What's the worst that can happen?

[maky29]

Ok.. Here's the deal. I have the 3G and am a local ATT customer for many many years. No intention of cancelling my contract or anything... I'm pretty bummed out with the whole Netshare deal and that's the only reason I would consider jailbreaking it..

Couple of questions -

1. What's the worst damage I could do to it? Is there a chance that I can effectively 'brick' it permanently or is there always a way to restore a clean firmware to it?
2. What's the difference between restore and DFU mode? I couldn't find a real answer to it except for everyone saying they are different modes.
3. If I have a problem with the phone (say the ringer breaks) in my warranty period, can I undo the jailbreak and take it to an Apple store? Would they detect that I had once hacked it?
4. Does the same answers apply to unlocking it as well (once the unlock is out) or does Jailbreaking and Unlocking change different components of the phone?

Thanks in advance.

Mak.

 

[Coletrain17]

Ok.. Here's the deal. I have the 3G and am a local ATT customer for many many years. No intention of cancelling my contract or anything... I'm pretty bummed out with the whole Netshare deal and that's the only reason I would consider jailbreaking it..

Couple of questions -

1. What's the worst damage I could do to it? Is there a chance that I can effectively 'brick' it permanently or is there always a way to restore a clean firmware to it?
2. What's the difference between restore and DFU mode? I couldn't find a real answer to it except for everyone saying they are different modes.
3. If I have a problem with the phone (say the ringer breaks) in my warranty period, can I undo the jailbreak and take it to an Apple store? Would they detect that I had once hacked it?
4. Does the same answers apply to unlocking it as well (once the unlock is out) or does Jailbreaking and Unlocking change different components of the phone?

Thanks in advance.

Mak.

1. With the new tools out there, well the only tool for now, the pwnage tool, it is very hard if not impossible to brick your phone. You would have to really go out of your way to brick it for good. If anything does go wrong in/after the jailbreaking process, you can simply restore to factory settings in iTunes and you will have everything back to normal

2. Im not 100% sure about this, so I'll let someone with a little more knowledge on this topic answer.... sorry bout that

3. Absolutely. If anything that would usually file under warranty occurs to your phone, you can restore it in iTunes and have it back to factory settings. No trace, no questions asked. The only REALLY important step in this is that you DO NOT change the bootloaders in the pwnage tool. Cause if you take your phone in and the apple rep sees a pineapple when he turns on the phone, your out of luck. But as long as you dont replace the bootlader images, you can erase your trace

4. If you are on AT&T you are not going to have to worry about unlocking, so you don't really need to think about it too much.

Well there's my two cents. I hope it was helpful enough for you!

 

[ivtecDOu]

DFU is a low power mode in which you use to restore your phone. restoring puts your phone in an out of the box factory settings

 

[PNutts]

Is there a chance that I can effectively 'brick' it permanently or is there always a way to restore a clean firmware to it?

I'm not the search police, so I sincerely mean it when I say to search this forum for the word "brick". This will show what others have done and maybe give you some steps to avoid or things to watch out for.

I've only seen one instance in these forums where the iPhone had to be returned, but there is debate over whether it was a hardware problem.

Good luck!