How to Fully Soft Unlock iPhone 3G 2.2 Firmware (yellowsn0w)
/* Posted January 1st, 2009 at 1:02pm *//* Filed under Apple, How-To, Mods, iPhone */
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The latest iPhone 2.2 firmware was unleashed over a month ago to the world by Apple and just a mere day later, the iPhone Dev Team provides the PwnageTool unlocking software but for 2G iPhones only. 3G iPhones were left in the cold, with people only being able to jailbreak it but not unlock it. Today the iPhone Dev Team has finally released the 3G soft unlock code named "yellowsn0w" and we’re giving you the skinny on what you need to do to unlock the 3G iPhone for use with non-AT&T GSM carriers. We’ve covered the PwnageTool upgrade steps before, but since QuickPwn 2.2 does the same job a lot easier, this guide will show you how to upgrade, jailbreak, and fully unlock iPhone 3G 2.2 firmware with the yellowsn0w application.
- Upgrade your iTunes to 8.0.2 by launching it and clicking "Download iTunes" below. Or download it and install it manually.
- Allow iTunes to upgrade your iPhone to the latest 2.2 firmware. Don’t worry about the implications (losing jailbreak, unlock) as QuickPwn will take care of this for your. This step is necessary because QuickPwn doesn’t actually upgrade your iPhone. Instead, QuickPwn expects to be pwning the same firmware that your iPhone is on. If you don’t know anything about baseband versions, you can ignore this message. Otherwise, make sure you’ve updated your iPhone to be running on 02.28.00 baseband firmware, which should have been included in the 2.2 firmware update.
- Download QuickPwn 2.2 for Windows or Mac. Extract the file and launch the QuickPwn 2.2 application. Then follow the prompt and connect your iPhone to your computer via the USB cable. When the blue arrow button lights up, click it.
- QuickPwn is smart enough to detect the firmware ipsw file you downloaded via iTunes (something like C:\Documents and Settings\coderetard\Application Data\Apple Computer\iTunes\iPhone Software Updates\ on Windows XP). If it can’t find it for whatever reason, download the 2.2 restore firmware ipsw file for 3G iPhone1,2_2.2_5G77_Restore.ipsw directly from Apple’s servers. Then browse to the or restore firmware ipsw file you downloaded. After the green checkmark appears, click the blue arrow button.
- On the next page, make sure you select the “Cydia” checkbox. You can check “Installer” and replace logo as desired. Click the arrow button after making your selections.
- Now get ready to rumble…
- READ THIS STEP THROUGH COMPLETELY FIRST, lest you be caught off guard: Click on the Blue arrow button which will bring up a screen with some instructions (below). Follow them exactly to a tee. Just to prepare, here are the directions: 1) Hold Home for 5 seconds, 2) Hold Home and Power together for 10 seconds, 3) Release Power but continue to hold Home for 30 seconds. Throughout the process these three steps, you DO NOT LET GO OF THE HOME BUTTON until after the third step. I didn’t have to hold it anymore after it counted down to 21 seconds left.
- Then sit back and relax while QuickPwn does all the hard work for you, you’ll see some activity on your iPhone screen and hear your computer beep a few times, but when it restarts finally and says it’s waiting for activation, it’s ready to use. Now you can close QuickPwn.
- It’s now a good time to set up your wireless network settings on your iPhone 3G so you will be able to connect to the software repositories in Cydia.
- Now Launch the Cydia app, which will reorganize then restart. You’ll need to launch it again afterwards.
- When prompted at the "Who Are You" screen, just choose the first option "User (Graphical Only)."
- Click on the Manage tab on the bottom menu bar. In the Manage tab, click on the Sources button in the middle. You will need to add the source to the yellowsn0w repo to utilize the soft unlock.
- Click on "Edit" on the top right, then "Add" on the top left. In the URL, type: http://apt9.yellowsn0w.com/ as shown below. When you are done click "Done" and then "Browser."
- Now click on the "Search" tab and type "yellowsn0w" and install the app "yellowsn0w."
- For US T-Mobile users, you will need to disable the "Enable 3G" setting in your network settings.
