New Firmware Fixes Previously Bricked iPhones 182
drcagn writes "Ars Technica reports that Apple's new 1.1.3 firmware update unbricks iPhones damaged from unlocking and updating the firmware months ago. In September, users who hacked their iPhone's firmware to unlock it found their iPhone bricked when they updated to new firmware, creating a massive upset and internet furor. Although Apple claimed this was not an intended effect of the update, it held the stance that it is not their responsibility to ensure that updates work with users' warranty-voiding hacks, and many cried foul. This update, which provides new features Jobs showed off at Macworld, while not officially unbricking the iPhone, has restored iPhones from Gizmodo and a reader of the Unofficial Apple Weblog."
Crap! (Score:1)
Confused (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Confused (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Confused (Score:5, Funny)
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Let me be the first to say [Re:Confused] (Score:2)
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It'd take a miracle.
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Don't listen to him folks, they're all still expensive coasters, that's right.
Re:Confused (Score:5, Insightful)
Same as if you screwed up a BIOS update on your motherboard. Do it again, correctly and you'll be fine.
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It wasn't a matter of just trying the firmware update again; for those who bricked there were no options available to bring the device back to functionality --until now.
I think people splitting hairs about the use of the term "brick" are missing the point.
Re:Confused (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Confused (Score:5, Informative)
Bricked is when you need to take out the soldering iron and connect up a JTAG cable. If you can still communicate with the firmware loader over USB, it isn't bricked.
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If the device cannot be restored to function via the normal interfaces (JTAG is not a normal interface,) then it's bricked.
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"I'm not dead yet!"
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But you can never be sure that a future technology won't make it recoverable.
That's what happened here.
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Just as those who despair at peoplw calling the beige box a "hard drive" and the screen a "computer" are splitting hairs I suppose. This site has a high ratio of Moorlocks to Eloi so we object when one of the latter tries out technical slang to fit in and gets it wrong - that's why we're trying to eat you alive over such a mistake.
If the reference is being missed I am using Eloi in terms of a person that is only useful
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That is incorrect. They could have loaded a new firmware image to the device via the USB interface.
I think people splitting hairs about the use of the term "brick" are missing the point.
If a device doesn't boot simply because the OS installed on it is hosed, then it is not bricked.
Software can't be installed on a brick. If it's possible to r
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Do what again, boot into DOS and... oh wait, it doesn't boot, unless I take the chip out and flash it "correctly" in an entirely different device. It looks like the iPhone "works" as it turns on and does stuff ("in recovery mode"), so it's not really bricked. It just doesn't make calls.
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Note to readers: When flashing BIOS firmware, pay careful attention to the *ENTIRE* revision string of your motherboard. An
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Of course, back in the late 90s, there were a few times when all that got screwed up was the MBR, which in modern parlance would be (for the average user) the equivalent of b
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(And yes, of course I'm kidding. But in all seriousness, I do still have a floppy drive in my tower.)
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Ah. I have an MSI board myself. After discovering I needed XP to flash it it became my first and last MSI board (your board might actually be flashable from DOS at least).
My Asus boards on the other hand will update from USB, floppy, dos, etc. Corrupted BIOS? Just stick an USB disk with a fresh bios in a port and it will load...
I buy other brands once in a while, but this far I've ended up disappointed, and more and more inclined to just buy Asus every time..
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That's a rather bad analogy, since if you screw up a BIOS update on a motherboard and
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For instance, some will check for presence of a floppy and burn that to bios.
Some motherboards have dual BIOS so you can switch over if one gets screwed up.
If you've installed a BIOS Savior (I did on one of my previous machines) then you can use it until you boot up, then reflash your other bios.
Some will check for a PCI graphics card and use that to
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Re:Confused (Score:5, Funny)
Correct. Welcome to the new age of blogger journalism where something is called bricked the moment even a single feature or other stops working.
My wireless keyboard is on the verge of being bricked, excuse me...
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"download" is the universal word for data transfer for the technologically inept.
We have words for these things people: install, copy, upload, send. Learn the lingo or get off the computer.
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http://www.willitblend.com/videos.aspx?type=unsafe&video=iphone [willitblend.com]
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What a stupid waste (Score:2)
I swear, sometimes I am ashamed of my country.
Difference between brick and blend ... (Score:2)
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Software can't unbrick (Score:5, Insightful)
Flashed with a messed up firmware, or a bad flash, sure, but not bricked.
If you have to use a boot wait feature to load a new firmware over a network, it isn't bricked either because it was able to access a network and run a tftp server.
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If you can recover a device to a full operational state without opening its case or attaching a jTag cable, it wasn't bricked.
Informing the Slashdot community on what "bricked" means is futile. Most Slashdot folks are wannabee computer experts who claim that they are god's gift to computer science and/or information technology.
I think you should just blindly agree with the statement that "iPhones are often bricked when pursuing your constitutional rights due to Job's stupidity and/or evilness" and move directly onto the viability of flying cars and the IP issues of the Crackberry.
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I said that if you didn't have to open the case, it wasn't bricked.
I didn't say that if you opened the case, it was bricked.
