SOHO Router using Cell phone (wifi hotspot) instead of WAN port for internet?

[LxMxFxD4]

My cable modem is out until at least saturday (earliest avilable tech appointment to fix whatever the problem is) so i'm barely chugging along using my phone (sprint evo 4g) as a hotspot to 2 of my computers which have wireless (wifi 2.4ghz) adapters. I'm wondering however, if its possible for me to just get my Asus RT-N56U wired/wireless network to just connect to my phone and use it as the router. Basically:

Computers/printers/wii/ipods/etc --> RT-N56U --> Sprint Evo 4g --> Internet

In other words, instead of using the WAN port, connect to my phone to get to the internet.

If it can be done, anyone done it?

 

[JackMDS]

An in-between hardware will not add any bandwidth to the original internet signal that comes from the phone.

A bigger purse does not turn a $10 bill into $100.

If the LAN Wireless is the problem.

Connect the phone directly to one Win 7 computer, put a secondary Wireless card into the computer and use this to make it a Wireless HotSpot.

http://virtualrouter.codeplex.com/

 

[Fardringle]

A few routers have the ability to use a cellular card as the Internet connection. I'm not aware of any that are able to use a phone for the Internet connection.

 

[LxMxFxD4]

An in-between hardware will not add any bandwidth to the original internet signal that comes from the phone.

A bigger purse does not turn a $10 bill into $100.

If the LAN Wireless is the problem.

Connect the phone directly to one Win 7 computer, put a secondary Wireless card into the computer and use this to make it a Wireless HotSpot.

http://virtualrouter.codeplex.com/

Sadly I do not have a 2nd wifi adapter handy, and this really wouldn't solve my issue. My issue is

I have a wireless router connected to the internet right now - my phone. It connects my networked wifi devices. I have 4 computers (3 desktops and 1 laptop). I only have one USB wifi adapter, leaving me 2 desktops unable to connect to the internet using my phone. All 3 desktops are ethernet cabled. So I have 2 options:

1. Find out if its possible for my Asus SOHO router will connect to my phone instead of the WAN port to get to the internet
2. Buy 2 more wifi adapters

Generally speaking the former is more advantageous but if it wont work, it wont work. I'm really trying to find out.

 

[Fardringle]

1) No
2) For a long term solution, I might consider it, but it's a lot of work (and expense) for something that you'll only use for two days...

 

[LxMxFxD4]

1) No
2) For a long term solution, I might consider it, but it's a lot of work (and expense) for something that you'll only use for two days...

2) indeed, and if I add more computers, that means more wifi adapters

1) Is there a piece of hardware that WILL do it? It seems crazy that my SOHO router will only hard route to the the WAN port. Would this require for example, a mid level business device? I mean, cmon, it seems possible that the wifi radio could act as the wan port, its just a configuration setting, even if that means the internal wifi network would be eliminated...

EDIT: Yes this is possible, but of course, a DD-WRT router is needed:

http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Client_Mode_Wireless

Sadly, my asus isn't DD-WRT compatible (yet) !

 

[LxMxFxD4]

I did find an interesting solution which Jack alluded to but wasn't quite spot on (at least I couldn't follow)

What I did was use my laptop with ICS. Essentially plug in the WAN port of my asus router to the laptop ethernet jack. Then connect wirelessly to my phone. Then share my phone's internet with Local Area Connection (ethernet). Refreshed all IPs and the router IP and boom, everything is now connected.

I don't know why I didn't think of this earlier. I guess because its been like 10 years since i've done it!