Saudi + Mobily + Blackberry how to

Please be advised that if your intention for entering Saudi Arabia is for Ibaadah (Worship), please use your time wisely.

On my return home i regretted having not spent more time in the Harams. The following how to is intended for people who

Need to be reached urgently at times and/or you would like to save money on calls back home using VOIP (skype, voip buster etc..) instead of traditional call boxes or

Cell phones. International roaming doesn’t work nicely and is extremely expensive in South Africa. May Allah grant us understanding and guidance.

Warnings and Tips! PLEASE READ BEFORE PROCEEDING!

- Please note that your current email addresses are registered to your Blackberry with your current Service Provider via its PIN.

Switching to a new Service Provider means that you will have to re-register your email addresses to your BB.

So make sure you have your usernames and passwords handy.

- Also you are only allocated 1000MB browsing for the month. bbm and e-mails are unlimited.

I never knew about this and got capped after a while, they charge your 2 SAR per MB after your 1000MB Limit.

You can’t renew your BB Subscription for the month, but i just bought a new sim card and re-did the steps below.

- Skype video calling eats alot of bandwith, to prevent yourself from getting capped like I did, make them once in a while.

Voice calling works just fine. Also if your not in an area with good signal, video calling will have alot of latency (lag).

The current version of Skype (4.2.0.169) shows coloured meters on your calls (Green is good, orange/yellow is ok, red is poor).

If you are in the red zone, rather just use Voice instead of video

- I purchased my phone from South Africa, luckily it was not network locked, make sure you know if your phone is not restricted to one

Service provider. If your from England / U.S you might have this problem of the phone rejecting the SIM Card.

- I Will not be held responsible for any damage to your phone, laptop. Though if you follow this correctly it should work. InshaAllah

Equipment I Used:

Blackberry 9700

Blackberry Desktop Manager 5.0.1.37

Laptop with Windows 7

Mobily SIM Card

The Switch:

I enquired about the KSA service providers and most of the people i asked spoke against STC and said i should get mobily.

As you enter Jeddah Airport, the first counter you come to is the one where they check your passports.

Many of the cleaners there sell Mobily sim cards preloaded with airtime. Having come from South Africa I automatically didn’t

Trust these people. Dont worry i bought 4 sim cards from them and they all worked! They even take U.S Dollars or South African Rands.

1) Put your Mobily SIM Card In

2) Load 99 SAR (Saudi Arabian Riyaals) [ You can get this from any airtime kiosk later ]

3) SMS “BIS” (Without quotes) to “1100” (Without quotes)

4) You will receive a confirmation shortly.

5) Restart your phone (Removing the battery or, HOLDING DOWN Left Alt + Right Caps + Backspace)

6) You will receive an SMS Saying that your BIS (Blackberry Internet Service) Has been activated and 99 SAR Deducted from your account.

7) Go to Menu>>Options>>Advanced Options>>Host Routing Table

8) This Should show no entries “*Empty*” or something

9) Press BB Button>> Register Now

10) Restart your phone

11) Go to The Host Routing Table as explained previously and check to see that you have some entries there

Mine shows:

GPRS SA (420) [42000330]

Wi-Fi [60]

GPRS SA (420) [42000430]

GPRS SA (420) [42000130]

12) If there is nothing there just go to the host routing table and “Register Now” again after another 10 or so mins and restart your phone.

13) You will notice that your Blackberry Messenger is now working.

14) To get your email working, open the browser and navigate to “http://www.mobily.blackberry.com” (Without quotes)

15) Accept the agreement

16) Add your e-mails as normal

Tethering to Your Laptop:

Some people might want to browse on their laptops and use skype etc. To do this is simple.

1) Open Blackberry Desktop Manager

2) Connect your BB to your machine, Mass storage or not, makes no difference.

3) Click “IP Modem”

4) Click “Configure” Under “Connection Settings” (On the Left Pane)

5) “Add Custom Profile” Under “Connection Profile”

6) Type a Profile name, i used “Mobily” (this can be anything you like)

7) Under “Profile settings” >> “Access Point” type in “web2” (Without quotes)

8) Leave everything else blank

9) Click “Save”

10) Click “OK”

11) Make sure your newly added Profile is displayed under “Connection Settings” In our case “Mobily”

12) Click “Connect” under “Connect to the Internet”

13) After it authenticates it will display how much data is transmitted etc...

14) Your skype / explorer / whatever will work as normal

Troubleshooting:

- Try to the best of your ability to make sure you connect in a 3G area, your phone will display “3G” next to the signal meter on the top right.

Things work alot better as opposed to GPRS and EDGE.

- If your Desktop Manager doesn’t connect, add a new profile with “web1” and try, though the current setup always worked.

- When you get back home, put your old sim card back in and follow steps 7-10 of the first section.

Then add your e-mails as normal. Eg: Menu>>Setup>>Setup e-mail

Good Luck!

=)