Using Internet Sharing on Windows Mobile 6.1

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As you’ve probably guessed I spend a lot of time traveling meeting partners, customers, and potential future customers (more on that in a later post).  One of the tricks that I’ve used for some time (Windows 5.0 had this feature first I believe?) is to use a feature called internet sharing, which is just as it sounds;

Internet Sharing allows you to setup a connection from your laptop to your  mobile phones data connection.  I think the term we use in the US is ‘tethering’.  Anyhow, one of the tricks I use is setting up what’s known as a Bluetooth PAN, or Personal Area Network.

To set this up you need to go to your mobile phone and find the application Internet Sharing (some phones don’t have this on their main menus, but you can usually find it using explorer.  From here the instructions are simple;

  1. Start the application on you mobile phone.  It will probably remind you that you’re starting the bluetooth radio and ask you to confirm
  2. Next go to your laptop bluetooth devices and add the mobile device.  In most cases you should create a pin when prompted, I usually use 1234.
  3. Once you’ve connected the bluetooth device you need to go to the network and sharing center and click setup a new connection
  4. image
  5. Select setup a new connection, and all going well you should see ‘Connect to a Bluetooth PAN
  6. Hit connect and you should now be connected to the internet via your mobile – nice!

P.S.  Sorry for the lack of screenshots I wrote this while flying back to Seattle.