Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

If I don't want to preorder online, what to do?

ajcadoo

ajcadoo

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Sep 17, 2011
279
191
San Diego, CA
I preordered my iPhone 3GS on att.com once it was announced but the shipment was delayed for days because of the demand.

My question: How do you buy an iPhone at an Apple Store?

I am currently up for an upgrade (my 2 year contract has expired) and I am waiting for the next iPhone. How does the Apple Store activate my ATT service on my new phone? Do you do it online once you have the phone? What about the SIM card? How does it all work?

I think I wanna be one of the people camping out a couple hours before the Apple Store opens to make sure I get it on day one instead of having to wait for a darn pre-order.
 
Wait in line at your local carrier store if they're selling the iPhone. This way, chances are you'll be able to get there early and in the front of the line.
 
ap3604 said:
Your kidding right? :p
Click to expand...

No I am not. Did you understand my question? How is the phone activated, and associated with my sim card, etc. etc.? I have no idea how all this works. When AT&T shipped my 3GS, it was already activated and ready to go.
 
Pretty sure you can pre-order to allow you to pick it up in the store so you don't have to wait in the regular long line.

As for activation the Apple reps do everything for you, including changing your sim card to a micro-sim. Nothing at all to worry about.
 
ap3604 said:
Pretty sure you can pre-order to allow you to pick it up in the store so you don't have to wait in the regular long line.

As for activation the Apple reps do everything for you, including changing your sim card to a micro-sim. Nothing at all to worry about.
Click to expand...

Apple stopped doing reservation for store pickup after the 3GS. You could preorder the iPhone 4 for delivery only but it worked out great for me at my phone was delivered a day before retail launch.
 
ajcadoo said:
No I am not. Did you understand my question? How is the phone activated, and associated with my sim card, etc. etc.? I have no idea how all this works. When AT&T shipped my 3GS, it was already activated and ready to go.
Click to expand...

You tell them you want a iPhone. They pull the model you want from the back and they pull a new SIM card from the drawer, activate it, and insert into said phone. You sign whatever corresponding docs they need (contracts, etc, etc) and you walk out the door.
 
tbayrgs said:
Apple stopped doing reservation for store pickup after the 3GS. You could preorder the iPhone 4 for delivery only but it worked out great for me at my phone was delivered a day before retail launch.
Click to expand...

False! I preordered my iPhone 4 for in store pickup and got in line...a separate line then those w/o preorders.
 
wordoflife said:
You tell them you want a iPhone. They pull the model you want from the back and they pull a new SIM card from the drawer, activate it, and insert into said phone. You sign whatever corresponding docs they need (contracts, etc, etc) and you walk out the door.
Click to expand...

Thats exactly what I needed to know. Thanks

----------

I will either preorder on apple.com or go to a retailer/apple store. thanks for all the replies. i have furthered my knowledge of how launch phones are activated.
 
ajcadoo said:
My question: How do you buy an iPhone at an Apple Store?

I am currently up for an upgrade (my 2 year contract has expired) and I am waiting for the next iPhone. How does the Apple Store activate my ATT service on my new phone? Do you do it online once you have the phone? What about the SIM card? How does it all work?
Click to expand...
The SIM card comes pre-installed in all iPhones. The activation process (plugging your new iPhone into a computer running iTunes, which is supposed to be done in the store) will associate your account with that new SIM. It also removes from your account your old SIM, if applicable.

When you buy one at Apple, the employee will get some basic AT&T information from you, and type it into their iPod touch thingy. That information then gets sent to AT&T, who returns back to Apple the price that you're eligible to buy an iPhone for. If you chose to buy, the Apple employee gets a little more information, and by the end, AT&T knows everything it needs to know to associate your new iPhone with your account.

What Apple *can't* do is remove anything on your AT&T account that is incorrect. So if your bill is past due and AT&T returns back that you're ineligible to buy an iPhone until it's caught up, they can't fix that. If you have a lock on your account that prevents changes, they can't fix that.
 
ap3604 said:
Pretty sure you can pre-order to allow you to pick it up in the store so you don't have to wait in the regular long line.

As for activation the Apple reps do everything for you, including changing your sim card to a micro-sim. Nothing at all to worry about.
Click to expand...

due to Apple stupid system of making you get a new sim card for the new iPhone AT&T system generally gets slammed on release day. I expect Verizon activation and phone switching is going to suck on release day as well.
Mix that with also having to go threw Apple servers and having any issues between either of those points mean no phone activation.

Apple should follow the same way everyone else does and that is just reuse your old sim card. My sim card is over 4 years old and on its 3rd cell phone. My dads sim card still says Cingular on it and is on its 4th or 5th phone at this point.
Mom and sister had to replace their sim cards due to the iPhone and due to a glitch my brother iPhone never used the new sim card in his iPhone but uses his old cingular sim card.
 
Rodimus Prime said:
due to Apple stupid system of making you get a new sim card for the new iPhone AT&T system generally gets slammed on release day. I expect Verizon activation and phone switching is going to suck on release day as well.
Mix that with also having to go threw Apple servers and having any issues between either of those points mean no phone activation.

Apple should follow the same way everyone else does and that is just reuse your old sim card. My sim card is over 4 years old and on its 3rd cell phone. My dads sim card still says Cingular on it and is on its 4th or 5th phone at this point.
Mom and sister had to replace their sim cards due to the iPhone and due to a glitch my brother iPhone never used the new sim card in his iPhone but uses his old cingular sim card.
Click to expand...

I usually just swap the microsim from the old phone. No need to activate new microsim.
 
Does anyone know if you'll be able to but these unlocked/contract free from Verizon or Apple day one?
 
sulpfiction said:
False! I preordered my iPhone 4 for in store pickup and got in line...a separate line then those w/o preorders.
Click to expand...

My bad, didn't recall that was an available option so for those who prefer to go that route, hopefully it'll be an option for this release as well. Just curious though why would you go this route if you can have the phone delivered to your home on launch day (or even earlier in my case :D) and thus forgo having to wait in any line?
 
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_3_5 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8L1 Safari/6533.18.5)

I've actually purchased mine from my local AT&T store on the morning of release. It was more of a spur of the moment thing where I happened to be up and went down - they've always had plenty and at most 8 people in line.
 
I preordered the iPhone 4 at an AT&T store and got it delivered on the morning of release. I might not do that agin this year since the servers went down last year and it was hectic. I even got an apple preorder just in case, but I gave it to a friend of mine who got his iPhone 4.
 
tbayrgs said:
Just curious though why would you go this route if you can have the phone delivered to your home on launch day (or even earlier in my case :D) and thus forgo having to wait in any line?
Click to expand...

I went that route because I would hate to be stuck at home waiting for the UPS guy to show up. I would constantly be checking outside every time I hear a truck engine.

Plus, sometimes you meet some pretty cool people while standing in line. Everyone standing in line for an iPhone on day 1 has something in common, so there are always good conversations.
 
I have a family plan with AT&T. I'm (likely) going to need to use the upgrade available on another line to upgrade the 3GS on the line I currently use. Is that something they can handle at the Apple store (physical or online), or will I need to go through AT&T to get that done?

EDIT: I don't mean to hijack this thread in any way. I just figured this would be a good place for the question since it is somewhat related and I know the repetitive threads from us noobs can get annoying.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back