Unlock an iPhone 3GS without SIM card?

[Cubytus]

This is a Telus. A SIM card from them is $25, and I am not sure they are selling "naked" prepaid plans.

Since a factory unlock for an iPhone is made in Apple's database, supposed "difficulty" is pointless. It is not more difficult to unlock a British iPhone than it is to unlock a Canadian iPhone. Carriers, on the other hand, may display a strong lack of willingness (such as the one displayed when asked to block a stolen phone IMEI) and charge unreasonable prices. But this has nothing to do with purported difficulty.

 

[Baggio]

This is a Telus. A SIM card from them is $25, and I am not sure they are selling "naked" prepaid plans.

Since a factory unlock for an iPhone is made in Apple's database, supposed "difficulty" is pointless. It is not more difficult to unlock a British iPhone than it is to unlock a Canadian iPhone. Carriers, on the other hand, may display a strong lack of willingness (such as the one displayed when asked to block a stolen phone IMEI) and charge unreasonable prices. But this has nothing to do with purported difficulty.

Telus SIM cards are going for $6-$8 on eBay. You don't need an activated SIM to see the iOS version.

For whatever reason, the cost are higher over the who unlock for AT&T in the US.

On edit: swiftunlocks.com has a Telus unlock for $34. That's the cheapest I have seen.

 

[Gregintosh]

$34 is not a bad price to pay to make all the headaches go away.

In the future, it may be good to pass up a really good deal if its going to be a pain to deal with if you value your time.

For example (just an example), I would rather pay an extra $100 for something than spend 20 hours spread over several weeks figuring out how to fix an issue with it. To me, just having stuff work properly makes me happy and that's worth the price (that's why I buy Apple and not cheaper alternatives).

 

[Cubytus]

Thanks Baggio, I contacted them for the exact process as all I can see is that:
. Entering the "iPhone 3GS" in the "iPhone" searchbox leads to precisely nothing. No page is loaded, nor any message. This is still a very expensive unlock, but hey, Telus has a reputation to hold as the most expensive carrier in Canada (among other expensive carriers). If I may ask, what have you typed to find them but avoid all those shady amateur unlockers placing eye-bursting ads full of typos on Kijiji and the like? I seriously hope they won't need any Telus SIM card at any point here. No Telus susbcriber I know can help me here since they are using micro-SIM formats.

And no, SIM lock doesn't have any legitimate reason to exist considering that, if a customer wants to break a contract before term, he / she will have to pay a penalty amounting to the full remaining price of the phone. So carrier wouldn't lose any money over SIM unlock.

Gregintosh, I knew a brand new iPhone was a bad deal in itself at $800, but never thought a used one could be. I am also a buyer of Apple because it "just works" most of the time, even talking about service. But all these reasons become moot when we turn to iPhone. Unreasonable price (Apples vs. Apples), ****** service, and previously un-serviceable iPhones outside their country of origin. Problem is, there's no competition to iOS

About paying a bit more to get "just working" stuff, I just wonder what videosurveillance software you'd get, that being the utmost example of something that must work without being incessantly taken care of.

 

[Baggio]

Thanks Baggio, I contacted them for the exact process as all I can see is that:
View attachment 400654. Entering the "iPhone 3GS" in the "iPhone" searchbox leads to precisely nothing. No page is loaded, nor any message. This is still a very expensive unlock, but hey, Telus has a reputation to hold as the most expensive carrier in Canada (among other expensive carriers). If I may ask, what have you typed to find them but avoid all those shady amateur unlockers placing eye-bursting ads full of typos on Kijiji and the like? I seriously hope they won't need any Telus SIM card at any point here. No Telus susbcriber I know can help me here since they are using micro-SIM formats.

And no, SIM lock doesn't have any legitimate reason to exist considering that, if a customer wants to break a contract before term, he / she will have to pay a penalty amounting to the full remaining price of the phone. So carrier wouldn't lose any money over SIM unlock.

Gregintosh, I knew a brand new iPhone was a bad deal in itself at $800, but never thought a used one could be. I am also a buyer of Apple because it "just works" most of the time, even talking about service. But all these reasons become moot when we turn to iPhone. Unreasonable price (Apples vs. Apples), ****** service, and previously un-serviceable iPhones outside their country of origin. Problem is, there's no competition to iOS

About paying a bit more to get "just working" stuff, I just wonder what videosurveillance software you'd get, that being the utmost example of something that must work without being incessantly taken care of.

I have the same problem on my laptop. I was able to see everything on iPad Mini. Not sure why it doesn't work on my laptop either.

 

[Cubytus]

iPhone 3GS software-unlocked. Expensive and unstable.

As they didn't answer my email about the procedure to follow and their website didn't work, I had to go with a local unlocker. However, for some reason, in this poor city of mine no local unlocker seem to do a factory unlock for less than $100, which is very good for a subsidized iPhone 4S and +, but too expensive for an older 3GS, and price varies according to original carrier. Anything less expensive is a software unlock.

For that reason, I suspect there may be some kind of intermediates on the carrier's side that, while the customer side doesn't do any unlocking when requested by the original customer if too long a time passed since last activity, the wholeseller side is able to manually look for an IMEI when requested by a third party unlocker and remotely unlock it. Hence my question about how to contact them, if an estimate of unlock requests can be made to get a more interesting license access. Working at the carrier itself would be very interesting indeed as I heard the salary was quite good in this poor city, but this is definitely not my chosen career.

This was, apparently, a jailbreak + software unlock so yes, quite expensive as I won't be able to upgrade iOS. Each time I connect my phone to the Mac, I feel worried that iTunes will check for an upgrade without my permission, since iOS 6 jailbreak provides no safety net to prevent un-jailbreaking or relocks, AFAIK. iOS was still 4.2, so he had to upgrade it before unlocking. As I had no time to wait for a Telus SIM card to come and was unsure of the process required to actually upgrade iOS without the phone activated, I paid the $40 requested. Yes, I feel somewhat ripped as it doesn't come with any hard warranty, like 1 or 2 years of free, unconditional unlock in case of re-lock.

As always after a jailbreak, the phone isn't so stable anymore (although no additionnal extension was installed, except for the ones disabling software update notice and the reset all soft key). At once, I wasn't able to send or receive SMS, but rebooting the phone finally allowed it. Sometimes phone loses cellular connectivity for some reason where the Nokia received it, and the battery seems to be a bit worn, but again, I was pretty brutal downloading all applications over cellular. iOS being what it is, I had no problem whatsoever configuring emails, and using different applications, despite the obviously slower experience from a 2009 phone. It is still faster and more stable than the Nokia N8 it replaces.