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Did your AT&T service activate right away on your 4S?

I got a 4S for my wife this morning at my local at&t store. Got there around 7 am and was out the door at 8:30 with a working phone.
 
MBHockey said:
I doubt the screen would say "Please try again later" if that really brought you back to the end of the queue. Sounds more like they are just saying that so everyone stops hammering the servers.
Click to expand...

I thought the same thing but I swear, after 4 hours of hammering, I set it down for 20 minutes and it went right through...
 
I tried for about two hours to activate (purchased through Apple, service through AT&T), mainly through iTunes. Went through the activation flow probably 20 times, failure each time.

Gave up, left the 4S at home, took my old 4 with me while I ran errands.

As I was checking email while I was out, I noticed my iPhone 4 Internet shut down, then the cell service went down. That's when I knew that success was close. :)

Went home, connected 4S, went through the activation flow one more time, and then it finally worked!
 
found it!!

activated it!! try this guys

go to your ATT account online....go to suspend/lost or stolen

suspend the line. turn off phone, take out sim.


wait 2 min aprox. reactivate the phone from ATT

put back sim, turn on phone and try activating again



good luck, let me know!
 
sardille said:
activated it!! try this guys

go to your ATT account online....go to suspend/lost or stolen

suspend the line. turn off phone, take out sim.


wait 2 min aprox. reactivate the phone from ATT

put back sim, turn on phone and try activating again



good luck, let me know!
Click to expand...

sounds like a lot of crap to activate a phone... glad it worked for you though.
 
How do you get the sim out with the 4S? They don't give you a tool, like the 3GS. What'd you guys use?
 
***** att

spar13 said:
For people who bought through Apple and have AT&T.
Dial 611
Press 1 for your number
Press 3 for upgrading
Tell them that you're upgrading to the 4S
Give them your name and last 4 of social
Supply them with your IMEI/MEID code, It's located at the bottom right hand corner of the box the phone came in.
Supply them with the 20 digit code that is on the new Sim Card, Apple does not give you the "tool" to get the card out this year so you'll need to either use an old one or find something that can do it.
After they've entered the information. Put the card back in, turn off your phone.
Restart your phone after 10-15 min and you should have either more cell reception or be activated.
If you're still not activated at this time, plug it in to your computer and start trying to activate via the Phone and iTunes.
Click to expand...


TRIED this waited on hold for over 20 minutes finally got through and they told me I needed to call from a different line I'm so pissed right now I don't have another line and no ones phone to borrow i am livid.
 
Not too sure if it this is what did it but after 5 hours of trying to activate it I picked up my old 3GS and started to check voicemail just to get some cellular activity. Next try after that and success! 4S is now activated! :D

I'm an ATT customer bought through apple, if that makes a difference.
 
spar13 said:
For people who bought through Apple and have AT&T.
Dial 611
Press 1 for your number
Press 3 for upgrading
Tell them that you're upgrading to the 4S
Give them your name and last 4 of social
Supply them with your IMEI/MEID code, It's located at the bottom right hand corner of the box the phone came in.
Supply them with the 20 digit code that is on the new Sim Card, Apple does not give you the "tool" to get the card out this year so you'll need to either use an old one or find something that can do it.
After they've entered the information. Put the card back in, turn off your phone.
Restart your phone after 10-15 min and you should have either more cell reception or be activated.
If you're still not activated at this time, plug it in to your computer and start trying to activate via the Phone and iTunes.
Click to expand...

This. Except you don't need to pull out your SIM card. The CCID number is on the phone if you press the little i right above the slide to activate. After getting off the phone, I tried again in iTunes and it went through right away. I was trying all day too, so definitely do this if you're having trouble!
 
TRY THIS. IT WILL WORK. GUARANTEED


go to your ATT account online....
go to Phones & Devices > Lost or Stolen Phone

suspend the line. turn off phone, take out sim.


wait 2 min aprox. reactivate the phone from ATT

put back sim, turn on phone and try activating again



good luck, let me know!
 
Surefire way to activate

Called up Apple and they were saying that it's just volume on the server. However, the tech was going to have me try activating through iTunes on a different machine (a Windows box). While we were waiting for the download, he told me that another customer had tried the same thing and in the middle of downloading on the Windows machine, the activation on the Mac went through. Same thing happened with me. Apparently, according to Apple, you must make your Mac jealous and then it will work.

Seriously, it just seems like you have to keep trying and it will eventually go through.
 
The message at the end no longer says that I will get an email when activated. Now it says shut down your phone again to retry. They finally got the message that their last message was contradictory.
 
Wow, sounds crazy. Guess its going to be a long night for me. Plus I am still waiting on UPS to deliver my phone!
 
Call at&t!!! It helped sooooo much

So I called AT&T and gave me IMEI and SIM (find an old SIM card tool since the new 4S won't come with one) and give them the #s. After you do, your old iPhone will stop working (mine was when I was talking with the CS Agent....sorry AT&T) and the system will take about 5 mins to update (essentially both phones will have NO service...don't worry, it'll work)

Keep trying to activate the new iPhone and in about 5 mins, my friends and I all got the same messages

-:confused::eek:sim card not correct
-:mad:problem with system, try again
:D:apple:phone now activated, please connect to iCloud or back up from computer

This saved me hours!!!

Thanks to the previous users who said to call in!!!:):eek:
 
Last edited:
Try this.

I decided to go the "wait" route, and waited about 45 minutes. At the direction of another post here, I removed my SIM to get the number off of it in anticipation of calling ATT.

When I powered back on, I had 1 bar of signal and a "3G" indicator, where before I had No Signal. I tried activation on the phone, and it gave me the option of activating over cellular, where before it forced me to use only WiFi or iTunes. I chose over cellular, and activation went right through in a minute or two.

I don't know if it's from waiting or if somehow the act of removing and reinserting my SIM card tripped something in the phone to allow activation over cellular and not through Apple's servers.

If you've not been having any luck so far, try removing and then reinserting your SIM. Restart the phone and see if you get 1 bar of 3G. If you do (hell, even if you don't), try activating through the phone and see if you now have a cellular option now.If you do, see if it'll go all the way through.

Good luck!
 
could be dumb luck but I got it to go through by taking the sim out of my iPhone 4 putting it into the 4s tried activation it failed put the iPhone 4s sim back in the 4s activated and it went right through.. restoring right now...

Edit. I attempted activation through iTunes directly.
 
Finally called att. They said that it was showing up as active on their server, and it was just stuck in line on apples server. I was hoping to activate via sim number, but they didnt give me the option. Did i just have a person who didn't know his tricks?
 
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