Iphone 2g 3.1.3 - Restore, reinstall questions

Dear Forum members;

I am pretty much at a beginner level when it comes to Jailbreaking / unlocking, I have purchased my 2g Iphone 8gb 1.5 years ago via ebay, sent to some guy to jailbreak, had problems with it, never really used additional software. Now I want to take control and make use of it;

Its installed 3.1.3 (7E18)
can use it with different sims (never had to use AT&T)

but everytime these few people tried to connect ITunes, it locked itself in the past, so was never be able to use any jailbroken software with it, and also kept losing "Available HD Space on it" everytime I sent a guy to reinstall it.

so now I don't have the original AT&T simcard, whoever bought with it when they first activated it.

1-Can I still somehow delete everything, Restore completely to factory settings, and then take matters in my own hands and restart a successful jailbreak / unlock process myself?

2-I have been reading posts, and one thing got my attention in one post that some people can't activate the phone anymore after they restore because they don't have the original AT&T simcard. I don't wanna get trapped in that.

3-If that's the case, can I just borrow a friends AT&T simcard and put that in and activate my 2g again and then jailbreak / unlock again?

my main concern is to get this process right so that I can at last start my jailbroken / unlocked iphone 2g close to its full potential. I know its a bit late, but better late than never?

thanks for your time in advance

Quote:

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Originally Posted by arda21

Can I still somehow delete everything, Restore completely to factory settings, and then take matters in my own hands and restart a successful jailbreak / unlock process myself?

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Yes of course, the 2G is pretty much impossible to lock (unless you somehow damage the radio hardware or baseband)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by arda21

I have been reading posts, and one thing got my attention in one post that some people can't activate the phone anymore after they restore because they don't have the original AT&T simcard. I don't wanna get trapped in that.

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You are trapped in that, you have to rely on redsn0w (or another jailbreak) for hacktivation.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by arda21

If that's the case, can I just borrow a friends AT&T simcard and put that in and activate my 2g again and then jailbreak / unlock again?

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Nope.. that only works for 3G and higher, 2G had different rules for activation. Only the original AT&T SIM that shipped with the phone (which was activated on an iPhone plan and is still active or was later deactivated) can activate this iPhone with iTunes.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by arda21

my main concern is to get this process right so that I can at last start my jailbroken / unlocked iphone 2g close to its full potential. I know its a bit late, but better late than never?

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You are end of iOS road, 3.1.3 is the last iOS version you can install. It can always be jailbroken, hacktivated and unlocked (unlock is only needed once and then should be permanent)

Olethros first of all thank you,

now when I look back, I realize thats why when I bought it from ebay the guy had the old simcard shipped with it, and I was like why do I need this I will just throw away, I am assuming if I still had that old simcard my life could be easier?

ok so after restore, I am trapped and the phone is gonna get locked, but you mention I have to rely on red snow, meaning from that point of on where the phone is locked I am gonna use redsnow to re-activate with the original simcard. Now is this risky? do you have personal experience that it is gonna def work? I am thinking to start the procedure today...

Quote:

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Originally Posted by arda21

Olethros first of all thank you,

now when I look back, I realize thats why when I bought it from ebay the guy had the old simcard shipped with it, and I was like why do I need this I will just throw away, I am assuming if I still had that old simcard my life could be easier?

ok so after restore, I am trapped and the phone is gonna get locked, but you mention I have to rely on red snow, meaning from that point of on where the phone is locked I am gonna use redsnow to re-activate with the original simcard. Now is this risky? do you have personal experience that it is gonna def work? I am thinking to start the procedure today...

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let me clarify.

There are two separate concepts with the iPhone.

1. activation - Performed via iTunes, this allows you to use the iPhone as everything but a phone. Without this the phone is stuck at "slide for emergency" screen. On a 2G, the sim card that shipped with the iPhone originally - if the sim card had been activated with the carrier and then was still active or subsequently deactivated, then iTunes would detect this and allow iPhone activation (different to sim activation)
2. unlock - allowing sim cards from any carrier to be used with the iPhone

On the 2G, hackers have managed to create a permanent unlock - this is installed via bootneuter (which is bundled with redsn0w and pwnagetool). Once installed, normal restores do NOT remove the unlock. Even a DFU restore doesn't remove the unlock.

