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Difference bw iTunes Restore and iPhone "Erase all Content & Settings"?

EJ8

EJ8

Suspended
Original poster
Oct 13, 2010
645
324
iTunes is not letting me perform a restore. It errors with some message about not being able to find the correct software. Will doing an "Erase all Content & Settings" from the phone settings do the same thing? Seems like it would be the same but I'm wondering if there is some technical difference.
 
They both technically erase / reset the phone. But the big difference is:

The on phone reset will reset all settings and remove all content, etc. however as it is on the device there is a chance that some hidden file, etc could remain, and it could have your data. Basically there is chance not all user data is removed, or some corruption may not be fixed.

If you restore the iOS through iTunes. It is actually restoring the whole os on your device. Similar to reformatting a hard drive and then reinstalling the os. According to apple this is the only way to ensure all prior user data is removed. Also it would fix any software issue.

Which device are you trying to restore? Also which iOS device?

Remember old iOS versions are not being signed for current devices. So it almost impossible to restore to an old iOS version ( if you some third party tools and have the correct iOS device you might be able to).
 
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I am trying to restore an iPhone 5. It has had all of the iOS 7 beta versions on it and they were all updated over the air with no fresh installs. The phone is giving me some problems so I wanted to just wipe it out and start over with iOS 7 installed from iTunes.

----------

Here's the error message I am getting.

fzeeQlK.png
 
Did you already make sure iTunes is updated to the latest and greatest version?

I believe a new version was released pretty recently

Also you could manually download the ipsw file from one of the tracking sites, like idownloadblog, and save it to you computer

Then when you restore in iTunes I think you would hold down the I believe the Shiftkey and click the restore button (windows). Or a similar key combination for Mac. Then iTunes would let you manually search for the file.
 
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Armen said:
I had the same error on my Macbook until I updated itunes to the official 11.1 release.
Click to expand...

I was about to reply that my iTunes was up to date because I had previously checked this and iTunes tells me it is up to date :

e84FxYF.png



But I remembered that I was actually running a beta at one time and decided to look a little closer:

Kutsp3Q.png



So the update checker was actually incorrect!

Long story short I installed the public version of 11.1 and iTunes is letting me restore my phone now. Thanks for the help and ideas.
 
EJ8 said:
I was about to reply that my iTunes was up to date because I had previously checked this and iTunes tells me it is up to date :

Image


But I remembered that I was actually running a beta at one time and decided to look a little closer:

Image


So the update checker was actually incorrect!

Long story short I installed the public version of 11.1 and iTunes is letting me restore my phone now. Thanks for the help and ideas.
Click to expand...

You will get this error if you have a beta version currently installed. You have to find the ipsw file and manually do it.
 
EJ8 said:
I was about to reply that my iTunes was up to date because I had previously checked this and iTunes tells me it is up to date :

Image


But I remembered that I was actually running a beta at one time and decided to look a little closer:

Image


So the update checker was actually incorrect!

Long story short I installed the public version of 11.1 and iTunes is letting me restore my phone now. Thanks for the help and ideas.
Click to expand...

My pleasure.:)
 
Best way to wipe and clean install

Since the OP had his issue resolved, I have a related question. What is the best way to do a clean install on an iPhone? My process:

1) I connected to iTunes and downloaded iOS7 to computer
2) connected my iP5 and installed ITunes and then synced my backup
3) disconnected the phone from computer and reset all settings and erased all data
4) proceeded to then set up phone by downloaded my apps from iTunes and configuring mail, data, etc.

Is there a better way or is this process fine?

Thanks,

Rick
 
C5Longhorn said:
Since the OP had his issue resolved, I have a related question. What is the best way to do a clean install on an iPhone? My process:

1) I connected to iTunes and downloaded iOS7 to computer
2) connected my iP5 and installed ITunes and then synced my backup
3) disconnected the phone from computer and reset all settings and erased all data
4) proceeded to then set up phone by downloaded my apps from iTunes and configuring mail, data, etc.

Is there a better way or is this process fine?

Thanks,

Rick
Click to expand...


If I am correct. It sounds like you manually installed all your apps and configured everything again.

If you wanted a purely clean install I guess that is the way to do it.

However this may have worked better, to get all your apps, settings to auto install

I did this for my iPad mini

1) Backed up to iTunes
2) Reset / ipad
3) Install iOS 7
4) Then restored from backup
5) All the settings and apps installed automatically
6) Then completed a reboot of the iPad

After the restart. All my stuff was there but on iOS 7

The restore process on the iOS devices is pretty good. Normally any bad files/ garbage does not get reinstalled.

Basically I let iTunes restore/configure/install everything for me.
 
Shan S. said:
If I am correct. It sounds like you manually installed all your apps and configured everything again.

If you wanted a purely clean install I guess that is the way to do it.

However this may have worked better, to get all your apps, settings to auto install

I did this for my iPad mini

1) Backed up to iTunes
2) Reset / ipad
3) Install iOS 7
4) Then restored from backup
5) All the settings and apps installed automatically
6) Then completed a reboot of the iPad

After the restart. All my stuff was there but on iOS 7

The restore process on the iOS devices is pretty good. Normally any bad files/ garbage does not get reinstalled.

Basically I let iTunes restore/configure/install everything for me.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the input. You are correct that I manually installed all the apps. I have an iPad that I have not loaded iOS 7 on yet. I may try your method.
 
C5Longhorn said:
Thanks for the input. You are correct that I manually installed all the apps. I have an iPad that I have not loaded iOS 7 on yet. I may try your method.
Click to expand...

Glad to help... I think the key step really is to full erase/ reset the iPad /iPhone back to factory before any major iOS install....

During the iOS 7 install it will ask if you want to setup as new device or restore from backup.

I just chose restore from backup. And plugged into my computer. My iPad mini has been working great..
 
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