- Now restart your iPhone 3G with your SIM card inserted. Wait for the slide to unlock screen and then wait 15 seconds more. If you don’t see the SIM card working, reinsert the SIM and wait another 10 seconds. Now try and make some calls with your newly unlocked iPhone 3G!
- For T-Mobile users, continue reading if you have problems:
- Download and install BossPrefs and via Cydia
- Disable all functions with BossPrefs (don’t worry if you can’t disable EDGE)
- Reboot your Phone with BossPrefs (not the normal manual way – this is important!)
- Wait a minute and a half when you see the slick to unlock screen
- Take out your T-Mobile SIM card and insert it again
- Wait for 10 seconds
- Go to Settings and turn on Airplane mode, then turn it off again
- Take out your T-Mobile SIM card and put in any AT&T SIM card and wait for a minute. Ignore the "Waiting to activate" prompt
- Now take out the AT&T SIM card and put in your T-Mobile SIM card again
- After a moment you will see the activation succeeded prompt. Now you should be able to pick up a T-Mobile signal
Image/Apple
Screenshots/Code Retard
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(Tech Industry News) The unlock works exclusively with baseband 02.28.00. This baseband is provided by the latest firmware update (2.2) from Apple. You’ll need to upgrade to this release using iTunes and then use QuickPwn to activate etc. Warning - Do not but this app from anyone its FREE. Avoid shysters like Jody Sanders and his limited company “Phone Unlock Limited”Dugg 1 times
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Hey i have an iphone 3g where out of the box it was version 2.2.
well whenever i put a simcard in it asks me to connect to itunes as if you have just turned the iphone on for the first time and when i do connect to itunes, itunes rejects the simcard, even after i have tried to unlock it in this way. Any ideas in what i have to do?
Did you jailbreak it with QuickPwn first?
yeh i jaibreaked it with QuickPwn
Try it with an AT&T SIM card.
I’m from the uk, so i did try an o2 simcard which does work and is recognised by itunes, but then when i reinsert my orange simcard again, it is again rejected
If you’ve unlocked it, you should be able to install the yellowsn0w soft unlock from Cydia. This doesn’t require that your iPhone be connected to your computer or iTunes at all. Install the app, insert your SIM and give steps 17-27 a try without having your iPhone connected to your PC.
iv tried all the steps and everything but then when i put in my orange simcard the iphone asks me to activate the simcard by using itunes, which when i do connect to my computer does not recognise the simcard.
i have try do the the instruction but can not get my t-moblie sim card to work,any sugest.
I am using Mac and I tried following the steps to install Quickpwn but after following the steps by pressing and releasing the buttons it just goes into “Quickpwn is about to run on your iphone 3g” and keeps loading and nothing happens!
Also the screens and steps are a bit different from what is shown here
my T-mobile is not working too
Didn’t work the first time through for me either. I just kept restarting, waiting, reinserting and hoping for dumb luck, but I think I think steps 17-27 really did it for me on T-Mobile.
try scond time around still not working with t-mobile sim card
WORKED GREAT THANKS FOR THE HELP!!!
Hi,I tried to unlock but it dosent work..i am using tmobile..it shows me a tmobile signal but when i tried to make call the signal are gone and i cannot make calls…i tried many times but didn;t get signal and cannot make calls…It shows me a signal and after a second it shows me no singnal…and as soon as i make call it shows me call failed.
this never works i tryed it with many i phones !!!!!!!!!
I got one of iphone working with t-mobile still try on other.
Good job with the article Adam. :)
i unlock my phone with yellow stone and it reads my t mobil sim card. i could send and recieve text and i could resive calls but when i try making a call the service goes down and the call fails. any help on wut i could do to fix this??
i meant yellow snow
I got 1 of my phone working after 1 day when my battery dead after charger my phone have no service and been try to get by reloaded and restore no luck get back to work again and suggestion.
not working on t-mobile.The same thing happened
as Andy’s and bindesh’s comments. i’m getting the t-mobile signal but i;m losing it.
mine has started working after upgrading yellowsn0w ver.9.4 :) other than check mark as your carrier at settings/carriers.
mine has started working after upgrading to yellowsn0w ver.9.4 :) other than check mark as your carrier at settings/carriers.
mines not working, after i unlock my iphone i am not able to recieve or make phone calls. ne thing to fix the problem?
