The Unauthorized Guide to iPhone, iPad, and iPod Repair (2013)

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When you’re set up with iCloud, your iDevice performs an automatic backup every 24 hours so long as your iDevice meets the following conditions:

It’s connected to Internet over Wi-Fi

It’s connected to a power source

Its screen is locked

You can perform a manual iCloud backup of your iDevice by navigating to Settings, iCloud, Storage & Backup and tapping Back Up Now.

Backing Up an iDevice Manually

Historically, Apple has allowed an iDevice to synchronize with one and only one computer. If you, for instance, attempt to sync an iDevice with a second computer then you receive the scary message box shown in Figure 3.6.

FIGURE 3.6 iTunes warning seen when you try to sync your iDevice with a second host computer.

If you proceed then the iDevice’s content is wiped clean. This isn’t desirable if, for example, you want to back up a customer’s iDevice content (with their permission, of course) before undertaking repair work.

You can turn to third-party utilities that enable you to circumvent the one-computer limitation; I cover those tools in more detail in Chapter 18. At that time I also show you the mechanics of manual iDevice backup and restore.

In summary, if you have any choice in the matter, using iCloud or iTunes is by far the preferred way to back up your iDevice’s data.

Restoring an iDevice by Using iTunes 11

The main problem with performing a full iDevice restore is the requirement that you be either within USB cable range or on the same Wi-Fi network as the PC or Mac with which you’ve synced the libraries.

Given that significant limitation, however, follow these steps to restore your iDevice by using iTunes:

1. In iTunes, navigate to the Summary page for your target iDevice.

2. In the Backups area, click Restore Backup.

3. In the Restore Backup dialog box, select your desired backup set from the drop-down list and click Restore. This dialog box is shown in Figure 3.7.

FIGURE 3.7 Restoring an iDevice by using iTunes.

Restoring an iDevice by Using iCloud

Speaking candidly (and have you known me to speak in any other way thus far in this book?), Apple has some work to do in terms of making iCloud-based restores more user friendly.

As it is, the only way to do an iCloud restore is to set up your iDevice as a brand-new device. Well, that works fine if you just purchased a new iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch. However, what if you need to reset your current device to its state as of its last iCloud backup? Here’s the procedure:

1. On your iDevice, navigate to Settings, General, Reset, and tap Reset All Settings.

2. When the iDevice reboots, step through the configuration wizard. When you reach the Setup page, shown in Figure 3.8, be sure to specify Restore from iCloud Backup.

FIGURE 3.8 Restoring an iDevice from an iCloud backup.

Jailbreaking and Unlocking iDevices

To wrap up this chapter I’m briefly covering two popular iDevice hacks: jailbreaking and unlocking. Some newbies to Apple mobile devices confuse these two terms. They represent fundamentally different approaches to iDevice modification, although both of them enable you to customize an iDevice to meet your individual needs more closely.

What Is Jailbreaking?

In order to ensure a consistent user experience and minimize the possibility of a customer lousing up her iDevice, Apple configures its iOS operating system software in such a way that the customer never has full (root) access to the device.

Thus, jailbreaking refers to the application of code exploits that enable the user to circumvent Apple’s built in firmware protections and gain root access to the iDevice’s file system.

When iDevice enthusiasts released the first jailbreak exploits, Apple used legal means to fight back, citing intellectual property theft. However—and this is important—jailbreaking was upheld by a Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) exception ruling in 2010. Therefore, it is within your legal right to jailbreak your iDevice.

However—and this is equally important—Apple countered the DMCA ruling by stating that jailbreaking invalidates your Apple Hardware Warranty and AppleCare plan.

Here’s the money quote from Apple Support Document HT3743 (https://support.apple.com/kb/ht3743; the emphasis in the following extract is mine):

Apple strongly cautions against installing any software that hacks the iOS. It is also important to note that unauthorized modification of the iOS is a violation of the iPhone end-user license agreement and because of this, Apple may deny service for an iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch that has installed any unauthorized software.

The Apple Hardware Warranty has the following to say on the subject:

This Warranty does not apply to an Apple Product that has been modified to alter functionality or capability without the written permission of Apple.

For completeness, the following extract is from the AppleCare+ Terms and Conditions contract:

The Plan does not apply to an iPhone with a serial number that has been altered, defaced or removed, or has been modified to alter its functionality or capability without the written permission of the manufacturer.

Pros of Jailbreaking

All of this background information on jailbreaking is academic, however. The main advantages that jailbreaking your iOS device offers you are as follows:

You can install non-Apple Store apps: As you may know, iOS apps must be submitted to Apple for approval before they are allowed to be listed and sold in the Apple Store. Thus, Apple has the final say whether such-and-so app becomes publicly available. By contrast, jailbroken iDevices can use Cydia, an alternative app storefront, to download and purchase apps that greatly expand the functionality of your iDevices (see Figure 3.9).

