I was wondering if it was possible to take the 3d0... texts backup file, save it somewhere else, wipe the phone and set it up as a new one, replace the new backed-up empty texts file with the one I saved, then restore the phone from a previous backup. I want to do this because I set up my iPhone 4 from a backup from my first-gen iPod touch and it's kinda wonky at times (home button not always working, and when I'm done a call, the screen won't come back on), but I don't want to lose my texts. Syphone doesn't work for me and I don't want to pay anything. Sorry if this wasn't the right forum, but I figured since it involved digging around in the backup files, it kinda counted as a "hack".
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Restore texts after wiping iPhone 4
- Thread starter digitnsm
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Yep it's possible if you SSH into your phone I think it's somewhere under mobile is where you find your sms.db. Basically back that up but last time I did it I backup everything in there because I found out that if you had pictures or mms texts they turned into blanks. A problem though is you have to make sure you set the permissions correctly after you SSH them back onto your new restore. Or else you will not be able to send or receive texts.
But don't you have to jailbreak your phone to do that? I don't really feel like jailbreaking (I know it takes 2 seconds. It made my iPod unbearably slow a few years ago) 
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I know that when iTunes backs up the phone, it backs up the texts. If you put that backed-up texts file into a backup from a different phone and restored that phone to the backup you just modified, will the texts you had show up?
. I know that when iTunes backs up the phone, it backs up the texts. If you put that backed-up texts file into a backup from a different phone and restored that phone to the backup you just modified, will the texts you had show up?
But don't you have to jailbreak your phone to do that? I don't really feel like jailbreaking (I know it takes 2 seconds. It made my iPod unbearably slow a few years ago)
I know that when iTunes backs up the phone, it backs up the texts. If you put that backed-up texts file into a backup from a different phone and restored that phone to the backup you just modified, will the texts you had show up?
jailbreaking has come a long way from a few years ago,
But don't you have to jailbreak your phone to do that? I don't really feel like jailbreaking (I know it takes 2 seconds. It made my iPod unbearably slow a few years ago)
I know that when iTunes backs up the phone, it backs up the texts. If you put that backed-up texts file into a backup from a different phone and restored that phone to the backup you just modified, will the texts you had show up?
That..I have not done myself and I don't know if that is possible or not. But I believe there are some programs that do this for you, but I can't think of them off the top of my head.
I think iPhoneExplorer, or something like that, will let you access the files you need without jailbreaking. I have tried to restore my text messages before, but like someone else mentioned, I always had the problem resetting the permissions. Without that you can't send/receive texts, but you can see your old ones.
Yeah you just got to mess around with it until it works. That's what I did and there are actually some posts from another forum that kind of helps.
Oh and iPhoneExplorer doesn't show any text message files that I could find. I dug around for maybe ten minutes.
I think they are here:
private/var/mobile/Library/SMS/sms.db
Don't know if you can navigate to that with iPhoneExplorer or not.
Well like I said you would have to jailbreak to do what I mentioned. So I will try to search for the posts if you are going to jailbreak and attempt to SSH the files. But I thought you didn't want to jailbreak but if you change your mind let me know I will try to help you out.
I think I'm gonna wait for iOS 5 and wipe my phone, but save the backup file that holds the text messages. When I back it up with iOS 5 I'll replace the empty file with the saved one, and restore the phone from that backup. If that doesn't work, oh well. But I don't feel like jailbreaking. Thanks for your help