iPhone Nightmare

Found this, can't vouch for it but there are plenty of programs for unlocking iphones....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mtXCWwHaCS8

General info....
http://www.idownloadblog.com/unlock/

I like my iphone 4, but I know your frustration with Apple. Just after I got the phone, and had spent an hour or so loading a lot of contact info into it, I plugged it in to my pc and the itunes software did a sync that wiped out all that contact info. Grrrr...

So I learned to avoid using the itunes program.

Good luck with yours.

By what means was the iPhone unlocked?

When I brought the iphone back from Canada we took it to our service provider, called CLARO here in the Dominican Republic (Carlos Slim!!!!!). We paid about 25USD and the phone was unlocked. I do not know how they did this but after doing it all I had to do was plug in my sim card from my old cellphone and it worked.

I went into the you tube sites mentioned above and now see that many options exist for unlocking and jail breaking. I am not sure if I can follow all the steps but under the circumstances I might give it a try. Right now I have iOS4.1 which will not allow me to download my back up or many Apps I paid for. I guess if I try to update again and can get a higher level like 1OS 5 or something then maybe I can jailbreak and get my back up back. If I fail I will have to go back to the shop and getted ripped off again.

I will admint that I dont feel very comfortable doing this and stand to lose my contacts again if it goes wrong.

Thank you all for your help. Its comforting to know that I´m not alone. I wish Apple would address these issues and come to the aid of all of us who have made them rich instead of abandoning us.

Its astonishing to me that expensive devices like these are already obsolete in just a few years. If this was back in the 60´s I´d call it a communist plot.

John

I have two iphones sitting in my drawer doing nothing due to those illegal jail breaking /upgrades! You have had an old but functional 3G which was initially upgraded to a transitional software version after being jailbroken. The transitional 3 GS software upgrade initially enabled your iphone to accept somewhat more advanced versions of applications! You should have been happy and contented at that point! Your old iphone is just like an old XP computer designed and capable of working happily with a matching XP version of operating system. Newer versions of operating systems, (win7 or windows 8) although are available for upgrades were designed to work for a matching newer versions of hardwares, (32 bits vs 64 bits)!

Comparative OS application to a 3G Iphone, you can upgrade the XP to a Window 7 version but without at least expanding your memory bank, you'll experience a much slower computer that's also susceptible to freeze ups!

I was "happy and contented at that point". It´s the incessant prompting for me to do an update that forced me unwarily into the current situation. As a matter of fact all I was doing was charging my phone. Thats all I wanted. Being untrained and having little experience made me virgen territory for all those nasty people out there who just prey on unsuspecting, half broke, users.

I will never do an update again not even charge the phone again in the computer and when I can afford it I will gleefully trash the thing and buy another brand.

Too bad Apple could care less about us little guys.

John

To be fair to Apple, their tight control over their hardware and software is a major factor in creating the easy-to-use trouble free environment their fans rave about. However, this is a rather inflexible system which many others find intolerable. If you need freedom and flexibility, Apple ain't the way to go. Apple treats its customers extremely well, and the customers willingly pay very high prices.

I learned I wasn't a good choice for an Apple customer with an iTouch I received as a gift. I guess you may have learned a similar lesson through this phone.

You say "to be fair to Apple"?? Did I commit a crime by bringing my daughters iPhone, a gift, to the Dominican Republic and have it unlocked? Is my situation an "easy-to-use trouble free environment"? Is unlocking illegal? Whay would such an expensive device be "locked"? Locked for what??? I dont get it.

When my daughter gave me the iPhone I didn´t have the faintest idea what "unblocking" was. All I knew was the phone wouldn´t work.

I pay a fortune to the telephone company for the services. The iPhones cost a fortune to buy. Unblocking costs plenty too. Who is being fair to who?

I just dont get it. With all the money Apple makes as well as all the money the telcos make why do they remain so greedy that on top of all that, they have to build in systems to make the already expensive devices unusable.

I cannot afford to chase Apple technology. I´m sure they can afford to help out guys like us. I´m not Apple or Carlos Slim. I´m just me getting sucked into this world wide malicious plot to make sure that if I make one tiny mistake everything I have enjoyed and accumulated is lost in a puff of smoke.

