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Pivoh

macrumors member
Original poster
Mar 20, 2012
55
0
I have been trying to find an answer for this, apologize in advance if this has been discussed already, but I just purchased a " device only " iPhone5 at the apple store.

I would like to activate it, but I am afraid it will lock itself to AT&T when I enter my sim card , is there any risk ?

thanks in advance for any help.
 
factory unlocked iPhones stay unlocked forever (unless someone from apple locks it haha)
 
My iPhone 5 had a bad home button and they gave me a replacement. When I got it home I restored it to my last backup and it forced me to carrier lock it....which means, I guess it was unlocked.
 
My iPhone 5 had a bad home button and they gave me a replacement. When I got it home I restored it to my last backup and it forced me to carrier lock it....which means, I guess it was unlocked.

I dont get it.
What do you mean it forced you to carrier lock it?
The lock or unlock has nothing to do with the backup file or wether you restore from backup or setup as new.
The unlock comes from Apples activation server.
 
I dont get it.
What do you mean it forced you to carrier lock it?
The lock or unlock has nothing to do with the backup file or wether you restore from backup or setup as new.
The unlock comes from Apples activation server.

It was activated in the store and working fine. I got home and restored it and it came up with a screen I had never seen. It said, which carrier will this phone be activated on, I had to pick Verizon and it said, be sure this is correct as it can not be undone.
 
It was activated in the store and working fine. I got home and restored it and it came up with a screen I had never seen. It said, which carrier will this phone be activated on, I had to pick Verizon and it said, be sure this is correct as it can not be undone.

That's not a carrier lock.
It just asked you what carrier will you use it on.
 
you can put an att sim in your iphone and it will work. You can take it out and put a tmobile sim in and it will work. You can reinsert the att and it will work again with att

you can switch sims all day long
 
Than why did it say this selection can not be changed?

From what I heard from Apple if its a verizon replacement and they enter all the info like previous imei/esn number even if you picked sprint or VM it wouldn't lock to them.
It will still be locked to verizon and every verizon i5 is officially unlocked to work with any gsm carrier.
 
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