Can anyone guess what exactly happened here?

Tom Dunne

Apologies for the length of this, it is partly out of frustration.

Ok, so in my naive quest to get decent broadband in this country (living in Bahrain) I signed up for a providers 3G USB service. Same as 02 or Vodafone, the device is made by Huwaei.

I recently got a Samsung Galaxy Tab, so decided to try the Sim card from the USB device in the Tab - no problems there. The provider even sent an SMS to the Tab with updated config settings.

Now, this is where the fun starts.

I put the sim card back in the USB modem, fired up the connection on my laptop, no problems.

Apart from my VPN, that is. Now my VPN service won't connect on my laptop. However, when I use another service provider, the VPN connections on the laptop work fine. So the problem appears to be with the 3G service provider. Prior to me moving the sim card, the VPN connections worked fine.

Tech support don't seem to understand the problem, and have basically told me "tough".

Any pointers on where the problem might be? Or how I can explain this to tech support?

William Powell

Wild guess

Service providers differentiate between phone users and broadband users, you'll notice data for phones is more expensive than data for Mobile broadband users, so I'm wondering if your SIM having been used in a phone is no longer getting the same service as before.

Then the other wild guess is that I have heard that the SIM can hold some of the basic settings like APN etc on it and provide them if none are provided by the dialing software on the PC, again using the SIM in a phone might have changed these settings.

So best I can advise is double check the profile you use when you connect (create a new one if necessary) and check you have an APN specified and that it is correct.

Also check what IP address the computer has when connected and compare that to what www.whatismyip.com tells you if different then you might now be behind a NAT server which you might not have been previously. Edit> Many service providers have 2 or more APNs one will give you a Public IP address that will probably work OK with a VPN and another that gives you a Private IP address which probably won't work, hence my reason for pointing you to checking the APN.

Gadgetman496

I recently got a Samsung Galaxy Tab, so decided to try the Sim card from the USB device in the Tab - no problems there. The provider even sent an SMS to the Tab with updated config settings.

Could it be that by updating the SIM while in the phone changed the settings needed for the Internet USB device?

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Tom Dunne

gadgetman496 wrote: »

Could it be that by updating the SIM while in the phone changed the settings needed for the Internet USB device?

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Possibly - but what could it have changed? From what I can see, the APN is the same on both the phone and the USB modem.

I will have to have a better look at it today.

William Powell

Tom Dunne wrote: »

Possibly - but what could it have changed? From what I can see, the APN is the same on both the phone and the USB modem.

I will have to have a better look at it today.

Thats the essence of my earlier point. Many operators would have a different APN for each service, one for mobile phones and another for broadband users. The mobile phone APN will allow browsing but because the telcos can't afford to give every phone user a Public IP address they will be behind a NAT frewall sharing a Public IP which will screw up any VPN.

PM me the IP address the computer gets and the IP address you get when online at www.whatismyip.com and I'll work out what APN you are using the important thing to note is that if those IP addresses are different a VPN is unlikely to work as you will be sharing the extenal IP address with losts of other users.

Edit> Just did a google for telcos in Bahrain and as an example I found that Batelco have 2 APNS and the naming convention might just indicate the difference between them APN mms.batelco.com or APN internet.batelco.com

Tom Dunne

Right, now we are getting somewhere.

I am getting two different IP addresses, one when the usb modem is in my wireless router, and a different one when I am on the phone.

PM on the way.

William Powell

Got the PM and the IP addresses told me which network you are on and that that particular provider does have 2 APN's so I've PMed you back what I think is the correct one.

If that doesn't fix it we need to take a closer look at whats going on but I warn you it gets even more boring and techie from here on in .