I would say that your problem is much more "bricked" than many of the recent articles on
They are right (Score:5, Insightful)
They shouldn't be held liable. You buy a product and modify it the manufacture can't, and shouldn't, be held responsible for the results.
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They shouldn't be held liable. You buy a product and modify it the manufacture can't, and shouldn't, be held responsible for the results.
No, Apple shouldn't be held liable, but they *should* be strongly condemned for locking it down in the first place and forcing people to resort to these measure so as to have true ownership of THEIR (not Steve's) hardware.
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Don't put Apple software on it if you don't want Apple software.
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What freaks me out is the attitude that first we go out and change undocumented things on the iPhone, and second we go for the Apple-supplied firmware update. Either choice sounds reasonable to me, but both at once is foolhardy.
Not so fast! (Score:2)
Of course the burden would fall upon the owner of the damaged phone to prove in court that Apple set out to render the hacked iPhones inoperative, but that's what discovery is all about.
Ultimately
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If, in fact, that's what Apple did. As many people have already pointed out, if the device has enough of a brainstem left to accept a flash over a USB cable, it isn't bricked.
Hey kid, lesson learned? Good! Now you can play. (Score:2)
BUT: Apple knew that a lot of people used a specific hack on the phone to "unlock" it. And while testing they found out that their upgrade would "brick" those phones.
They could have changed the upgrade so it wouldn't "brick" the unlocked phones, but they chose not to. Now they were even able to "unbrick" those phones.
To me this looks more li
Re:Hey kid, lesson learned? Good! Now you can play (Score:2)
To me this looks more like a plan. Apple wanted to communicate to their users: "Only use our products as we intended or we will simply break them." And now that the users got the message they play good cop and "unbrick" them for the users, so that the now "good" users will keep on purchasing Apple products, but will never try to use them in any way other than the intended one again.
Funny, it seems to me, that it's an example of Apple fixing phones that third-party unlocking (not unjailing, installation of other apps, but unlocking - modifying the firmware of the cellphone section of the iPhone) caused. The 1.1.2 firmware changed how the OS interacted with the radio - the 1.1.3 firmware made it so phones that worked on 1.1.1 but stopped working on 1.1.2, would now work in 1.1.3. In other words, they _fixed_ those phones, despite having no compelling reason to do that. Yet people
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well, since the bricked phones weren't modified skillfully by there owners, I guess they weren't hacked.
It doesn't unbrick all iPhones (Score:2, Informative)
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ABout brick (Score:5, Insightful)
Like 'Hacker'. You can't stop it, just sigh and go on, otherwise your just screaming into the wind.
mod parent up (Score:1)
I was aming for Insightful, but the new discussion system sure makes it easy to kinda 'miss'
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The brick it gracelessly (Score:5, Funny)
I bricked about this happening to "meme" [slashdot.org] a couple years ago, then bricked the solution, [slashdot.org] so I'd like to brick some words of encouragement to anyone who feels bricked by the loss: brick your vengeance. If you can't brick "brick," then nobody can.
Heretofore, "to brick" can brick anything. You can brick a beer; you can brick a pizza. You can brick a computer; and you can brick your girlfriend. You can brick your hat, except in Soviet Russia, where hat bricks you.
Go brick something, and then brick somebody about it in the hopes that they'll brick someone else. Brick the word, so the whole world will brick that they bricked "brick." Hopefully after that, maybe they will have bricked that some words are better off left unbricked.
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The common use definition has changed. You can be the biggest ass you want, but it still won't stop the common use of 'Brick' use in this context.
You want to get pendantic? it's not bricked at all.
a brick is:
a block of clay hardened by drying in the sun or burning in a kiln,
bricked is:
1. To construct, line, or pave with bricks.
2
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-Ted
Professionals don't misusing terms on purpose (Score:2)
Save yourself some frustration and realizer the term brick changed when it hit the mainstream market.
Like 'Hacker'. You can't stop it, just sigh and go on, otherwise your just screaming into the wind.
What you said is true when talking to the general public. But with how these "bricked" articles keep popping up, one can only assume that the slashdot editors are TRYING to piss off it's readers (perhaps to get more comments and indirectly more ad revenue.) When talking to other specialists about their specialty, you don't go around purposely misusing words. I'm looking at you slashdot, home of news for nerds, stuff that matters. Commander Taco and company might just have some atomic wedgies in their n
In other news.. (Score:1)
Hackers Did This Months Ago (Score:4, Informative)
This is the link to the Ars Technica story (Score:5, Informative)
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Trivia about this unbricking (Score:2)
I also hear through Chicago Sun Times writer Andy Ihnatko [cwob.com] that he's been able to unbrick a phone.
Responsible or not (Score:3, Interesting)
a small number of non-hacked phones which got bricked as well?
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morons or not (Score:2)
Or perhaps they just trust their customers not to be morons? After all, what would you call somebody who installs an update on a modified phone in defiance of a prominent warning IN ALL CAPS that the update will damage modified phones? And then complains about it when that happens?
Crap! (Score:3, Funny)
iPaq Recovery? (Score:2)
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No self control? (Score:2)
Why, because you have uncontrollable urges to modify anything you buy in ways not supported by the manufacturer?
