This is going to put many of you to sleep. So, if it’s late and the kids are in bed, fire up this entry and you’ll be nodding off in no time. However, if you’re interested in jailbreaking your phone and you’ve upgraded to the 1.1.2 firmware already, my experience might be helpful.

Here was my setup…

• iTunes 7.6
• iPhone upgraded to 1.1.2

I made the mistake a week ago of updating to 1.1.2. I don’t know why I did. I had held out doing so for soooo long, thinking that I was going to jailbreak my iPhone.

After seeing the rather unimpressive offerings yesterday at MacWorld for the iPhone, I made the decision. Jailbreak here I come.

Why, you ask?
For starters, the iPhone is capable of SO MUCH! Why in the world it’s taken Apple almost 8 months to give users what has already been proven possible is beyond me. I really don’t think Apple’s Jobs-ian culture was prepared for the demanding mobile market. We don’t just want a phone. We want… it all.

Combine that with incredibly talented hackers of goodwill (I’m amazed at how helpful folks have been walking the iPhone faithful through the process) and you have a recipe or revolution.

When the iPhone update yesterday only gave us Google GPS, multiple SMS and the ability to customize your home screen, I was deeply frustrated. That pushed me over.

Yes, I know that in February, we will supposedly begin to see third-part software “blessed” by Apple, but heck, that’s been available since last AUGUST or before!

So, here’s my iPhone jailbreak saga:

I downloaded 1.1.1 firmware. (http://wiki.howardforums.com/index.php/IPhone_Firmware_Downloads)

I put my iPhone into plug mode and then option-clicked Restore in iTunes to downgrade. I was then stuck in plug-in mode and needed to use Independence. (Get it here: http://independence.googlecode.com/files/iNdependence_v1.3_beta2.dmg)

I then had to download something for iTunes. (Mobile Device 7.4.2 Frameware). This was because I had unthinkingly upgraded to iTunes 7.6 and didn’t know that successive versions iTunes make yoiu lose the ability to use previous firmware. I used Independence’s MobDev tool to link it to Independence. Independence then kicked my iPhone out of plug in mode.

MAKE SURE YOU READ ALL THE readme.txt’s that come with these downloads. Very helpful stuff.

Then I went to jailbreakme.com and it worked flawlessly. I spent too long putting stuff on the phone to see if it would work. All did.

Then I noticed my phone wasn’t working…

That’s apparently normal, but I went about 4 hours today without the phone use while I tried to figure out what happened. If I’d just read the read me doc that came with Conceited Software’s deal below, I’d have known that I just needed to continue to the next step and upgrade the firmware to 1.1.2.

I found firmware here:
http://wiki.howardforums.com/index.php/IPhone_Firmware_Downloads

Since I had upgraded to iTunes 7.6, I had to trash iTunes and download 7.5 (found here: http://www.oldapps.com/download_iTunes_mac.php) to get it to go to 1.1.2. (or so I thought… all I had to do was option-click on Upgrade and pick the 1.1.2 firmware where it had downloaded on my hard drive.)

Who knew how hard it would be to uninstall iTunes 7.6 and go back to 7.5? You also have to uninstall the AppleMobibleDevice stuff… Look at these two links for help in uninstalling iTunes and all the assorted junk:
http://www.iphoneatlas.com/2007/09/07/iphone-syncing-problems-under-itunes-74-fixes/
http://www.iphoneatlas.com/2007/10/03/iphone-or-ipod-touch-not-recognized-restartreinstall-apple-mobile-device-service/

After doing that, iTunes started back up with NO SONGS.. Aaaah. [I knew my songs were still on my HD, but I had thankfully put my iTunes Library in the previous library folder before I started, just in case. After I finished this whole process, I'll update to 7.6 again, and then replace the newly created iTunes Libarary in the Music>iTunes folders with the one I drug into the Previous iTunes Library folder.]

I could now option-click on UPDATE – NOT RESTORE – and begin the process of going to 1.1.2.

NOW, I could finally run the software from Conceited Software to jailbreak it in 1.1.2. With Itunes quit, I run jailbreak.jar and simply wait.
It’s here:
http://conceitedsoftware.com/iphone/site/112jb.html

VOILA AND EUREKA!! After messing with this a good part of the day, I am back to 1.1.2 and a jailbroke iPhone! Away I go to install all kinds of goodies (especially productivity generators like Solitaire and Othello!).

Helpful Site:
After it was almost all said and done, I found this site which could have saved me HOURS. Oh well.

On this day...

• Famous people - 2010
• Surgery today - 2009