To install the unlock, the iPhone must first be jailbroken. This is performed by jailbreak tools like redsn0w, pwnagetool and blackra1n (blackra1n is not recommended as your primary jailbreak)

Once the unlock is installed, as I said a restore will not remove it. However you still need to be able to activate via iTunes after a restore.

If you don't have the right sim card to enable this (and even then that can be problematic on the 2G) then you need to use something called hacktivation. This is part of the redsn0w jailbreak and is automatically applied if it detects that the sim card in the iPhone during jailbreak won't be able to activate legitimately with iTunes.

The only downside to hacktivation is that you don't get push notifications. They require unique certificates that are issued during a legitimate activation. You can work around this with the free Push Doctor or the paid pushfix 2.0 - both of which install unique legitimately generated certificates on your iPhone.

Without legit certs, not only do push notifications not work - but they chew up battery life trying to initiate the push notification subsystem. So if you don't think that you will ever use push notifications - you must install an app that uses push, let it turn on push notifications, then turn push notifications off in the settings menu that appears. Otherwise it remains in a half-on state that simply uses battery.

you may realize as much as the information you are giving me is exactly what I asked for, it does confuse me on the way as well. but this has been very useful for me understanding the whole process. Now let me explain what state the phone is in, maybe we can come up with the best plan without me doing anything 'stupid'

1- I don't have the original AT&T simcard anymore (as a fool I threw that away when I got the phone from ebay)

2-The phone must be unlocked as I have been using it fine with different carriers all over the world. including with t-mobile in US.

3-it says it has 3.1.3 (7E18) with modem firmware 04.05.04_G ( I dont know if these 2 info are linked in anyways )

4-whoever did the last jailbreaking put only Cydia under applications but not even once Cydia worked when I try to this day, it would get stuck up 'loading data' whenever I try when I am connected to the internet via WiFi. So I was never able to install any additional software other than the basic software it comes with it (I guess with 3.1.3)

5-All I want is to be able to delete this broken cydia, or uninstall it, and check if the phone is really jailbroken and start using 3rd party software and customize it like other people who jailbroke / unlock it.

6-not getting push notifications you mentioned in your last message, I have no idea what that is, but it scared the hell out of me, so I stopped what I was doing (I was actually gonna connect to Itunes for the first time as I just downloaded itunes to this PC) so I am just holding off any procedure, until I get your suggested plan of action.

7-To this I have never connected this phone to Itunes myself, I have no idea what would happen

8-The battery life works fine in its current state. so thats something I really don't wanna mess up as you can imagine.

9- I really appreciate you taking time to help me with this all the way from Norway!

Thank you

Quote:

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Originally Posted by arda21

whoever did the last jailbreaking put only Cydia under applications but not even once Cydia worked when I try to this day, it would get stuck up 'loading data' whenever I try when I am connected to the internet via WiFi. So I was never able to install any additional software other than the basic software it comes with it (I guess with 3.1.3)

All I want is to be able to delete this broken cydia, or uninstall it, and check if the phone is really jailbroken and start using 3rd party software and customize it like other people who jailbroke / unlock it.

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My suggestion for cydia fix:

Restore again - iClarified - iPhone - How to Unlock/Jailbreak Your iPhone 2G on OS 3.1.3 Using RedSn0w (Windows) and jailbreak again. Then connect the iPhone to power, make sure it is connected to a wifi network, disable screen lock entirely and then launch cydia, let it run - however long it takes. If it wants to update critical packages, let it do that. Then run Cydia again afterwards.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by arda21

not getting push notifications you mentioned in your last message, I have no idea what that is, but it scared the hell out of me, so I stopped what I was doing (I was actually gonna connect to Itunes for the first time as I just downloaded itunes to this PC) so I am just holding off any procedure, until I get your suggested plan of action.

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The fixes for push notifications are pretty straightforward - nothing to panic about if you do it right.