I insist that the big guys are outrageously unfair to little guys like me. I have done nothing to them except make more money for all concerned.

I also do not understand the term "jailbreaking" Why is any device to be considered "in jail".

I´m just plain disgusted with the whole thing. I´m a 60´s person and will be 67 on the 26th. When computers came along I had a hard time getting up to speed and still am not very good. When I look back and recall all the frustrations and thrown away computers all due to evil malicious people I often get depressed and have serious doubts about the direction this society is taking us in.

Why does modern technology have to bring such pain and suffering? What are we doing?

I have a large collection of older devices here at my home that with care will work for hundreds of years. Example, I have a WILD T16 THEODOLITE in mint condition which works flawlessly, requires no batteries or software and will never be out of date. It was made back in the 40´s. All my devices give me great pleasure to look at and use in my work and the older the better. I´ll even put up a picture here to just show you guys a small part of my collection. The WILD is the green one in the left corner.

Thanks for all your advice. I dont know what to do next and cant afford anymore modern devices that will be out of date as soon as I get them home from the store.

I appreciate all of your comments and the time you have taken. If Apple can read this, shame on you!!!

Best Regards To All

John Van Allen

I agree with you 100%, John. I just have a cell phone, call it "my flat tire phone". It costs me $20 a month, and that's all I wish to pay for the convenience. I have no intention of paying $50 a month for a smart phone contract, or anything over $50 for a phone which can get lost, broken, stolen, etc.

I am impressed by the ability the smart phones have, but not enough to pay the fee.

If you had been a Nerd, you would have known all the "pro's and con's" of such a phone.

You are not a Nerd.

The best way is to use it as Apple and the telephone company intended you to be able to use it. Exporting and unblocking it was never considered by them as being "OK".

So simply leave such things alone in the future.

Apple sells its phones to provider companies who parcel it together with a contract and sell the phone (seemingly!) cheaply. But you pay more for it with higher telephone charges than you might have got for your own phone (no simlock) and the same provider.....you pay in the end anyway and all flexibility is lost. A "lose-lose" situation.

The phone is "SIMLocked" to that company.

Its best to buy the phone without a simlock and buy a simcard from your favourite provider and retain the possibility of changing the simcard/country/whatever when you wish....but the phone will (seemingly!) cost several times more than you paid for a simlocked one...but in fact as you can search out the best/cheapest provider, you will actually save money in the long run....

Unblocking, or jailbreaking is considered by these companies to be illegal, though I do believe in a court of law that may not be true....but if your daughter signed a contract, she may in fact be breaking the law (or you are doing it for her!!), so do be careful.

But where does it get you, one thoughtless moment and you are back where you were, minus a lot of money.....as you have clearly demonstrated.

You are not alone in the world, thousands are caught out this way every day of the year. So its better to inform yourself fully before taking on hardware that needs a deeper understanding than you wish to have...

Ask yourself why did your Daughter even give it up, it sounds like she did not like it for some reason and wanted simply to get rid of it....even if you (and probably she) seemingly paid nothing for it, look at just how expensive that turned out to be, so put it down to experience and move on...

Have a great day.

My daughter gave me her iPhone 3G because she upgraded to a 4G. It was a gift and also allowed her to put it into use instead of wasting by throwing it in a drawer or a land fill. Waste like this is seen everywhere, not just in the USA and Canada. Here in the DR we must have 7 or 8 old cellphones in drawers here. As soon as you get one its outdated!!! Pure Waste! Why cant designers make things that grow over time instead of having to be thrown away? Example again mt theodolite. Still works perfectly and competes with modern ones after 60 years! I had it on a job the other day and a man pulled out a modern "total station" with evrything imaginable built in but when he turned it on he got gibberish on the LCD screen. A glitch! My WILD came to the rescue. Did I feel good or what??

You are not following your own very good advice!

I have had only 2 Mobiles in about 10 years, still got them both. (Got given a third as spare, never used it - yet!). The older one also goes with me on long trips (Tonight Spain) as a spare and because it has two batteries and Bluetooth for the hands free....Before buying them I checked what I needed and what was on offer for several weeks first.

The second one I got when I swapped it for an older GPS (Tom Tom) that I had.....eg. It was a GPS that I bought broken on ebay and repaired. Cost me less than US$10 to buy and fix......had all of Europe/UK and more maps already on it.

