What is the right order of events to do this?

[gwynne]

I have a 2G iPhone that is out of contract and I'm thinking of going and getting a 3GS tomorrow because the (lack of) speed is really starting to annoy me. I checked resale prices on eBay for the old 2Gs and I see that many of them are jailbroken/unlocked. Since I'm comfortable giving this a try, I figured I'd do it before I sell it.

What is the right way to do this to retain my info for the next phone and also not leave personal info on the phone when I sell it? Is it like this?

--Backup phone (I honestly don't know how much gets backed up? everything?)

--Do some sort of restore to default settings to wipe everything

--Jailbreak/unlock

--Go obtain new phone and get phone number transferred/reup contract

--Restore data onto new phone

--Sell old phone

Is this about right?

Thanks in advance.

 

[labman]

ummm

yup sounds good oh and Google!

 

[gwynne]

yup sounds good oh and Google!

I tried something like 'how to upgrade your iphone' since I figured that would cover at least the 2G > 3G upgrade process, but I just kept getting hits about firmware.

I tried to do due diligence, ah swear!

 

[labman]

what firmware are you on?

I guessing money wise you want to be on the latest also are you mac or pc I will find you the tutorial!

 

[gwynne]

I guessing money wise you want to be on the latest also are you mac or pc I will find you the tutorial!

I have a Macbook w/Snow Leopard. (I also have various Windows boxes but I assume it's easiest from a Mac?) The iPhone is at 3.1.3 but from what I have read this doesn't matter on a 2G.

I've poked around some more and I think I have the process figured out, the only thing I'm not quite clear on is if I should jailbreak/unlock before or after I go to the Apple store and they swap me out for the new phone. Will I even be able to afterwards, or will I need to swap SIM cards back temporarily?

I'm comfortable with technology and with following instructions/hacking stuff/taking stuff apart, I just haven't played with smartphones much because it's not my usual thing.

Got my backup done and my photos pulled off.

Thanks for any responses--in retrospect I feel kind of silly for putting up with the 2G this long, didn't realize there was still eBay demand.

(Edit: wonder what my chances are of getting a 3GS that is still on 3.1.2 out of a retail store.)

 

[gwynne]

To answer my own question, 16GB 3GS came out of the box with 3.1.3 at my local Apple store. Boo.

They did not swap SIM cards from the 2G and the 2G still seems to be functional aside from phone service, so presumably redsn0w will work fine. Will try later.

 

[gwynne]

So I got my old 2G wiped and what I assume was jailbroken/unlocked using redsn0w. The process went as expected (found the 3.1.2 ipsw and the bin downloads needed) and everything came up as successful. Afterwards, I could see the Cydia app, but can anyone tell me how I know for sure that the phone is unlocked? I did tick the Unlock box in the process, but I'd like to know for sure before I sell it. Is there something I can check? The phone still has its old SIM card but is not activated.

 

[thelatinist]

So I got my old 2G wiped and what I assume was jailbroken/unlocked using redsn0w. The process went as expected (found the 3.1.2 ipsw and the bin downloads needed) and everything came up as successful. Afterwards, I could see the Cydia app, but can anyone tell me how I know for sure that the phone is unlocked? I did tick the Unlock box in the process, but I'd like to know for sure before I sell it. Is there something I can check? The phone still has its old SIM card but is not activated.

You would need to put an active SIM from a non-official carrier in your 2G in order to verify that the unlock worked. There's no reason it shouldn't have, however...

 

[gwynne]

You would need to put an active SIM from a non-official carrier in your 2G in order to verify that the unlock worked. There's no reason it shouldn't have, however...

Thank you for the response!