The Hassle of Unlocking iPhone!
Wiki Article
I never thought that iphone factory unlock softwarewould be a hassle. Being in the US, the home of iPhone, I thought that is an easy thing to do. Go to an apple store and buy an unlocked iPhone. Easy? NO!
As I discussed with the lady at the store, although I can buy the iPhone without a contract, I still would not be able to use it on a network other than AT&T. That was a problem to me as I am mostly overseas in some countries where AT&T does not exist or barely have any partners.
Don't get me wrong, I like AT&T and I have a contract with them on another iPhone that I am not planning to unlock. However I was still determined to unlock one for my usage overseas. My friends overseas made it sound an easy thing to do. Get an iPhone and you can pay someone that will unlock it for you.
So, in brief, my iPhone traveled with me in its unlocking trip. The fee to unlock it was 30 USD but the guy told me he cannot do it now and that I needed to wait. Because I am impatient, I decided to research it on the internet instead. Hundreds of solutions were there on line for free but none of them worked because I had the latest iphone unlock program free downloadversion. I decided to go into a paying site instead and that is when I thought everything is solved!
Needless to say it wasn't! My phone still did not recognize the new SIM card I inserted. I concluded that I got tricked into a fake site, so I decided to research further. For a newbie, it was like opening a can of warms. Jailbreaking, unlocking, firmware, software, baseband, and all those words that meant nothing to me and seemed so complicated were in my face!
Being me, I did not give up. I researched, read and re-read the information. The most complicated issue is that many software developers (or hackers) assume that the end user understands their terminology. Guess what? We don't!
I don't want an illegal iPhone, I just want to be able to use the iPhone that I paid for anywhere I want especially when the services of one carrier or another are not available. I travel between developing country markets and roaming services are too expensive if they were available to start with!
To make a long story short, I continued to research and found many reliable and free sources to unlock my iPhone on the internet. My phone is unlocked yet but I did unlock my friend's (it seems that I have a newer firmware), and hopefully a solution for mine is on its way.
So my advice to you, read, read and read some more before you venture into unlocking. Better yet, if you don't NEED your iPhone unlocked (like using it overseas with carriers who are not in partnership with apple) then don't do it, and just stick with your carrier.