Fun with a K800i

I've got a Sony Ericsson K800i, a phone with a rather fine little camera in it. That's why I bought it and I've talked about that before here. It's also a 3G phone and that's what I wanted to wibble about today.

It's a joy to use on the Net stand alone, especially with the latest version of Opera Mini which really has got web browsing on a 240x320 screen sussed and it also works very well with Google Maps, as I mentioned recently.

What I've failed to do is get it working as a modem with either my laptop (which is running Kubuntu Linux, the Dapper Drake release) or my Nokia 770 and up to now I've been using my old Sony Ericsson T610 as a "modem" phone with a Vodafone SIM in it and the K800i with my Virgin Mobile SIM in it for voice and taking pictures. But I really want to use the K800i for everything now, especially as the phone Net apps are now so good and Vodafone is so much cheaper (relatively speaking) for data than Virgin.

So on Wednesday night I decided to crack this once and for all. I started with the 770 and failed dismally so switched to the laptop where I could get some audit trail. My conclusions are as follows:

1. Assuming you've got a good data connection from your K800i, so you can browse the Net from there, then you need to do the following:
   1. Go to "Settings / Connectivity / Mobile networks / GSM/3G networks". Select "GSM and 3G" (by the way if you're not using data then setting this to "GSM only" should improve your battery life).
   2. Go to "Settings / Connectivity / Data Communication / Data Accounts" and highlight the service you're using. If like me you're on Vodafone pay as you go that's "PAYT WAP". Select "More / Account info" and it will display the "External ID". Note that number (it's 8 in my case, if your phone is fresh from Vodafone it will probably be 1 or 2).
   3. Go to "Settings / Connectivity / Bluetooth / Bluetooth Internet" and select the right account (in my case "PAYT WAP").

2. Now you need to pair the K800i and the Nokia 770. It's a long time since I got this working so you're on your own doing that. Sorry.

3. Finally you've got to set up to 770.
   1. Go into "Tools / Connection manager" Use the Mobile Operator Setup Wizard and it will appear to set it up for you but it won't work.
   2. Now go back and edit the connection. The "Connection type" should already be set to "Packet data" so leave that be and go to the next page. Delete the "Access point name", the "User name" and "Password" fields so they are all blank and replace the "Dial-up number" with *99***n*# where n is the number you noted in 1(b) above.

That should be the 770 done.

The laptop is than pretty easy if you're using kppp - the phone number is *99***n*# as above. Remember to turn off any other network connection first using ifdown