If you installed via Installer, try Cydia. Installer installed yellowsn0w did not work for me. Also try the opposite if Cydia doesn’t work for you.
A note to all wannabe Czech T-mobile users; you will have to get the PIN protection removed from your SIM card before this solution will work. It is as easy as asking the T-mobile rep to remove the PIN security feature on the SIM. Then follow the instructions listed here and all is working greatly. Thanks iPhone Dev Team!
its working fine with my tmobile but i cannot text please someone help me
tnx for the help!
Thanks a wole lot it works great!!!!!!!11
NOU !!! CEA MAI SIMPLA MODALITATE DE DECODARE A UNUI IPHONE 3G ! ( 2.0 ; 2.1 si 2.2 !!!) X-SIM Model 2009 special pt Iphone 3g 2.2 ! UNIC IN ROMANIA ! DETALII PE : http://GSM.BaRLadUL.Ro
I bought my 3G in Canada and now I’m back in France. I accidentally updated to 2.2 so I was heavy stressin on the fact that I couldn’t get my phone to work in France, then I discovered this little gem of a site. In less then 10 minutes my phone works with my prepaid Orange SIM card,and a prepaid SFR SIM, super stoked! Thanks for the lowdown
Worked for me… Had to go through the full process (BossPrefs) but still showed no t-mobile signal. Then switched off, waited a minute and switched on, waited another minute and up came full t-mobile signal. One thing though, if I put a pin lock on the t-mobile sim card it will not work “invalate sim” flashed quickly and I get no signal. I would disable the sim card pin before you start this soft unlock process and leave it of until these guys get a fix.
I haven’t done it yet, but, does it mean that if I just want to jailbreak and im with AT&T I should have no problem?
If you are with AT&T and just want to jailbreak you don’t need yellowsn0w. Just follow steps 1-8 only.
Thank you very much!! I am from mexico, with telcel carrier and it works just fine, THANK YOU VERY MUCH!!!!!
You are geniuses!!!
I have a “waiting for activation” message… This may take some time? Any help?
its working now, need to use pwnage tool rather than quickpwn!
jus wondering if 3g works with this because on mine i have 3g switched on but it cannot find any 3g service?
Hi,
I’ve followed the steps up to a point after I installed the yellowsn0w. I’ve restart the my iphone and so on but my vodafone SIM card seems unstable. Sometimes the sim works,sometimes it shows ‘No service’ and sometimes it searching for quite a long period. Somebody help?
thank you every one hwo comment here you guys save my cybernetic life
thankyou from Utah
I was able to jailbreak and unlock my 3G. However, I’m doing this so I can use my phone with the local service provider when I’m travelling internationally, hence, I don’t have another SIM already available to test if this is working or not.
Can you tell me if this will work if I put in the SIM at a later date as well? Or will I have to repeat the whole process?
Thanks,
Z
Thanx. I can use my phone with all kind of simcards in turkey.
And it works at the first time when i opened the phone.
gr8888888888888888 stuff thr mate……….
100% workin here in india…..
cheerssss !!!
Thanks, It’s working with STC Saudi Arabia. For some sims u have to switch all network services OFF or use BossPrefs and reboot.
THANKS… SUPER DUPER THANKS…. It works like a charm :)))… Thanks for your instruction and DEv team for wonderful Job
it worked for me, great thanks alot.
Thanks a lot!!
It works great!!
The only problem I had was with the SIM PIN, once I disabled it, it zoomed.
Thanks again for the hard work.
(It is working with a carrier in India)
hi i m from maldives.. it worked for me :D thank you!!
Thankx alot. it worked 100%.
Thank you soooo much! It worked on my iphone 3g. by the way, i am from the Philippines and using SMART :)
Hi I have unlocked my iphone with your instructions but unable to find Edge settings, can you pls help me in that.
