How To Turn An Apple iPad Into an iPad 3G

The new Apple iPad 3G comes out in the US at the end of this month. It cost $130 more than the WiFi only iPad plus you have to pay for a data plan that cost $14.99 to $29.99 a month. That means a 16GB 3G iPad with an unlimited data plan would cost $1,288.88 for the first year of ownership. That’s a pretty hefty price to pay over the $499 WiFi only iPad. However, If you already own an iPhone, there is a way to turn a WiFi only iPad into a 3G iPad.

For Jail Broken iPhones Only

The magical app that pulls this off is call MyWi. MyWi turns your iPhone into a 3G wireless HotSpot. When you’re at a location with no WiFi and you want to surf the net with your WiFi only iPad, just fire up your iPhone, turn on MyWi and log your iPad onto it. Your iPad will be connected to the Internet using the 3G of your iPhone. Since the iPhone becomes a wireless HotSpot, any other WiFi enabled device can log onto it and use it. MyWi offers 40bit and 105bit WEP security to prevent others from accessing your WiFi HotSpot. Since my iPhone goes wherever my iPad goes, it’s like having an iPad 3G for the price of an iPad WiFi. Plus I don’t have to pay for an additional data plan.

The main problem with MyWi is it’s not available at the iTunes store (and probably never will be). You need to jail break your iPhone in order to get it. Jail breaking an iPhone isn’t that hard to do but it can be intimidating if you’ve never done it before. The program I use to jail break my iPhone is call PwnageTool. Once your iPhone is jail broken, you’ll be able to download and install MyWi. The rest is extremely easy. MyWi cost $9.99. This a very small price to pay when you consider the savings you’ll get over the cost of a 3G iPad with data plan.

The following video shows the MyWi app in action. For the step by step on how to jail break the iPhone, check out this guide at iClarified.com. Thanks to Gary Ng at iPad In Canada for the refresher course on iPhone jail breaking.