[hecatae]

http://www.whatmobile.net/2011/03/iphone-update-kills-free-tethering-for-t-mobile-users/


The recent iPhone 4 update (iOS 4.3) update has angered Web ‘n’ Walk Plus customers now forced to pay for using the new Personal Hotspot feature.

the above article is worth a read and a tweet

[Ben]

Worth a read indeed, but not well written. I do feel for T-Mobile customers, though! Now they can be just like me :)

[DBMandrake]

Unfortunately the linked article and some of the discussion and complaining going on in other forums about this issue is incorrect and somewhat misleading. The Tethering APN has not changed with iOS 4.3.

I have iOS 4.3 on my 3GS, which has the T-Mobile 10.0 carrier bundle, and 4.2.1 on my 3G, which has the T-Mobile 9.1 carrier bundle. On both the Tethering APN is broadband.t-mobile.uk. The handset APN on both is general.t-mobile.uk. Nothing has changed with 4.3 in regards to T-Mobile APN's.

My T-Mobile SIM is Pay&Go and currently has the £5/month 30 day internet access addon active - which is only intended for handset data, and yet I can still Tether quite happily on both the 3G running 4.2.1 and the 3GS running 4.3. (Tethering and Personal Hotspot use the same APN, and are basically the same thing)

What we have managed to ascertain on another forum discussion so far is that attempting to enable Tethering / Personal Hotspot whilst the phone is roaming on Orange 2G (assuming the SIM has been opted into Orange roaming) will fail - because the broadband.t-mobile.uk APN is disallowed by T-Mobile whilst roaming on Orange. The phone interprets this to mean that Tethering is not allowed, and disables Tethering. (Changing the button to "Set Up Internet Tethering" which then tells you to contact T-Mobile)

However, roaming back onto T-Mobile and selecting Tethering / Personal Hotspot again gets it working again. This is the case with both 4.2.1 and 4.3.

Anybody who can't Tether whilst not roaming on Orange is due to T-Mobile having chosen to disable the broadband.t-mobile.uk APN on their tariff. The real story is that T-Mobile have chosen to tighten up which tariffs and data addons allow the Tethering APN to work.

The quote from the story "Apple’s decision to ask for more money to share a connection, plus the willingness to do so by the networks, has been somewhat controversial." is simply ludicrous - Apple has never made such a decision and is not telling networks to charge more money for Personal Hotspot - it's the networks choice to restrict this to certain tariffs or require extra addons. The network decides what APN's (and other settings) go into their carrier settings bundle, and the networks decide what APN's work on what tarrifs. If Apple really did mandate charging more why is it networks like Three can provide tethering on iPhones at no extra charge ? Poor reporting and fact checking I'm afraid.

No big conspiracy here, no change with iOS 4.3 as far as I can see, and as always, if someone is unhappy with a stunt that their network has pulled, such as removing features from their tariff, vote with your wallet! ;)

[Ben]

So much misinformation! Thanks for clearing that up, DBMandrake :)

[hecatae]

shame the other forum does not know this, http://forum.whatmobile.net/showthread.php?t=45052

so someone who is 15 months into a contract with Web n Walk Plus, who has been able to tether with their Iphone since contract began, and the latest Iphone update stops them from doing what the data package has always permitted as it's a chargeable add on that works fine on any other smartphone that allows tethering, trying to not say Android but it's true.

so they should vote with their wallet and leave a network who stops a service from working properly with their chosen manufacturer?

i cant stand t-mobile, and the everything everywhere deal seems to bringing in some interesting issues.