My current Nokia mobile has all the "NEEDED" things:- WLAN, Bluetooth, I can save notes, look at my calendar etc., it can also look at the internet when I am away from home, but that is switched off....always!

Have a great day.....

PS. If someone here says even two is too many, one is enough, I may have to agree that they may be right......I did have company mobiles till 2006 as well, but they really don't count as I did not find them or buy them and they were never mine (and neither was the bill at the end of the month either!!)

No, you did nothing illegal. It's not illegal to treat your Testarossa like a dune buggy, but Ferrari will not by sympathetic. And the Testarossa is still considered a great product.

I know folks who work at Apple. I ask why there are no manuals for your products? "Because Steve wants everything to be intuitive!" Your intuition was not up to Apple's standard, so I figure you are not an Apple customer.

One finance expert I have read opines that the iPhone has been an instrument to move shareholder value from AT&T to Apple. Apple sells its phone to the telcos who must pay the entire price up front. The telcos support all the infrastructure, all the marketing, all of the most expensive parts of the smart phone universe, and have to try to convince people to give them money. Apple makes their money now, the telcos hope to recoup their money sometime in the future. Apple releases a new phone and the cycle starts again even though the telcos still have a large inventory of old phones.

A Japanese economist wonders why Apple is willing to weaken the United States economy? Since parts are transported from the all over the world to go into the Apple products, these things could be made anywhere. By his calculations, if Apple paid prevailing union labor wages in the US, Apple would still make at least a 58% profit per unit sold. 58% profit! How much does that stack up to other businesses?

What I am wondering is am I in a minority class. Does everybody else understand all this stuff? I graduated from BCIT in Canada in 1964 when tubes were still in use and the transistor just getting started. As time passed I have tried my best to keep up but I will admit that it´s a formidable task. The generation of people I now live with seem to be able to handle all this new stuff better than me. They know the operational side of things. I can understand electronics and visualize currents flowing in circuits and how the components interact. If I ask a newcomer if he realizes what actually goes on when a phone call is made from point A to point B thay have absolutely no idea. I can explain how a radio wave propagates through space and is received by an antenna on a tower, forwarded into the system etc etc etc. Great but this information is useless if I cannot decipher the software invented by some Apple engineer in his cubicle at the office. All my basic knowledge cannot help me one bit.

So I am surrounded by people who know a lot more than me and sort of see me as an old fart who couldn´t keep up.

I also feel that society in general is intensely focused on wrong doers. Engineers can´t come up with simple, easy to use, easy to understand ideas because we are enveloped in an ocean of evil people who take advantage of every opportunity to wreck havoc on new ideas.

I still think in a basic, clean, linear form based on honesty and simplicity. I must be a dying breed. Is there no room in todays society for people like us?

Again, many thanks to all of you for your good ideas and advice. One of you said I should give away all my earthly possesions and simplify my life to find happiness. I would probably get stuck doing that when I hit an anti-giveaway software glitch.

Best Regards To All

John

Most hardware is built for around 10% of the final cost (or less!).

It's due to the middlemen/transport costs that the price increases.

The last in the row (retailer) usually makes the most, standard is 50%....or close. A big discounter might reduce that to 10%, assuming he can move many 1000's of them each week.

Small shops have a problem competing and giving full service as well....

John, I understand your frustration. I don't use an iPhone, because I enjoy tinkering with things and I use my cell phone as a phone and not an internet device. My better half loves her iPhone and Apple products. She is not technically savvy and she likes simple, easy to use products. So she puts up with the limited modifications, she pays AT&T for the data plan and overall she's thrilled with her iPhone.

I'm not a fan of jailbreaking phones, because I know myself and I'll make a mistake and do a software upgrade that kills the jailbreak. I need my phone to work all the time, as I use it for business. I also need my battery to last, so I don't use the internet or email on my phone - I don't even know how to. It's a tool for me, but for the misses, she uses it as her phone, video, gps, email, phone, game player, etc. We simply have different needs.

Good luck and my recommendation is to avoid jailbreaking phones, unless you are 100% sure you won't make a mistake of upgrading software. And you'll also be stuck with an old operating system - not an optimal choice.

Most "shops" will redo the unlock if it fails within 30 days.....

Keep your reciept....