Can quickpwn hacktivate the iPhone 3G 2.2? I’m asking this because I don’t wanna be stuck on the activation screen that allows me to make emergency call only (Its the same screen where the iPhone 3G says to connect it with iTunes) I’m not a legit user!!!!
tried but still no service !!!
i have iphone 3g 2.1, i want to use apps compatible to 2.2 fw, is there anyway u can do this without me having to reinstall my apps or change my baseband.
Yes download FWChanger from cydia.
Wow!!! This actually worked!!!
My iphone can now be used under different networks.
Thanks a lot!!!
c”,)
I have 3G 2.1 jailbroken and unlocked with turbosim, I need to know when I get to the yellowsn0w part what I should do:
do I have to remove the turbosim ansd just keep the sim or run the yellowsn0w and nothing in the slot?
thnx in advance
It worked! Thanks so much for all your work!!! Only took me 5 min because my phone was already unlocked..
Rony Debs I took out my Turbo sim card and my sim card while i downloaded yellowsnow and then i put my tmobile sim back in without turbo.
hi,
I unlocked my Iphone3G and i’ve been using it for several weeks. So all i wanna know is if i restore all settings back to their defaults by using itunes 8 restore option would i encounter any problems or would be any risks that could damage my iphone. I just want to do this becouse i wanna give my phone back to the apple store i bought it!
WOW!!! great job iphone dev team it worked perfect. Thanks a lot, you guys are something else!!!!
Is their any difrent between installer file which generated from a Mac pc and another from an IBM pc?
I have the 3g 2.2 unlocked, installed yellowsn0w, but for some reason can’t get the steps 15-27 to get my any service. any help plz?
fuk*n works:):):)
Thank you SO much! I unlocked my phone in under 10 mins, and it now works with my service provider (I’m in Lithuania, and I’ve been trying to get it to work properly for over a month).
hey guys… i updated my iphone 3g to 2.2.1 and after that i couldnt restore it to that baseband..:( what should i do :((((((((so i dont have signal and just jailbreak it :(
There’s nothing you can do if you upgraded to 2.2.1 using Apple’s firmware because of the baseband update which is not compatible with yellowsn0w. What you should have done is update with a custom firmware that excluded the baseband update.
whenever i tried to use the 2.2 version i downloaded it always give me an error 1013 how can you assist me to overcome this error message
hi i got an iphone 3g running at 2.2.1 AND moden firnware at 2.30.03 is there anyway i can unlock it yet cuz dev team is taking for ever lolzz… i got me one of those sim that thhey are selling but i keep loosing service and when i lose it it doesnt comes back till i put my sim in another phone and put it back on the iphone again
nope its bricked and ur screwed
hey every1, i am planning on buying iphone 3g for tmo. 2 questions. after disableing 3g, can u reenable it for tmo? also, i have the tmo g1 (i want 2 phones, lol), will my internet plan work on the iphone?
thnx in advanced for replies
k i downloaded Quikpwn… and when i click on it it sends me this error message about .NET etc etc im basically stuck at the beggining of the yellowsnow guide
I have the iphone 3G with 2.2 firware installed but doesnt search network. Do I need the original sim card to unlock the phone? I dont have it. What other possibilities do I have?
I’ve tried downloading quickpwn, but it keeps telling me quickpwn has stopped working. is there anything else i can do? cant get it to open on my desktop or laptop
I believe it requires Microsoft .NET framework to be installed. I forget which version, perhaps it was 2.0.
I’ve tried downloading quickpwn sevral time
when it reboots it stay on the qickpwn logo for ever and itune does’t recgonsise it so what should i do pls help
did u figure out how to do it? i have the same problem and am trying to figure it out!!!
Thanks a lot. It works almost perfect for me but i cann’t connect to the internet by 3g or GPRS. Currently, i’m using Vodafone UK. What should i do?