Thank you again Super Moderator.

I will go with what you say, and try to sort out Push Fix thing after the whole process. I guess I will post if anything unexpected occurs during and after.

1-I have read the whole link you sent me for the procedure, there is one thing that got my attention, it says in Step Seven there;

"From this window you can select the jailbreak options you would like. If you have already pwned your device check the Already pwned option."

-what is already pwned? so that I know, what to select at that stage.

2-also I am gonna go ahead with restore first before anything else now via ITunes, and then start this procedure right? I am assuming my phone is gonna be locked at some point after the restore because of not having the original AT&T simcard. (sorry for being such a fool, first time ever doing this)

3-Should I take off any simcards off the iphone before starting restore and jailbreaking process? or should I keep it so redsn0w realizes I don't have the original simcard so it needs to do other things? in what stages I should have the current simcard in?

Thank you again!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by arda21

Thank you again Super Moderator.

I will go with what you say, and try to sort out Push Fix thing after the whole process. I guess I will post if anything unexpected occurs during and after.

1-I have read the whole link you sent me for the procedure, there is one thing that got my attention, it says in Step Seven there;

"From this window you can select the jailbreak options you would like. If you have already pwned your device check the Already pwned option."

-what is already pwned? so that I know, what to select at that stage.

2-also I am gonna go ahead with restore first before anything else now via ITunes, and then start this procedure right? I am assuming my phone is gonna be locked at some point after the restore because of not having the original AT&T simcard. (sorry for being such a fool, first time ever doing this)

3-Should I take off any simcards off the iphone before starting restore and jailbreaking process? or should I keep it so redsn0w realizes I don't have the original simcard so it needs to do other things? in what stages I should have the current simcard in?

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Just to be clear, this procedure will wipe the current contents of your phone, is there anything on the phone you want to keep (SMS history, game highscores etc)? If so you need to back this up in advance.

Perform whole procedure with current SIM card inserted.

No guide is perfect, but it is the best I have found. It has two small errors.

Issue#1
It doesn't tell you that you need both 3.1.3 and 3.1.2 IPSW - these can be downloaded here: http://www.hackint0sh.org/f127/22056.htm

You use 3.1.3 in step 2 and 3.1.2 in step 5 - the pictures are correct for these two steps.

Issue #2
Pictures show redsn0w 0.9.2 but they tell you to download redsn0w 0.9.4 (beta version). This is really a non-issue as I have never seen an instance where 0.9.4 doesn't work. I still recommend you use 0.9.2 (stable) downloaded from redsn0w 0.9.2 [iPhone Dev Team]

For step seven - follow the first picture with just "install cydia" selected.

Because you just select install cydia, you can skip step 8 and ignore any mention of bootneuter in later steps.

Step 14 (not in the guide) is to connect the iPhone to iTunes again and select "set up as new phone" NOT "restore from iTunes backup"

After that, you should follow my prior advice to get cydia up and running properly. Cydia takes forever the first time you run it on the first generation iPhone - just be patient

I have backep up everything including my contacts, so I dont have anything in this phone left (ALL sms test messages I don't need as I just checked) and since I dont have any games installed, I am fine with that.

First of all thank you for going over the instructions,

just last 2 questions on the way;

1-I am skipping Step Eight (even though in the pictures it says they are necessary to unlock the iPhone 2g) so I won't load up any bootloaders I will just press 'Next' to directly go to Step Nine?

2-that thing about not getting push notifications, I will deal with that by using cydia later on after everything is finished and the phone is jail-broken, right?

I am almost ready to go thru with this! and thats thanks to you!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by arda21

1-I am skipping Step Eight (even though in the pictures it says they are necessary to unlock the iPhone 2g) so I won't load up any bootloaders I will just press 'Next' to directly go to Step Nine?

2-that thing about not getting push notifications, I will deal with that by using cydia later on after everything is finished and the phone is jail-broken, right?

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1 yes
2 yes later (solution depends on whether you want proper push notifications or simply want to disable push in a say that is not detrimental to battery life)