Newbie Guidance to Hackivate 3GS

[mkochsch]

Situation:
A friend gave me an old 3GS. Was running 4.3.x iOS. My plan was to jailbreak and unlock the phone and give it to a friend who needs a pay as you go phone for financial reasons.
The iPhone is probably locked to either Roger's or Bell.
I plugged it into iTunes last night. It updated to iOS 5.1 (probably a mistake oops as it was activated).
Now when I turn it on I'm stuck trying to activate the phone: I can get as far as selecting, language, country and connecting the wifi (which it recognizes) then I get stopped at "SIM not valid".

My question is: what do I do first? continue to try to (h)activate? or should I unlock or jailbreak now?. I'm working from PC if that matters. I've d/l'd 0.9.10b.6 of redsn0w and verified the 5.1 iOS using Tiny Umbrella. Baseband says 05.16.05-6.4_M352.

Thank you. ~m

 

[mkochsch]

Fixed I think

Running redsn0w seems to have fixed.
- Used the "Jailbreak and install Cydia" button.
- Did the hold power (2secs), hold home button (3sec) and let go power button while holding home button (13secs) reboot.
- Cydia now installed.
- Chose "Set Up As New iphone" during the configuration.
- viola! boots up. Thank you redsn0w team.

Need to acquired a sim card. Probably go with the 7-11 plan or Petro Canada. Anyone have an opinion on pay as go in Canada? ~m

 

[mkochsch]

No Signal

OK. Tried the Rogers sim card from my android and I'm still getting a "No Signal" when I boot, and in settings under "My Number" have a greyed out "Unknown". So I'm not "unlocked" at this point.
I guess I'm heading down the baseband road, since I accidentally put 05.16.05 on the phone last night.
~m

 

[Applejuiced]

That baseband cannot be unlocked.
Your only option is the iPad bb but I don't recommend it.