Hi,
I bought an AT&T black iPhone 4s 32GB on eBay. It had iOS 5.1.1 on it and also some music and apps left by the previous owner. I decided I wanted to set up the iPhone like new by going to the reset menu in settings and clicking on "erase all content and settings". It brought me to the activation screen, so I placed my active AT&T microsim into the iPhone and went through the activation process, but after choosing the language, country and wifi network it brings to me an error "Your iPhone cannot be activated. The activation server is temporarily unavailable". Then I tried activation through iTunes, but it gave me the "Your request cannot be processed" error. I also tried restoring iOS 5.1.1, but because apple isn't signing the firmware anymore, I thought updating to iOS 6.0 would help (I was reluctant to update before because of all the bugs I've heard of).
So I updated to iOS 6.0, but I still get the same error when either activating via wifi or iTunes. I also tried DFU+restore and recovery mode + restore multiple times using the iOS 6.0 ipsw file I downloaded straight from apple (I also checked my host files to make sure gs.apple.com wasn't listed) and I also tried this with the iPhone doing the same thing on different computers and different wifi networks to no success. So basically, I've tried everything I could (restoring firmware, waiting a couple of hours to see if it would activate, asking AT&T to activate the iPhone for me). I also checked the IMEI online using http://www.numberingplans.com/?page=analysis&sub=imeinr which says the IMEI validity is very likely (means it's not a bad IMEI).
I'm going to see the Genius Bar later this week, but I was hoping someone here might have an answer that could solve this. My thinking is that the iPhone actually does have a bad IMEI (I'm going to check with AT&T tomorrow) and that's why it won't activate. I've also heard this could happen with previously jailbroken iPhones that update (but I've DFU restored firmware iOS 6.0, so that should have erased the jailbreak if there was one on the iPhone left by the previous user).
The funny thing is, I bought another iPhone 4s (white) for my girlfriend at the same time and it activated just fine after placing her microsim card into the iPhone (on the same wifi, using the same computer). I even tried to use her microsim to activate my black iPhone 4s, but it still didn't work.
I think my only option now is to sell the iPhone as is or wait until a hactivation method is released (which I hope is soon for iOS 6.0). Any thoughts on this? Much help would be appreciated and thanks in advance!
I bought an AT&T black iPhone 4s 32GB on eBay. It had iOS 5.1.1 on it and also some music and apps left by the previous owner. I decided I wanted to set up the iPhone like new by going to the reset menu in settings and clicking on "erase all content and settings". It brought me to the activation screen, so I placed my active AT&T microsim into the iPhone and went through the activation process, but after choosing the language, country and wifi network it brings to me an error "Your iPhone cannot be activated. The activation server is temporarily unavailable". Then I tried activation through iTunes, but it gave me the "Your request cannot be processed" error. I also tried restoring iOS 5.1.1, but because apple isn't signing the firmware anymore, I thought updating to iOS 6.0 would help (I was reluctant to update before because of all the bugs I've heard of).
So I updated to iOS 6.0, but I still get the same error when either activating via wifi or iTunes. I also tried DFU+restore and recovery mode + restore multiple times using the iOS 6.0 ipsw file I downloaded straight from apple (I also checked my host files to make sure gs.apple.com wasn't listed) and I also tried this with the iPhone doing the same thing on different computers and different wifi networks to no success. So basically, I've tried everything I could (restoring firmware, waiting a couple of hours to see if it would activate, asking AT&T to activate the iPhone for me). I also checked the IMEI online using http://www.numberingplans.com/?page=analysis&sub=imeinr which says the IMEI validity is very likely (means it's not a bad IMEI).
I'm going to see the Genius Bar later this week, but I was hoping someone here might have an answer that could solve this. My thinking is that the iPhone actually does have a bad IMEI (I'm going to check with AT&T tomorrow) and that's why it won't activate. I've also heard this could happen with previously jailbroken iPhones that update (but I've DFU restored firmware iOS 6.0, so that should have erased the jailbreak if there was one on the iPhone left by the previous user).
The funny thing is, I bought another iPhone 4s (white) for my girlfriend at the same time and it activated just fine after placing her microsim card into the iPhone (on the same wifi, using the same computer). I even tried to use her microsim to activate my black iPhone 4s, but it still didn't work.
I think my only option now is to sell the iPhone as is or wait until a hactivation method is released (which I hope is soon for iOS 6.0). Any thoughts on this? Much help would be appreciated and thanks in advance!