LTGT <>.com

Here’s a hot story:

The quest to unlock the iPhone from being inextricably tied to AT&T’s network has finally proved to be, um, extricable. (Is that even a word?) While the process is nontrivial, involving opening the iPhone and soldering and stuff, it’s doable in the right hands. You can browse the hardware hacking process starting with “What you need” on George Hotz’s blog (http://iphonejtag.blogspot.com).

The hard part, so it seems to me:

“The red line is covering the A17 trace. In order to trick the chip into thinking the flash is erased in the correct section, you will need to pull this high. Scrape away at the trace with something like a multimeter probe. Then solder a very thin wire to it. Be very careful. Only scrape away at that solder mask above that one trace. YOU DO NOT WANT TO BREAK THE TRACE. This is the hardest step in the whole process; the rest is cake. Also solder a wire to the 1.8v line. Connect to wire coming from the trace and the wire coming from the 1.8v to your unlock switch. Be careful, you only get one chance to do this right. Thanks again to Nick Chernyy for the picture.”

There’s also a fair amount of software-fooling-around-with. I won’t pretend to understand or explain it.

What it comes down to is that a fully unlocked phone should be able to be used on any GSM network. This is a bigger deal outside of the US. It’s not like you can use the iPhone on Verizon or Sprint, for example. Also, if you’re patient enough it’s very likely that you will be able to purchase an unlocked phone, or send yours to someone to do the dirty work, in the near future.

If you’re burning with desire for an unlocked iPhone, and your wallet is burning a hole in your pocket, you can bid for the second unlocked specimen on eBay.  Be forewarned - it’s already over $8k, with 6 more days to go!

Apple’s not gonna like this. Maybe they should hire George?