Wow, Pandora on the Motorola Q

The Motorola Q smartphone is getting pretty old and crufty these days, and can't do a lot of the cool stuff that newer Android and iPhones can do but... apparently it still has a few tricks up its sleeve, including the ability to play streaming Internet radio using the free Pandora service.

How to tether your Moto Q as a modem *in Windows*

Previously, I figured out how to use a Motorola Q smartphone as a modem under Linux. I use Linux all the time, but for the benefit of others I got around to figuring out how to do it under Windows XP as well.

How to use your Moto Q as a modem

So, I have the awesome (and now-discontinued) Spring SERO phone plan, which basically gives me unlimited text/data/everything for less than I paid for Verizon's cheapest plan. The only problem I've had until now:

How to tether my Motorola Q phone to my computer, so that I can use it as a modem when I'm not in range of a wireless network?

I read a whole lot of stupid forum posts on this topic, mostly by seriously confused people, and I was under the mistaken impression that (a) it's really hard to do, (b) it requires special software, and (c) Sprint has removed the features enabling tethering from the phone.

Well, it ain't true. In the course of a few hours, I figured out not how to tether my Moto Q in two different ways: first, using a USB cable, and second, via Bluetooth. So I'm going to explain how to do it both ways under Ubuntu Linux 8.10. It should be pretty much the same under other Linux variants.

Fixing cell phones and where to get the parts

So, I went camping at Lake Erie a couple weeks ago, and cracked the glass protective cover over my phone's screen:

My phone with the broken protective glass screen cover

It didn't really affect the phone functionally, but it was pretty ugly and I figured it would eventually fall apart with so many cracks in it. I called Sprint, and they wanted $125 to fix it!!! And I'd have to mail in the phone and be without it for several days.

So I did a little Googling... and apparently this glass screen cover is literally just a sticker. It has an adhesive backing and just sticks down on top of the LCD. Making it extra-ridiculous to pay someone $125 to fix it.

I've always thought it was annoying how you can't buy small parts for cell phones. But it turns out you can!!! There's a great online store at CNN.cn where you can buy small parts for zillions of different phones and the prices are very cheap. I got a new glass screen cover for $5 + $5 shipping from Hong Kong. It arrived in about a week very well-packed. I basically just pried the old screen cover off with a thin blade, and put the new one on. Now my phone's back to its original state:

My phone with the protective cover replaced

So... if you need any parts to fix your cell phone, and don't want to pay the ridiculous prices of the cell phone companies, definitely check out CNN.cn. I'm not affiliated with them or anything, just a pretty happy customer.