Remind me not to be within a mile of you starting your car - or your blender.
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I dont think so.
There's a reason bundling like this is mostly illegal in the EU. There's no logical reason why we customers should accept this, or any reason other than kickbacks for Apple.
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First off, customers don't have to accept it.
Second, Apple arranged this partnership so they could get the concessions THEY needed from the phone company, namely for Visual Voicemail. So there's a good reason for a consumer to WANT to accept it -- added functionality. Now you can argue that visual voicemail was a pointless feature and just a cover for Apple being greedy and wanting a share of the profits. I'm just telling you there IS a reason.
Why are EU laws inherently bette
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But when I look at things dispassionately, per your inspiration, it becomes obvious to me that this was an insanely smart play on their part. Because of evil, emotional lock-in? No, because of risk management.
I manage risk for a living and it can be quantified as
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car analogies don't work for computers.
Oh and this isn't bundling. If you modify a sharp zaruas and it stops working completely youu don't go back to sharp to get it fixed. If you flashed your nokia to hack it to add features that wasn't there before Nokia won't support your phone anymore.
stop singling out apple when ever other company does the exact same friggin thing you friggin idiot.
Hydrogen (Score:2)
Nope. A ford works anywhere.
However, what if someone built a hydrogen car that got 100x the milage of gas cars, and partnered with the only chain of hydrogen stations there were. Would you still refuse to use it? Or instead would you support a better idea in cars?
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if you're using "bundling like this is mostly illegal in the EU" to mean "bundling like this is common practice in the vast majority of EU member countries", then I'd agree with you.
Re:Cue the bitching (Score:5, Insightful)
Since the iPod touch is an iPod, and not a PDA, and since those features were not there to begin with and everybody who bought one knew that if they bothered to to do any research first, isn't $20 a small price to pay to add those features if you want them? Are you forced to spend the $20? Did Apple claim those features were there to begin with and then charge people $20 to get them?
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What happens when you buy a computer with Windows XP and then Vista comes out and you want the computer to have that instead? You have to pay to upgrade it, that's what. Even if its the same hardware... costing the SAME price (or less).
Yes, it'd be very cool if manufacturers just doled out free software/feature updates for everyone in perpetuity... but that
Re:stop saying "BRICKED!!!" (Score:4, Insightful)
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
Seriously, nothing indicates that these users updated the firmware by any abnormal method. The phone would be bricked if there were no way to get into recovery mode or whatever lets you update the firmware.
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This wasn't some magical unforseen technology, like a flux capacitor that allowed users to go back in time and prevent themselves from unlocking the phones, it was some software to run on the device, which was apparently perfectly capable of installing and running whatever you gave it. It was obvious from the initial reports that the problem was not irreversible. So, again, "(at the time) irrevocably"?? In response to that Princess Bride quote?
If I had some old weird computer like an Amiga with the optio
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"irrevocable" is an absolute term, just like "bricked". By very definition, if something is eventually revoked, it wasn't irrevocable.
Please, go back to grade school. Do not pass go, do not collect 200 dollars.
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They aren't worthless idiots, they are what they are, and Apple treats them exactly how they should be treated.
Fleecing are what sheep are for.
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Apple's continued stance that they know what's best for their customers and that their products are 'perfect' as-is prevents what could be revolutionary products from ever reaching that potential.
Um, WTF are you talking about?
That they disavow any damage a firmware update will do to a modified piece of hardware? If that is the case, I would submit that 99.9% of companies are in the exact same class.
If you are talking about the fact that an SDK is not out yet, wait a month til it is.
If you are just turned off by Steve Jobs, that seems like a personal issue.
but so long as they keep the snotty outlook on the world at large, they're just another tech company. Apple, you need to stop acting like assholes, and stop treating your customers like every last one is a worthless idiot.
What are you *so* bitter about? I really don't understand this somewhat prevalent attitude that because they aren't supporting an unsupported
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They can innovate to extraordinary levels in many ways, but so long as they keep the snotty outlook on the world at large, they're just another tech company. Apple, you need to stop acting like assholes, and stop treating your customers like every last one is a worthless idiot.
Yeah! How dare they release a $20 upgrade to an MP3 player that turns it into a wifi-connected PDA! What jerks those guys are! The nerve of them! To show how big of jerks they are, they even went further and added those features to the new ones, for free! Someone should do something about this!
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And in America... (Score:2)
Re:Ugh. (Score:5, Insightful)
If you want a really nice product, particularly aesthetically nice, then Apple makes all kinds of shit you might like. But you have to give them MONEY for it.
That software was not advertised as included in the ipod touch. So you didn't get screwed. If you want this version of the software, pay 20$. Of course, a lot of people get it through a different avenue.
If you want a cheap PDA that has a lot of this functionality, you can get one pretty cheap. If $20 is a big deal for you.
Apple is going to always do this. They've found a niche that is profitable, has decent clientele, is fun to manage. I think Apple isn't going to change. They will charge you more for everything, but make good stuff.
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Microsoft makes a small amount on end user OS sales compared to OEM OS sales, MS Office sales, consulting, etc. And their interface can be infuriating.