Being Frugal with My iPad

I've been debating about a tablet device ever since the first iPad was announced. After buying the Pocket PC and Palm devices the moment they we're released only to realize I had no use for them in my life, I try to hold off on buying tech toys because they seem cool. Consequently, I debated iPad vs netbook then held off too debate iPad vs Android vs Playbook vs all the other tablets coming out. A couple days ago I bit the bullet and bought an iPad 2. The anti-conformist in me tries to avoid Apple products but after playing with the alternatives and looking at available apps the iPad was the superior device for my intended use. Note for those of you happy with the other devices I'm not slamming them, they just didn't fit my requirements.

I decided that I donate enough money to Rogers monthly and also wanted to save a little over a hundred bucks on the initial purchase so went with the wifi only model. The idea here was that I always have my Sony Xperia X10 phone with me so I would just tether the wireless off my phone when no other wifi was available. I have a friend who does this with Blue Tooth and a iPhone 3GS. Well turns out that you can't do that easily via Blue Tooth with the X10. You can pair to the iPad but can not connect. "No Worries", I thought, I half expected that. I would have been shocked if Apple and Android 2.1 played together. So I went with Plan B which was to use the Android app "Barnacle Wifi Tether" to make my phone a portable wifi hotspot.

To do this you need to suck up some courage, if your not a tech guy, and make some adjustments to your phone as Barnacle requires root access. To clarify at a high level, Root Access, means superuser access.

After searching the Internet on how to root your phone I finally found a method that worked on my phone which was using a tool on xda-devlelopers called "SuperOneClick". The latest version worked, phone is now rooted, I'm writing this using Barnacle to access the Internet, and my dislike for my Android phone has softened as a result ;).

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=803682

Note I'll have to Unroot when Sony officially releases Gingerbread for the Xperia X10 so I can upgrade but that looks to be pretty easy using "SuperOneClick". I also hear that with Gingerbread Barnacle may not be necessary anymore so we shall wait and see.