iOS 5 Install Steps - Please HELP

Plug in your phone to your computer. iTunes will say that iOS 5 is available for download. Download the update and iTunes will do the rest. Thats it!

 

On October 12, after you hear that iOS 5 is officially available, plug your iPhone into your computer and open iTunes. First make sure iTunes is up to date, then click check for update on your phone's status screen. Follow the instructions to update your phone

It will be an upgrade, not a full wipe or anything. You will not lose any information or app data, and you will not have to set it up as a new phone.

 

one of the first steps after plugging in to your updated iTunes is backup your phone and then update, then follow the onscreen instructions for iOS 5 that appear on your iPhone and when prompted chose restore from iTunes backup

 

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I've always found it is better to set it up as a new phone when upgrading to a new OS, not just .x updates.

 

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Just plug in the phone when ios5 is released and click "update" it will do everything like backup for you automatically.

 

iCloud setup is part of the things that happen when the phone first boots into iOS5. Just follow the prompts. *if* it doesn't do this, go into Settings->iCloud and setup from there.

You should NOT need to setup as new phone. It should just upgrade then restore all your stuff from the backup. Just follow the prompts and you should be fine, don't overthink this.