I had to take my galaxy sIII back twice....

After looking at this story ( http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2013/03/19/apples-new-ios-update-prevents-evasi0n-jailbreak-after-its-been-used-around-18-million-times/ ), I would wonder about any unlocked Apple phone. Perhaps the best advice for owners of unlocked iPhones would be "Never upgrade your software".

I think so too! Since everytime you connect the Iphone to the pc (Itune) for backup or to sync, it's going to prompt you of an option to upgrade, after which when completed, will result into an endless loop. The newly backed up information can no longer be re-installed anymore, since it was based, wrap around on the previously loaded version of software which by the way was already upgraded during the first jail break you had done in the unit. Now you'll end up with the original basic (much - much older) version of operating software which also by the way will be in the locked mode again!

I don't ever buy hardware from Apple or Sony to name but two, as both companies do unethical things to their customers, but I believe I recently read that certain updates from Apple are designed to prevent a customer ever unlocking the phone again, so be warned.

Best is to buy from other more ethical companies like Samsung, HTC or similar.....its usually better fitted out and faster. Of course its cheaper as well......

But so many just want the name Apple and are blinded to the down sides of Apple products.

Be warned.

If a few more people in this world read the online newsletters from such free sources as ZDNet Tech (http://www.zdnet.com/) and similar, who report lots of negative and where applicable, positive news about telephone and computer hardware/software, then Apple's sales would be down by at least 50%.

Tom's Hardware is also a good source of infos about almost ANY hardware, there are plenty of negative comments about Apple products here as well:-

http://www.tomshardware.com/

A small amount of research will save a lot of money and heartbreak.

The old British saying is " you can lead a horse to water, but it must drink on its own!"

Caveat emptor?

Welcome to the world of Apple! I just recently came out of the dark ages and decided I better catch up with the rest of humanity, and get me one of these I-phones jiggies. It hasnt been the greatest experience :( I did a master reset....lost everyone! Fair enough, probably my fault that time. Since then though, I have simply turned my 'I-fail' off and on again, and onnot just one, but two occassions, it has deleted ALL my contacts! Whilst it can be quite liberating to start completely a-fresh, it can also be VERY frustrating.

Next piece of advice I got was, 'oh, you gotta plug your phone into I-tunes, and sync your stuff to save it all'. OK, I thought. Plugged it in, turns out the I-tunes I have is that old it obviously is not compatible with the 'I-fail', so it tells me I need to uninstall I-tunes, and re-install the latest version? That is as far as I got, for fear of losing all the music I have saved on there.

I think it may be a faulty phone, so I took it into the shop, and they said they will have to send it away and get it assessed.....well thats just great!

Seriously!.....Technology is suppossed to make everyones life easier and simpler....apparently, so I thought? I guess that ideology/goal/whatever got lost when someone decided they needed to make money first one the list, and put functionality/usability way down near the bottom! Typical Apple sh#t, corner the consumer, and make it impossible to use anything else.

The very least they could have done is give me some sort of storage capability like a Mini SD slot or something, where I could rely on myself to save all my crucial data............but then I wouldnt need bullsh#t I-tunes anymore now would I?

I honestly dont know why their sales are so high? I honestly cannot understand how something can have so many good design features and still have SOOOO many bad ones? Everytime I raise my middle finger, I raise part of it for you Apple!

You wrote a great post, totally agree with all you wrote as it was down to personal experience and knowledge, well put!

Your last sentences were:-

I honestly dont know why their sales are so high?

Well many people are suckered in by slick sales and they think that "flashing the Apple" will make their standing in the world better, this demonstrates to me personally, a sad/missing part of their personality to need this.....

But be careful, as you were one of them too at one time!!! :-(

I am one of those people (with Scottish blood!) who uses the web and other sources of information to allow me to buy what I need cheaper, faster and simply better than many of the "leading" brands.....its actually not too difficult to do once you have set your mind on what you don't want to buy!!!

Your post will go a long way to warning many others here simply in the future to buy only "eatable" Apples.....well done!

If you want peace of mind, live simple life. In old days when least things were invented, people were living peacefully and helthier. My advice is to give all new invention and live peacefully.

Did you mean "give away all new inventions"? E.g. Not buy or use them....

Your grammar in English is very unclear to me.