Whoopy ti-yi-yo, tether your iPhone

There’s a lot of to-do about iPhone tethering overseas so I assumed it would be a similar drama over here. Not so – Vodafone NZ supports tethering. It’s free. It’s easy. And it’s super useful!

What is tethering? It’s using your iPhone (or other cell phone) as a modem for your computer when you’re away from your broadband connection, so it’s particularly relevant to, but not exclusive to, laptops.

It’s not new technology, or exclusive to Apple, by any means. In fact, tethering goes back at least 5000 years to ancient times, with the Mesopotamians and Egyptians using it to stop their domesticated donkeys and horses from getting away. These people also had apples, and even windows, of a sort.

OK, I realise I am being an overly clever hoofed mammal of the horse family with a braying call. I used Bluetooth tethering with an Ericsson phone already about eight years ago, so I could get online when I was out with my old Mac PowerBook, but it was such a mission I only did it twice. Besides, it was painfully slow.

Tethering is possible with many other phones and other computers, so long as they have Bluetooth, a short-range wireless technology, or some other method of connection.

The reason it’s a big deal now is that 3G puts cellular networks up to speeds similar to low-end broadband. That’s quite fast enough for downloading emails and some browsing.

The usual way to get online like this before with a laptop was using a Vodem, in Vodafone’s case, or the T-stick in Telecom’s, both of which require separate account plans. Plus you need to buy a Vodem or T-stick itself, of course, a little USB thing that acts like … a tethered cell phone.

The beauty of tethering your existing iPhone is that you already have a data plan for it, and that it tethers using Bluetooth so you don’t have to plug anything into your laptop. If you’re anything like me, you haven’t even come close to using your data cap, (mine’s 250MB), mostly thanks to doing the most serious downloading either inside my wireless network or to my Mac before transferring data (songs, apps, audiobooks) to my iPhone when I plug it in for charging.

Note that you can check how much data you’re using easily: on the iPhone, open Settings, touch General, touch Usage. (I reset this data at the end of every month when my plan ticks over so I know how many calls I can make.)

If you have installed OS 3 on your iPhone (tethering won’t work with the iPod touch as it’s not a phone), now you can go online whenever you’re in cell reception. That’s most places in New Zealand.