iPod Touch 4G + MacBook Pro + USB modem

I am living in Egypt and will be moving into an apartment doesn't have a landline, so I can't have ADSL. These could be installed but might take months, so I now have a USB modem from a mobile phone company. So far it seems to be working quite nicely with my MacBook.

However, this will leave my iPod Touch (which is synced and Bluetooth-paired to the MacBook) without WiFi unless I'm at work or another hotspot.

I do not yet know if I can buy a router for the USB modem (which is an Etisalat Smart USB Modem, according to the packaging, which also says MF100 HSDPA). Is there any other way for me to allow my iPod to access the Internet via my MacBook? Even if there is a way to do it with the two machines tethered to each other physically, that would be fine.

MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.6.4)

Posted on Sep 29, 2010 11:38 PM

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8 replies

Sep 29, 2010 11:49 PM in response to NDoyle

try googling "connectifyme".

it is a cool FREE program that installs a "server" on your computer which should be able to convert your phone company's mobile broadband connection into your own personal wifi hotspot. Essentially, you're using internet sharing with yourself, and your MacBook Pro also becomes your wireless router. You should then be able to add your iPod Touch as a client to "connectifyme" via wifi, just as you would a normal wireless router.

I'm obviously not familiar with Egypt, and much less your phone companies, but in theory this should work for you!!

Good Luck!

Sep 30, 2010 12:26 AM in response to GuestG4

Thank you for the suggestion, Guest, but from what I have seen, Connectify is for Windows 7 only. Investigating this did lead me to a similar program available for the Mac, Whisher, but I really do not want to make my WiFi connection generally available, which seems to be what Whisher does.

It is too bad that I can't simply plug the USB modem into my Airport Express base station (which I brought with me, not knowing that I would get an apartment without a telephone line!), but I know that's not an option.

Sep 30, 2010 1:03 AM in response to NDoyle

Have you tried these:
http://lifehacker.com/283088/share-your-macs-internet-connection-wirelessly
http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=766743

The first one is just internet sharing from your System Preferences>Sharing Section. I know they talk about using ethernet on the host system and sharing wifi with a client system, but it's worth a try to see if you can get it to work with your USB mobile broadband connection.

The second one has someone's experience with some previous success using a USB mobile broadband connection.

if worse comes to worse, you could try something like a Mifi, which is a small mobile broadband/wifi box that you would have to cary around with you if you go somewhere, but it's expensive.

If you have copy of windows, you could install that as a virtual machine with parallels on your macbook pro, and then run connectifyme from the windows side.

Let me know what you decide. I'm really interested in this myself.

Sep 30, 2010 8:10 AM in response to NDoyle

Fellow Mac user here, so maybe I can help. What you want to do is setup something called and ad hoc network. With your USB wireless stick inserted and your Mac connected to the internet, go to System Preferences > Internet & Wireless > Sharing.

Once you are there, you are going to select the service to share (Internet), the source to share it from (your wireless card) and the where you want to share it to - your Airport connection. You can only encrypt this using WEP but follow the onscreen instructions on how to set up the key. Once you are done, you have created a mini-wireless network from your USB card. No extra software needed.

Oct 1, 2010 3:10 AM in response to NDoyle

That did it, Luvlabs! Thank you. Guest's other suggestions weren't workable for one reason or another.

I'm only not crazy about the idea of having apparently created an unsecured network, even though I'll have it on like this only when using my iPod at home. Is there any way to password-protect this?

Stupid question: What would happen if I plugged in my Airport Express Base Station? It's set up with a password. Would it be able to protect the WiFi created by the USB Modem + MacBook?

Mar 24, 2011 6:45 AM in response to luvlabs

So I have a question on this: When I'm in the "sharing" section I don't have a choice to "share my connection from: USB"--I only have ethernet, firewire slot express card, bluetooth, airport. I downloaded the most recent software for my wireless card (a sierra wireless 3g card) but it still doesn't show up there, even though it does connect me to internet just fine.

Also, I do have an ethernet connection as well and that works (my ipad and iphone see it and join the network), but then safari says I'm not connected to internet, even though my macbook pro is connected. I figured that it was b/c I'm on a network and that is somehow firewalling out the ipad. That's why I went to wireless card, but ran into the problem that computer not listing it as an option to share from.

any help would be appreciated.

Mar 24, 2011 4:44 PM in response to Texas 100

You really should have posted this as a new question.

If you want to share the connection from the 3G wireless dongle you have for your MacBook, you have to start at System Preferences > Network. Your 3 G device should show up in the list of potential sources of network connections. Typical things there are ethernet, firewire, airport, and if you have one, any wireless modem device. If you don't see it there, then you are not going to be able to setup sharing for it. Before you do anything else, restart your Mac and see if it appears after the restart.

The rest of it is pretty easy - just use Spotlight to find out how to setup sharing.

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iPod Touch 4G + MacBook Pro + USB modem

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