This is BrainLog, a blog by Dan Sanderson. Older entries, from October 1999 through September 2010, are preserved for posterity, but are no longer maintained. See the front page and newer entries.

April 25, 2009

Enabling EDGE Data on the HTC Dream Phone with AT&T

The HTC Dream is the first mobile smart phone that runs the Google Android operating system that made it to market. It is sold subsidized and locked to the T-Mobile network as the T-Mobile G1, and also sold unlocked (and more expensively) as the Android Dev Phone 1. The Dream works with any GSM network, including T-Mobile and AT&T.

The AT&T experience is not ideal (and AT&T does not sell a version of the Dream yet). In particular, you can't use AT&T's 3G network, even though the device supports T-Mobile 3G. However, you can use AT&T's slower EDGE network. If you have an unlocked Dream phone and an AT&T SIM card with a data plan, you can enable EDGE networking as follows:

  1. From the Home screen, press Menu, then select Settings.
  2. Select "Wireless controls," then "Mobile networks," then "Access Point Names."
  3. Press Menu, then select New APN. Enter the following values in each of the fields:
    • Name: AT&T
    • APN: wap.cingular
    • Proxy: unset
    • Port: unset
    • Username: wap.cingulargps.com
    • Password: CINGULAR1 (with uppercase letters)
    • Server: unset
    • MMSC: mmsc.cingular.com
    • MMS proxy: unset
    • MMS port: 80
    • MCC: 310
    • MNC: 410
    • APN type: unset
    Press Menu, then Save.
  4. Press Back to return to the "Mobile network settings" screen.
  5. Probably optional: Select "Use only 2G networks."

If your SIM card is good, you have a data plan, you're in range of an AT&T EDGE network and you're not already connected to a wireless access point, an EDGE connection icon should appear in the notifications bar. It looks like an "E" with up and down arrows. (Sorry, I'm too lazy to produce a screenshot.) If you are connected to Wi-Fi, you can disable it temporarily from the "Wireless controls" settings screen to test your EDGE connection.

This is especially useful if you use an iPhone as your regular phone, and have acquired an unlocked Dream (such as the Android Dev Phone 1) for development or tinkering purposes. You can just take the SIM card out of your iPhone, put it in the Dream, and set up EDGE to get a fully functional phone. (Google employees all got unlocked Dream phones as a holiday gift last December.)

Thanks to this T-Mobile forum post for the EDGE config.