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How to set up usb tethering with a nexus 5 on windows xp

I really like Google products and how easy they work but trying to get USB tethering working on my Nexus 5 almost drove me crazy: no documentation or wrong one from google, old driver sets. So I am quite sure there are many people out there facing the same issue. So here is how I did it finally:

First of all stick to the official documentation you can find here. You need the driver file tetherxp.inf which is unfortunately not linked in the help file – I dunno why. When you google for the file on the web you will easily find it but it won’t work cause it’s outdated. The thing is that every device needs to be mentioned with the correct device id in the file. Most of the files you find are 2 or more years old, so no nexus 5 device id is included. I modified the tetherxp.inf file in order to make it work:

tetherxp.inf

Rename the file to tetherxp.inf and follow the steps from the official documentation:

  • Follow the steps above to turn on USB tethering for your phone or tablet.
  • Download the following configuration file (tetherxp.inf) to your Windows XP computer. Typically, you can right click on the link and choose “Save As”. (If your browser adds “.html” to the file name, you’ll need to edit the name to remove the .html extension and replace it with “.inf” instead.)
  • Connect your phone or tablet to your computer using a USB cable.
    When Windows XP’s New Hardware Wizard opens, select No, not at this time, then click Next.
  • Select Install from a list or specific location, then click Next.
    Click Browse to browse to the directory where you installed the configuration file you downloaded in Step 1, then click Next.
  • When Windows XP finishes installing the software for Android USB Ethernet/RNDIS, click Finish.