iPhone 4 Unlock/Jailbreak Questions

Saladsamurai · Jan 9, 2013

Hi folks

Sorry if this is posted already, I am searching and reading a lot, but it is a bit much. I not very up to date on phone technology and the iPhone has been the fist smartphone I have ever used.

I am on AT&T and I am still under contract with my iPhone 4 iOS 6.0.1. I am traveling to Ghana, Africa for the second time this year and I am exploring the potential of using my iPhone there. I would like to be able still use ATT until the trip and then when I get to Ghana, pop out the SIM card and use a local carrier's SIM. Then, when I return to the US, I want to just pop the ATT SIM back in like nothing ever happened. I am assuming that I must jailbreak the iPhone in order to do this. Correct?

How feasible is this? I WILL NOT have my computer with me so that a "tethered Jailbreak" is not a good option. It seems that there is no untethered JB for iOS 6 on iPhone 4. I would be willig to downgrade my iOS if that helps.

Is it possible to incrementally upgrade iOS? Factory default puts me back to iOS 4.0.2 I think. There are jailbreaks for iOS 5 though; I am just unsure as to whether I can go from iOS 4 to iOS 5 or if I have to go straight to iOS 6.

Any thoughts or alternative suggestions are welcome. Worst case, I buy a "throwaway" smartphone when I get there.

Thanks,
Salad

Nermal · Jan 9, 2013

I believe that AT&T will officially unlock iPhones now for a small fee. An official unlock will avoid all of the hassle around jailbreaking etc.

Saladsamurai · Jan 9, 2013

Nermal said:
I believe that AT&T will officially unlock iPhones now for a small fee. An official unlock will avoid all of the hassle around jailbreaking etc.

Hi Nermal

As I said, I am still under contract with AT&T and so I am pretty sure they won't do it for me (or for free). I had a 3GS that is no longer under contract that I was going to have them unlock, which would have been perfect. I took it out of the drawer last night (it has been in there for over a year) and plugged it in. This morning I woke up to find that the battery had swelled to the point it bursted the plastic casing

In addition, the screen had what looked like a burn from the inside on it. Needless to say, I don't really trust that phone any longer

dextr3k · Jan 9, 2013

Having never jailbroken, you would not be able to downgrade to ios 5 (of which there are jailbreaks available), and a factory restore (through itunes) would put you back to 6.0.1. Apple would not let you go back to ios 4.

That being said, you have no need for jailbreak. Since it is AT&T, look on ebay and purchase an IMEI Unlock, also known as a Factory Unlock. In this case the phone and Apple will think it is unlocked and you would use it just like the way you described, pop in sim and go.

A lot of users on this forum rave about unlock_fusion which you can purchase for $2.

Baggio · Jan 9, 2013

Saladsamurai said:
Hi Nermal

As I said, I am still under contract with AT&T and so I am pretty sure they won't do it for me (or for free). I had a 3GS that is no longer under contract that I was going to have them unlock, which would have been perfect. I took it out of the drawer last night (it has been in there for over a year) and plugged it in. This morning I woke up to find that the battery had swelled to the point it bursted the plastic casing In addition, the screen had what looked like a burn from the inside on it. Needless to say, I don't really trust that phone any longer

Buy an AT&T IMEI unlock on eBay for $5-10. It take about 24 hours to get it done. It makes it a factory unlocked phone.

Applejuiced · Jan 10, 2013

Yes eBay seller will unlock it even though you're under contract.
Unlock fuzion will do it for around $3.

Saladsamurai · Jan 10, 2013

Thank you

Thank you everyone for your reply. I am currently looking at this (this was the only "Unlock Fusion" I could find):
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=370732732571&fromMakeTrack=true

Does anyone have experience with the Factory Unlock? Can anyone confirm that I can swap out the SIM card whenever I want without needing to re-connect to iTunes? This is important, as I will not have my computer while out of country.

Thanks again everyone.

chumawumba · Jan 10, 2013

Saladsamurai said:
Hi Nermal

As I said, I am still under contract with AT&T and so I am pretty sure they won't do it for me (or for free). I had a 3GS that is no longer under contract that I was going to have them unlock, which would have been perfect. I took it out of the drawer last night (it has been in there for over a year) and plugged it in. This morning I woke up to find that the battery had swelled to the point it bursted the plastic casing In addition, the screen had what looked like a burn from the inside on it. Needless to say, I don't really trust that phone any longer

Picture?

Baggio · Jan 10, 2013

Saladsamurai said:
Thank you everyone for your reply. I am currently looking at this (this was the only "Unlock Fusion" I could find):
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=370732732571&fromMakeTrack=true

Does anyone have experience with the Factory Unlock? Can anyone confirm that I can swap out the SIM card whenever I want without needing to re-connect to iTunes? This is important, as I will not have my computer while out of country.

Thanks again everyone.

Get a prepaid T-Mobile SIM here in the US and test it. You can get it from T-Mobile online for 99 cents. Do the re-sync if need be here in the US before you go.

Applejuiced · Jan 10, 2013

Saladsamurai said:
Thank you everyone for your reply. I am currently looking at this (this was the only "Unlock Fusion" I could find):
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=370732732571&fromMakeTrack=true

Does anyone have experience with the Factory Unlock? Can anyone confirm that I can swap out the SIM card whenever I want without needing to re-connect to iTunes? This is important, as I will not have my computer while out of country.

Thanks again everyone.

Yep. That's the guy bro.
I did 4 iPhone 5 devices locked to AT&T with him.
You'll be fine.

Saladsamurai · Jan 11, 2013

Baggio said:
Get a prepaid T-Mobile SIM here in the US and test it. You can get it from T-Mobile online for 99 cents. Do the re-sync if need be here in the US before you go.

Good idea to test it here before I go. However, re-syncing here will not do me any good. I want to use a SIM from Ghana, which I will purchase when I get there. We'll see what the test reveals.

Applejuiced said:
Yep. That's the guy bro.
I did 4 iPhone 5 devices locked to AT&T with him.
You'll be fine.

Nice! Thanks again man

Saladsamurai · Jan 16, 2013

Applejuiced said:
Yep. That's the guy bro.
I did 4 iPhone 5 devices locked to AT&T with him.
You'll be fine.

Hey Aj. I just went through the process. The final step is to restore the iPhone, which wipes out everything. I assume I can then set up the iPhone from a backup and all will be well? Meaning it will be unlocked AND as it was before with respect to apps, etc? Thanks again!

Baggio · Jan 16, 2013

Saladsamurai said:
Hey Aj. I just went through the process. The final step is to restore the iPhone, which wipes out everything. I assume I can then set up the iPhone from a backup and all will be well? Meaning it will be unlocked AND as it was before with respect to apps, etc? Thanks again!

You don't necessarily have to restore. I have done this IMEI unlocking and I just tested it with a T-Mobile SIM card. Doesn't even have to be an activated SIM card.

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