Click Add Device and then select Phone from the new window. You will get a pairing code that you need to enter on the iPhone.

4. Once the pairing is done, you will most likely get prompted for a driver. You can ignore or skip this step. You will end with a message saying the device drivers were not successfully installed. That’s fine.

5. Now go to Network and Sharing Center. Click Manage Network Connections on the left.

6. You should be able to see a Bluetooth Network Connection that is disconnected. Right click and select View Bluetooth Network Devices. In the window that appears you should see your iPhone. Select it and click Connect.

That’s it. If your iPhone was already set up for Internet Tethering and if Internet Tethering has been enabled in Settings, then you’ll simply be able to surf the net on the computer.

(See update at the end of the post)

Today, all of a sudden, I noticed the iPhone was no longer connected to the wi-fi network at home. I went to Settings/Wi-Fi and it wouldn’t even detect the network. Occasionally, it would show up, I would select it, enter the password and give the error “Unable to join the network <”SSID Name> “.

I tried connecting with the laptop to the wi-fi and it worked fine. I tried resetting the router, but still, no success in connecting with the iPhone.

I googled this problem and tried one of the suggestions:

- Go to Settings/General/Reset and Reset Network Settings

I tried that a few times and nothing. Then, I disabled the wireless security on the router and I was able to connect with the iPhone. But that wasn’t good enough a solution because I need the security enabled. So I turned it back and again, the iPhone wouldn’t connect or even see the wireless the network.

In trying to determine whether it’s a router problem or a phone problem, I setup a secondary wireless router I had as a spare. The laptop could see the second wireless network, but not the iPhone.

Frustrated and confused, I started changing whatever came to mind. I set both routers to wireless-G mode only, from the Mixed mode they were both on. On my main router, I also changed the password (I am using WPA2 Persnal with TKIP).

After a couple of minutes of “thinking”, the iPhone saw the second router all of a sudden and for the first time. I selected it, put in the password and connected successfully. Then, it started seeing the main router/wireless network also. So I selected that one also, put in the new password and also connected successfully.

Great! Makes sense? No. I cannot see any logical explanation to this, but it worked. This is, however, very common in the computer troubleshooting world. If all made sense initially, then the problem probably wouldn’t exist in the first place.

Somewhat scared that I may lose the wi-fi again, I went to the main router and changed the password back to what it was initially. I also changed the network mode back to Mixed. On the iPhone, I went to Settings/Wi-fi and chose to forget the network so that I can connect to it again and put in the new password. It worked fine.

Now the iPhone sees both wireless networks fine and can connect to either one without problems. My Wi-Fi is back! I hope some of this may help you in case you have similar problems. Good luck!

UPDATE 04/23/09: Eventually, the wi-fi died altogether. I thought it was a hardware problem, maybe with the wi-fi module. I gave up on it and got an iPhone 3G. I was getting ready to sell the original iPhone since everything else was working just fine, until…. I saw light at the end of the tunnel. I came across a post at the ModMyI forums of a user experiencing the same problems I had with Wi-Fi. Fortunately, that person solved it eventually and posted back with a link to a guide. So here it is:

How to fix your iPhone 2G if you have Wi-Fi problems: http://www.modmyi.com/forums/general-iphone-chat/441981-not-finding-wifi-iphone-2g.html#post3984881

It is a little involving, but it works! It was a software problem after all, probably somewhere at the baseband level…

My iPhone is fully functional again