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I'd like to USB-tether my Android phone to a local router. I have a tether plan, so that's not an issue.

My reasons why I want it this way:

  • the router should expose the internet to all clients, not the phone
  • reduced cross-chatter, no additional (second) wifi
  • local connections are handled by the router, not the phone

I know there are other devices out there, like ZyXEL's routers and apps like ZoomTether. That last one is almost like what I need — but I want a device, not a computer connected.

Has anybody done this?

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  • BTW, the official word from ZyXEL: "Phone tethering will not work as there is no way to load the usb drivers for the phone onto the mwr222 to allow the tethering to work.."
    – end-user
    Commented Aug 1, 2012 at 17:20

1 Answer 1

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Use OpenWRT 10.03 or later. Install the following modules: 

kmod-nls-base
kmod-usb2
kmod-usb-core
kmod-usb-net
kmod-usb-net-cdc-ether
kmod-usb-net-rndis
kmod-usb-ohci
kmod-usb-uhci

Then edit /etc/config/network. Under the WAN configuration, change option ifname eth1 to option ifname usb0. Then enable USB tethering on the phone and reboot the router.

This article has some information about how to get the configuration smoother so you don't need to reboot the router each time you want to tether. This article has a simpler way.

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  • Note that on some (all?) phones you need to manually enable USB tethering after each USB connect (or reboot). That may cause a connection loss after a blackout and you need to manually 'fix' this each time. You may want to change that behaviour via some /etc/init.d/* script (root required though) or so
    – ce4
    Commented Jul 30, 2012 at 7:57
  • Awesome, thanks David! This will take me a while to test out - I'll let you know the results. fingers crossed
    – end-user
    Commented Aug 1, 2012 at 17:18
  • @end-user - how'd it go?
    – Geoff
    Commented Dec 18, 2012 at 13:04
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    I wasn't able to get it to work. Granted, I didn't convert over to OpenWRT from dd-wrt. I assumed, perhaps wrongly, that they share a common ancestor and have access to similar modules. I was able to find some of them, but it looks like dd-wrt uses an older-model package management system (a little surprising). Up-shot is I don't have a lot of time to fiddle and haven't kept at it.
    – end-user
    Commented Dec 18, 2012 at 13:54
  • Thanks. I'll be sure to check out OpenWRT if / when I ever get LTE in my city. Cheers.
    – Geoff
    Commented Dec 18, 2012 at 14:38

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