Using the Nokia PC Suite to get Online

On a Windows PC, you can use the Nokia PC Suite to connect to the phone as a GPRS modem. The Nokia PC Suite probably already installed the modem driver for the phone for you. If it didn't (or if you add more phones to the PC Suite), you can download the Windows modem driver for most Nokia phones via the product software download page on the Nokia web site. The driver file has a .inf suffix. You should right-click it and choose Install from the pop-up menu to install it.

Once the modem driver is installed, you need to add the mobile phone as a modem to the Windows system. Open the Phone and Modem Options icon in the Control Panel and click the Modem tab. Click the Add… button to add a new modem. You should skip the modem detection step and select a Nokia phone modem from the list.

In the Nokia PC Suite, open the Edit Modem Options program and select a GPRS access point for this modem.

Now, you can add a new Internet connection for this new modem in the Network Connections section of the Control Panel. The Windows New Internet Connection Wizard asks you the phone number the modem should connect totry the phone number *99# for GPRS and EDGE connections (use #777 for Code Division Multiple Access, or CDMA, data service). That's it! Now you can use the new network connection to connect to the Internetit automatically dials and connects the phone behind the scenes.

The process I just covered is pretty complex and is difficult to troubleshoot if anything goes wrong. To make life easier for users, Nokia provides a free download called One Touch Access (http://www.nokia.com/nokia/0,8764,72028,00.html). It allows you to share an Internet connection from your phone, with just one touch. The One Touch Access program requires Nokia PC Suite v6.4 and above.

If you have difficulty working with the Nokia PC Suite to share an Internet connection, try QuickLink Mobile for Windows, from Smith Micro (http://www.smithmicro.com/). This is a nice utility for automating and managing Internet connections on a Windows computer, and it helps you to set up a mobile phone data modem. A Mac OS X version of QuickLink Mobile is also available.