Hi,

I recently acquired an iPad 3g + Airport Express.

The only internet connection available is the 3g iPad connection, the wireless network only exists to stream music to speakers, but does not have an internet connection itself.

Difficulties occur when the iPad connects to the wireless network, because it wants to connect over wifi, which doesn't work.

Is there any setting, which would force iOS to always connect to the internet over 3g, even when it is connected to a wifi. It should at least realize, that the wifi connection doesn't work and then try the 3g.

Is this doable with iOS?

Thank you for any useful input

The iPad defaults to wifi - if it is using 3G, it's not connecting via wifi. How are you establishing the wifi connection? What error are you seeing?

Well, I start off with having Wifi and 3g on. It then connects automatically to 3g. Now I connect manually to the Wifi network.

Safari just says "no internet connection available". Then as soon as wifi is turned off, it works using the 3g connection. But without wifi no airplay

It sounds as if your wi-fi connection isn't configured properly - you're not connecting to your ISP, and you should never have to manually connect via wifi if you've ever successfully connected in the past. I would recommend turning 3G off, leaving only wi-fi on, and diagnose what your wifi connection issues are.

Maybe I am misunderstanding something here.

But I only have an Airport Express hocked up to speakers. The APE is not connected to anything else, there isn't any router or anything present, so there isn't any ISP.

Originally Posted by DontUnderstandMyIpad

Maybe I am misunderstanding something here.

But I only have an Airport Express hocked up to speakers. The APE is not connected to anything else, there isn't any router or anything present, so there isn't any ISP.

I think I'm getting it now - you need 3G to access the internet and wi-fi to access your Airport Express. Because the iPad detects an active wifi connection, it's not using your 3G modem to access the internet even when Safari reports no internet connection via wifi.

Now that I see what you're talking about, I think you're screwed. I have the same problem with my AirStash,a wifi data card. If I connect to the card via wifi, I can't access the internet - 3G doesn't work when wifi is active. It's one or the other, as far as I know.

Yes, that it is exactly what I meant. To connect the iPad with the Airport Express to stream music, while still using 3G to access the Internet.

Since this doesn't seem to work, I will probably just go ahead and sign a broadband contract to get the APE connected to the Internet.

I apologize for the wage problem description earlier today. So thank you for the patience and help

Yep, you're screwed. Same thing for airprint and for airplay that requires an internet connection ( like youtube.)
Its hard to understand how apple missed this.

You can't get data from 3g while on a wifi connection. So if your wifi connection doesnt have internet access of it's own, you're screwed.

This is the same for the iphone 4.

If i need to airprint a document from the internet, i have to get the document, switch to wifi to print, then switch back to 3g for my internet connection.

I can't airplay any internet content because when its on 3g getting the content, you can't be on wifi to connect to airplay and play it.

Thanks apple!

Hopefully there will be a future update to address this.

Sean

The only other Option which might have worked is something along the lines of Mywi, as this creates an wifi network, while still being on 3G. The problem here is that Mywi currently only supports adhoc networks and the Airport Express cannot connect to those adhoc networks. I suppose the Mywi 2 update with support of industrial wifi networks might fix this or perhaps even the iOS 4.3 release, as that will also bring a hotspot function. I have my hopes up.

That might work for me as well. I dropped AT&T's 3G service for Clear's 4G with iSpot, an iDevice specific MiFi device. If I could get my AirStash working thru that, I could access both.