How-To: Tether Your BlackBerry to Your Mac
Written on June 24, 2009 by Jenny Kortina and 15 people have commented
One of the big, new features of the iPhone is its ability to tether. BlackBerrys have had this ability for a while, so below I have outlined how to tether your BlackBerry with your Mac to use your Internet connection to browse the web with your computer.
Some Things to Note
- This tutorial is for Leopard.
- I have successfully tested this with a BlackBerry Bold and a BlackBerry Curve 8900 using the 8800 modem drivers, but it should also work with the BlackBerry 8100, 8700 and 8800.
- Some service providers have a special tethering plan that you may need to add to your cell phone. (It will work without the tethering packing, but you might get slammed with overage charges if they catch you.)
Configure Your BlackBerry
- Open “Manage Connections.”
- Click the checkbox next to “Bluetooth” to turn Bluetooth on.
- Scroll down to “Set up Bluetooth.”
- A pop-up will come up to name your device; name it.
- An “Add Device” pop up will come up; click “Cancel.”
- Click the BlackBerry menu; select “Options.”
- Set Discoverable to “Yes.”
- Save changes.
Configure Your Mac
- Download & Install BlackBerry modem scripts for OS X.
- Go to System Preferences → Bluetooth.
- Check “Show Bluetooth status in the menu bar.”
- Click on the menu bar item and select “Set up Bluetooth Device.”
- A pop-up will appear; click “Continue.”
- Select “Mobile phone” as the type of device.
- When the computer finds your phone, select it and click “Continue.”
- You’ll be given a passkey. Enter the passkey into your BlackBerry.
- After successfully pairing your computer with your BlackBerry, you will get a pop-up that asks, “Accept connection request from (your computer)?” Click the checkbox “Don’t ask again” and select “Yes.”
- Your computer will now ask, “Access the Internet with your phone’s data connection?” Click the check box, and select “Continue.”
- Enter the following information into the appropriate boxes. (This is for AT&T. Do a Google search for other vendors.):
- Username: WAP@CINGULARGPRS.COM
- Password: CINGULAR1
- Phone Number: wap.cingular
- Save and close.
- Now open up network preferences: Applications → System preferences → Network
- Click the Plus Button.
- Interface: Bluetooth
- Service Name: Whatever you want, I named it “Tethered BB”
- Enter in all the information again:
- Username: WAP@CINGULARGPRS.COM
- Password: CINGULAR1
- Phone Number: wap.cingular
- Click “Advanced:”
- Vendor: Research In Motion
- Model: BlackBerry 8800
- Dial mode: Ignore dial tone when dialing
- Save Settings.
Connect to the Internet
Make sure Bluetooth is enabled on both you phone and your computer!
- Click the Dialer icon in your menu bar.
- Select Connect Tethered BB (or whatever you named your connection in step 14 of setting up your computer) from the drop-down menu.
- After a few seconds you should be connected!
Tweet This (33)
bonesb on June 24th, 2009 at 6:12 pm
No offense intended, but a revision to the title of this blog entry is in order, IMO. I have a BB. A Storm. On the Verizon network. While helpful to some, I could have avoided a trip to this entry if you’d added a “AT&T” to the title.
Staff Comment Josh Pigford, TheAppleBlog on June 24th, 2009 at 9:32 pm
Really? You’d say this article is now completely useless because in our example we didn’t show your network? You do realize mentioned how to find your network, don’t you?
Evan on June 25th, 2009 at 8:52 am
@bonesb Chill out. Its not like you had to pay to read this article and like he said “Do a Google search for other vendors”.
nickled on June 24th, 2009 at 9:45 pm
I’m not clear on how to “find my network.” What am I suppose to search for using Google?
Christopher on June 25th, 2009 at 12:37 am
This may help for other carriers wap settings:
http://pinstack.com/carrier_settings_apn_gateway.html
Jim on June 25th, 2009 at 8:14 am
I have a BB 8330 with Sprint and a MacBook Pro. Sprint has no address on the list above. Yesterday I purchased a MiFi 2200 Mobile Hotspot card. It is wireless and lets you connect your laptop (and 5 others) to the 3G Mobile Broadband at home or while you are on the road. It was $99 with rebate and $50 a month (normally $60 unless you are a Sprint customer) and you get to transfer 5GB a month before they start charging you.
I used it last night in my favorite restaurant where there is no WiFi available and I had a friend come over with his laptop and we both were online simultaneously. It was real fast when I was alone on it and it did slow down a bit when my friend joined in. People were coming over and asking us to check things on Facebook etc. I wanted to see how much data I used but it hasn’t updated yet on sprint.com but you can check it after a day or so.
All in all, I am very pleased with it and I have a 30 day free trial too!
Jonathan on June 25th, 2009 at 2:20 pm
I tried this, but could not find the Research In Motion options in the modem section of advanced network settings. I got an error about connecting to a PPP server.
Luke on July 8th, 2009 at 10:21 pm
Same problem here..couldn’t find the Research In Motion options in the modem section of advanced network settings either.
Did you hear back from anyone as to why this is so and what can we do to get around this?
I’d appreciate it so much if you could share any answers with me.
Cheers,
Luke.
Anna on July 31st, 2009 at 9:05 pm
I also could not find “Research in Motion” in the drop-down list in advanced network settings. Is there another way to connect my blackberry??
MarioRD on October 12th, 2009 at 7:56 pm
Did you find out how to solve this problem????
SAMTACKI on July 28th, 2009 at 9:26 am
Thank you! Worked like a dream first time out with T-Mobile USA.
Stay smart.
vic on October 22nd, 2009 at 10:06 pm
this is awesome!
Rock on November 10th, 2009 at 6:44 pm
Hey SAMTACKI,
How did you get this to work with T-mobile? Are you using Snow Leopard?
I upgraded and now this doesn’t work. I get an error at Authentication saying to check my PPP settings and try again. Dadgummit!