Just now the iPhone Dev-Team has released the unlock/jailbreak for the iPhone and iPod touch. At the time of this writing it doesn’t yet support unlocking the iPhone 3G and 3GS. The utility, PwnageTool, is currently available for Mac only. “QuickPwn for Mac OS X and Windows will follow sometime soon“. The required tools for Windows are available now from the Dev-Team Blog.

For the iPhone 3G unlock you’ll have to wait for UltraSn0w, which isn’t yet released – this should happen in the next few days. (This should give the iPhone 3GS upgraders that come from the 3G a way to sell their old phones on eBay.) It will be available via apt, so you can get it with cydia and icy on jailbroken iPhones. iPhone 2G users can create their custom jailbreak and unlock firmware now. iPod touch 1G can jailbreak, 2G users can only jailbreak an pre-3.0 version using Redsn0w.

Update 20.6. #1:
Currently I’m not able to get push notifications on the jailbroken iPhone 2G with OS 3.0. This already was the case during the betas. My app I used for testing runs without any problems on a regular iPod touch 2G, but it can’t register for notifications on the iPhone.

My current theory is that Apple’s servers, all notifications go through them, are declining unactivated devices. My iPhone 2G cannot be activated because I’m not running on an official carrier. (Actually, I am using it on T-Mobile Germany, but I’m not on the iPhone plan yet.)

If anyone is using a jailbroken iPhone that is not officially activated, let me know if push notifications are working for you or not!

Update 20.6. #2:
More people are finding out about the problem with push notifications.

Update 23.6.
Dev-Team today released Ultrasn0w that unlocks the iPhone 3G (not 3GS!). The instructions are pretty simple:

1. Ensure you have upgraded to iPhone OS 3.0
2. Jailbreak your iPhone 3G using redsn0w or PwnageTool (this will also install Cydia/Icy)
3. Run Cydia or Icy
4. Please add the repo repo666.ultrasn0w.com to Cydia or icy
5. Search for ‘ultrasn0w’ in cydia or icy and install ultrasn0w
6. Reboot your iPhone 3G
7. T-Mobile USA users should disable 3G before using ultrasn0w
8. Enjoy

PwnageTool screenshots after the break…
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I read and heard various opinions in the past few days since the “iPhone dev-team” released the updated tools for doing the things above. (Granted, unlocking the 3G iPhone isn’t yet possible.) Most of the people obviously think these things don’t matter anymore.

But they still do, maybe even more than before. It’s not about the new phone, but the old. Apple sold millions of these and they won’t go away soon. Especially the people exchanging their old for the new will want to sell their phones, for example on eBay. Are the buyers of these old phones going to use a new official plan by AT&T, T-Mobile, etc? They’ll probably want to stick to their current provider.

If they want to do this, there needs to be at least the activation and unlock, which now exists. Jailbreaking? Not so much. The App Store still has its problems, but once everything is working smoothly the jailbreak apps will only be a small niche market for apps that Apple doesn’t allow. But how long do you think Apple will keep the route of, for example, not allowing a video recording app? My guess is as good as yours, but with a growing user base the pressure for obvious applications like that will increase. The same goes for true navigation solutions like TomTom.

Unlocking will also stay important because of the growing number of business users who stay in various countries and have different SIM cards to avoid the crazy roaming charges. Or think about how many people you know who already have two phones. Why not use the 3G phone for surfing while you can save battery life on the old phone you use just for calls?

So, activation hacks and unlocks are here to stay. The phones will change owners who might want to change providers.

This post was written entirely on the phone using the WordPress app. It works but it’s not a great experience.

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