You’ll probably have to work out with your carrier to see if it can support 3G and how to set it up.
can somebody help me i followed every step , i have a mexican sim and i saw a comment of somebody with a mexican sim that worked, but mine is not working:S
hey whats up everyone, i got an iphone from a friend and did a whole reset to where the iphone had to do a recovery with itunes, and when it did it got rid of the unlock feature, this is a 3rd gen too. so i downloaded quickpwn and did the jailbreak, but how do i go about getting the unlock done for it. im in japan right now but if its the unlock, shouldnt it work for anything? i have the original AT&T sim as well. so after its jailbroken, lemme know what i should do, and the iphone is updated to the latest version as well, hit me back with some feedback, PLEASE! and try and make it step by step if you could
this actually worked for me..i had doughts but it worked..and i’m proud of my self//
I’ve tried using this guide to unlock my iPhone 3G but now I can’t get any signal on T-Mobile, anyone else had this problem or know how to fix?
Did you install 2.2 or 2.2.1 firmware? 2.2.1 includes a baseband update to 02.30.03 which you cannot unlock.
i phone 3g unlock code
So is this information 100% current as of today??
No, 2.2.1 is the most current.
Hello,
I am bit familiar with the procedure, but the step with AT&T sim card makes me wondering. What happens if i can not get any signal and do not have AT&T card to do the rest of the steps?
Thank you in advance.
Dario
There’s always some risk involved during jailbreak and unlock. You could try and hope for the best or borrow a friend’s SIM. You could also try the other tutorials (2.2.1 for instance).
I.ve got the 3G iPhone with version 2.1 (5F136) and Modem Firmware 02.28.00 on it. Can it be unlocked or must i wait for the iPhone Dev Team?
No need to wait, you are good to go. Use this tutorial to upgrade to 2.2, or this one to upgrade to 2.2.1.
[...] your iPhone has been jailbroken to 2.2.1 firmware, follow our yellowsn0w soft unlock guide to unlock your 3G iPhone if so desired, starting from step [...]
I have 2.2.1 with baseband 02.30.03 I can’t do anything? I tried install a 2.2.1 modified version and run yellow… It doesn’t recognize sim card.
First I tried directly quickpwn.. helo please !
It does exactly what it says,I had software 2.2 with baseband 02.28.00. Upgraded to 2.2.1 and kept the same baseband… thanks alot guys.
WOW !!!!!
it’s great….. just restart and done….. i’m just happy… finally fully unlocked
thank’s guys
well i got an Iphone 3G… FW 2.2 BB 2.28
see you anda thanks again
Welldone guys never thought it would work here in South Africa but it did thanks.
Hi guys, unlocking UK phone to use Vodafone NZ contract simcard.
Gone through the whole process but all I get for Vodafone NZ simcard is INVALID SIM.
Any suggestions?
hey buddy .. i do have the difficulty here ! i;m from malaysia and i been using DiGi telcall all da time .. anyway before this i upgrade 2.2.8 den my whole iphone i get lock .. luckily i download using pwnage by and right now my version is 2.2.1 .. unfortunately it require to use turbo sim to unlock the phone.. anyway that turbo sim doesnt really work that well .. da line is not stable n i need to remove my sim from iphone n put into another phone to for the line…after that i reput da sim to my iphone and i only manage to get connected with da signal … this is happen when i start moving from another place to another place only the signal will gone …. is it possible i downgrade to 2.2 and i can get fully unlock ???
pls reply urgent
Nice guid, will this work with a network 3 contract simcard?
i need firmware for i-pod touch 16 GB
Hi i’ve downloaded quickpwn fr2.2 but i think it is only for fw2.2.1 because it didn’t browse fw2.2 please help me
thanks its work 100%
Hey guys,
Just a quick one…
…But first – mad props to the amount of work you do and the devo team!!
My iphone 3g has gone mental, it always loads to the passcode/emergency call screen and no further.
I cant put it into UDF or recovery mode – itunes doesn’t recognise it.
I was previously messing about with WINSCP (but didnt link it with my iphones IP address).
That’s when it all went wrong.
How can i bypass the passcode or better still, just get it to be recognised my itunes again?
I have reinstalled itunes (various versions – i cant get any response – it will only be recognised by the computer as two separate mass storage devices when it is in off mode and connected via USB.
Any advice?
Thanks in advance.