Which carrier and data plan do you use for 3g access?

I was looking at AT&T which is my cell carrier and some data plans were $59.99 for only 5gb monthly limit. Do all plans suck this much?

Also if the rx-51 has 3g how would we go about getting a data plan for that when it comes out? Will it use a sim card?

I tether my N810 using my Nokia E71 or Nokia N95-4 on the $15/month MediaNet plan. Works fine and no problems at all.

Not sure about the RX-51, but as I stated in another post, you could add a share line to your existing account for $10 and then unlimited data for another $15. This will give you unlimited data on the device for $25/month unless there's some other way to get an unlimited data only plan for less. I haven't researched or made any calls to ATT to see what a data only plan would cost. And, yes, the device will have a slot for a SIM card to be able to access the network. Of course, it should still have BT DUN so you should be able to tether to your phone as you currently do.

The way I've always understood/interpreted it: unless you are using what AT&T calls a "smart phone", you get MediaNET. If you have a smart phone, you get a data plan. It's through the same 3G network, but I think there's some proxy-ing going on.

The data plan allows for tethering, if you pay for the privilege.

Tethering with MediaNET "works", mainly because AT&T doesn't seem too interested in locking that function out in the consumer phones they sell. However, under the TOS, you're not supposed to use MediaNET for anything other than surfing the content managed sites they provide, usually to their site for buying ring tones, wall paper, etc.

MediaNET Unlimited is really MediaNET 5gb, but that's a lot of data.

Final analysis: Let your conscience be your guide. If you feel it's worth it, get a 3G consumer phone (I have the LG Shine, and it's great at tethering) and tether it to your N8x0. Just understand that it's not officially allowed.

I initially had bought the $50 At&T data plan along with my smartphone - Samsung Blackjack. I realised that I was not even using a fraction of the "unlimited" plan even with daily email checking and blog reading (and I tethered the Blackjack to my N810 using DUN)

So next time I bought a unlocked N95 phone, I just downgraded the data plan to the $15 Medianet Plan and still am able to tether the N95 top the N810 and do all my browsing and emailing from the N810.

And I am saving a bundle now while still getting all the benefits. Of course again conscience is your guide. In my case where I see the service providers gauging the customers every which way ($50 plan is plain gauging), my conscience is pretty clear.

While I don't have a 3G phone capable of working with T-Mobile USA (Nokia 6680), I do use them for Edge using the $20 a month UNLIMITED data plan --- check out this page for 3G coverage: http://coverage.t-mobile.com/default.aspx?MapType=Data

I left AT&T/ Cingular long ago, and I have no regrets!

Also, with the T-Mobile 3G network there are people on this board who are tethering to their 3G enabled phones and paying $4.99 (T-Zones) a month for this option. It's suppose to be for slow old Edge/GPRS directly on the phones WAP browser but there is nothing stopping them from getting the 1.5Mbps to 700kbps downloads for that $5 a month. Yeah, yeah, use your conscience on this one too.

I'm personally on the $19.99 a month "total internet package" and getting the 3G speeds and am fine with this. For this package they also give you unlimited internet connections while at (Hotspots) which are primarily StarBucks coffee shops. So that is an extra boon for having them.

No conscience involved. T-mobile's pretty much unique in the US, as tethering, even on T-zones, is not a violation of TOS. However, the way T-zones is set up does have a technical penalty: everything has to run through a proxy (adding latency) or a few non-standard ports.

I've got a 3G-capable phone on T-mobile, but haven't been anywhere 3G is rolled out yet, so I've just been using EDGE.

why do they prohibit tethering? also how do they detect if you are tethering? do they check packets to see what browser/os you run?

That $15 medianet plan seems pretty good but if they catch you tethering its $0.01 per kb

So they can sell you stand-alone data plans (for a laptop with an aircard) or tethering add-ons, at a higher price.

If you ask them why the price is different, they'd probably explain that laptops typically use more data per month than phone browsers, even though the cap is often 5GB for either plan. (Obviously, the internet tablets are a bit of a special case, as they're mobile devices with a mobile OS, and presumably low typical consumption, like on-device browsing, and you actually might not violate some TOSes if they specify tethering to a computer, and the IT is deemed not a computer...)

Of course, a real reason (which they won't mention) is to provide the same service at two prices, getting business customers (with deeper pockets) at a high price, and leaving the rest of us with a technically equivalent service tied to a less-desirable interface, but at a price that we'll pay.
Varies by carrier and phone, and as I use T-mobile, I don't know for any specific instances. In some cases, they just load a firmware that disables tethering, but especially with smartphones, that becomes impossible, and they use detection methods instead. I know some detections are made solely on the basis of data quantity.

Howardforums is a good place to get details, if you know what carrier you're interested in...

Yep. If you're in one of the metro areas where the T-mobile 3G is (or you have reason to suppose it soon will be), I'd definitely go that route. Otherwise, "You've got to ask yourself one question: 'Do I feel lucky?' Well, do ya punk?"

Cool looks like T-mobile has 3g in my area. So it's $19.99 and I can tether with T-mobile without the fear of $0.01/kb?