Hey guys, so here's my situation :

I've got an iPhone 3G with a broken home button. I followed one of the guides on the internet about how to force the DFU mode by restoring it with a modified ipsw, like in the following link : HOW TO: Put The iPhone In DFU Mode And Jailbreak, Even If Your Home Or Power Button Is Broken | FSMdotCOM, because I wanted to install the Activator app.

I got an error while updating the firmware, but once reconnected the iPhone was recognized in recovery mode by iTunes.

This is where the annoying part comes in, so I tried to then restore it with a customized 4.2.1 ipsw. The firmware upgrade crashed and gave me the error 1601. So I unplugged the iPhone, replugged and to my biggest surprise, windows won't even recognize it anymore.

I've tried :

- Plugging it into another computer, nothing
- Pushing down the powerbutton, that doesn't do anything
- Plugging it into my battery charger, still nothing...
- Using some force DFU mode software, that doesn't work, maybe because the iPhone isn't recognized ?


Do you guys have any ideas of how to fix this mess ?

At this point you really are limited in options. I'd normally recommend holding power and home for 10 seconds to firmly guarantee that the phone is power cycled, but since your home button doesn't work, you can't do that. The only other thing I can suggest is to let the phone lay quietly for long enough that you're 110% certain that the battery is fully discharged, then plug it directly into a wall charger. If after 10-15 minutes you don't get the phone at least into recovery mode or at the charging screen, it's very possible that the phone is bricked and will need legitimate repair from a hardware level.

You're correct, DFU forcing software requires that the phone be accessible from the machine, which means it won't/can't work if the phone is not registering a connection to the computer.

Yeah luckily it wasn't bricked. I left it for a day unplugged.

The next day I was able to force the dfu with a corrupt ipsw and to downgrade the firmware. It now has whited00r installed and is running. It was such a hecktick mess that the next time I probably will straight up repair the home button...

Thanks for the answer,

Problem is solved !