FIGURE 3.9 The Cydia alternative app store for jailbroken iDevices.

You can deeply personalize your iDevice: Go to your local shopping mall and spend some time people-watching. You’ll observe that it appears almost everyone using a smartphone is holding an iPhone—the devices are that popular. Without jailbreaking, the only way to personalize your iDevice is to purchase a custom case or cover. Jailbreaking completely unlocks the firmware of your device such that you can dramatically change the device’s look and feel. A good example of this customization lies in what is called theming, an example of which is shown inFigure 3.10.

FIGURE 3.10 A heavily themed jailbroken iPhone.

The risk of bricking your iDevice is low: Perhaps the biggest fear people have of jailbreaking their iDevices is the idea that the process is irreversible (it is not), or that if something goes wrong their iDevices will be rendered permanently inoperable. I’ve been involved in jailbreaking since the iPhone 3GS, and I have never encountered a single case of a bricked iDevice. In a worst-case scenario, you have to perform a firmware and user data restore. I already covered the importance of regularly backing up your iDevice, so this fear is largely unfounded.

“But what if I have to bring my jailbroken iDevice to the Apple Store for warranty service?” you might ask. “Will the tech at the Genius Bar be able to tell I’ve jailbroken the device?”

The answer to this question is simple: Your warranty repair should proceed just fine as long as you can restore the firmware of your iDevice prior to submitting the device to the Apple Store. The only problem you might encounter is if you show up at an Apple Store with a still-jailbroken device. In this case, you are almost guaranteed to be denied service.

Cons of Jailbreaking

The chief arguments against jailbreaking are relatively minor in impact, actually. Let’s review them one at a time:

You will generally be required to lag behind in iOS version: When Apple releases a new version of the iOS, it obviously takes the jailbreaking community a while to figure out a new way to exploit the operating system kernel code and render a safe and reliable jailbreak. In practice this means that most of the time you need to be content with running a slightly earlier version of the iOS that has a jailbreak developed for it.

Apple makes iOS downgrading very difficult: Let’s say you want to jailbreak your iPhone 4S that currently runs iOS 6. However, because an iOS 6 jailbreak isn’t yet available, you decide to downgrade your firmware to iOS 5.1. Will this succeed? Yes, but only if you saved your Signature Hash (SHSH) blob from the previous iOS version. An SHSH blob is essentially an authorization ticket for a particular iOS version. Unless you use a third party app like Tiny Umbrella (http://thefirmwareumbrella.blogspot.com/) or Cydia (http://cydia.saurik.com/) to save your blobs, you won’t be able to downgrade to an earlier iOS version; it’s as simple and unfortunate as that. To further complicate things, Apple invalidates older SHSH blobs at an alarming rate, so in some cases even having a backed-up blob won’t enable you to downgrade. Apple exerts tight control over its software as well as its hardware—has that fact been made abundantly clear to you yet?

You might be required to do tethered booting: The two main types of iOS jailbreaks are tethered and non-tethered. Tethered jailbreaks require that you connect your iDevice to your host computer via USB cable in order to start up or reboot the device. This means that if you need to reboot your iDevice while you are on the road then you are out of luck. Naturally, the preferred jailbreak method is untethered, which means you can shut down and start up your iDevice any old time and retain the device’s jailbroken status. In my experience, initial jailbreaks for a new iOS version are almost always tethered, which ties in to the aforementioned disadvantage of having to run an earlier iOS version to gain your freedom.

Unfortunately, we do not have the white space in this book to cover iOS jailbreaking in more detail. Instead, I recommend that you read the article series on the subject I put together for Que Publishing:

“iOS Jailbreaking 101 Part 1: Understanding Jailbreaking” (http://is.gd/H5kcR7)

“iOS Jailbreaking 101 Part 2: Ensuring Your Device’s (and Your Data’s)” Safety (http://is.gd/H0m6Mx)

“iOS Jailbreaking 101 Part 3: Jailbreaking Your iOS Device” (http://is.gd/9IrpMy)

“iOS Jailbreaking 101 Part 4: Making the Most of Your Jailbroken iOS Device” (http://is.gd/uQSz2h)

What Is Unlocking?

By default, iPhones are bound to a particular wireless carrier. You can visit the Apple website (https://support.apple.com/kb/HT1937) to obtain a comprehensive list of authorized cellular carriers. In the United States, AT&T, Verizon, and Sprint are the three main players in the mobile carrier service arena.

What this proprietary locking means for us, the customers, is that we cannot (again, by default) register an AT&T iPhone that is attached to the Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) cellular network to another GSM provider such as T-Mobile. The same rule applies for Verizon or Sprint iPhones that employ the Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) carrier network.

The good news is that both AT&T as well as Verizon offer authorized iPhone unlocking.