vB Easy Archive - On Pwnage, iPlus, Ziphone and iNdependence

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On Pwnage, iPlus, Ziphone and iNdependence
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Posted by: Lestat_d

Based on how the different jb/unlock tools out there do the voodoo they do -- I would like to offer some advice at this point, after trying all of them and doing research.

Pwnage is the first tool of choice; with iPlus/iLiberty second, Ziphone third and Independence lastly.

The way Pwnage uses a pre-jb/activated custom firmware and you use iTunes to do the restore of it through 'normal' means; this is *the* safest and most reliable way to jailbreak/unlock your iPhone.

The way Ziphone does it is a bit more risky, and like iNdependence has a long list of issues folks have with it. iPlus uses a safer way of flashing than both of these -- but still not quite as good as Pwnage.

So please, use Pwnage (or iPlus going forward) -- and as always, set your phone up as a 'new' phone with each restore -- instead of reloading backed up settings when prompted. This is what causes problems most with no sound, wifi, youtube et all issues.

Posted by: j4y_7

Just an FYI, iLiberty & iPlus have been replaced by iLiberty+

Posted by: raulbe

Solid advice that. Just found out the technical differences between iPlus/iLiberty and Ziphone yesterday from a post by bootneuter/pwnage creator musclenerd.

Because of the way the ramdisk is set up during the unlock process it appears iLiberty/iPlus is significantly more safer than Ziphone to unlock, activate and jailbreak.

Of course pwange with all the modifications happening on your PC and then simply transferred to the phone by iTunes is by far the simplest and most risk free way to unlock. As elegant a solution as they come. Kudos to the dev-team for this.

Posted by: jlim

Quote:

Originally Posted by raulbe

Because of the way the ramdisk is set up during the unlock process it appears iLiberty/iPlus is significantly more safer than Ziphone to unlock, activate and jailbreak.

But at the same time you still have people on both camps having issues. dev team folks will always claim any and all *broken* iPhones in one shape or another is due to ziphone (wifi not working, dropped wifi, random reboot, corrupted BL, denial of warranty coz' of BL downgrade). At the same time, the author of ziphone doesn't really say much about them.

Just frequent the hackint0sh forum and you'll see countless folks having problems with iLiberty+ as well.

I chalked it to user error. If ziphone is indeed as bad as they put it, they would be more instances of broken iPhone from using ziphone on a consistent basis.

Having said that, and if I hadn't use ziphone myself, I would have used another tool instead and would also warn people not to use ziphone coz' if I read it on the internet, it must be true then.

Posted by: raulbe

Jlim: I would take the word of the dev-team who are bringing you the unlocks than random people on the net. There is enough information online for people to make an informed decision. However its your phone and you are free to whatever you please.

Posted by: raulbe

I think some information needs to be put in context. This is a forum for honest discussion and helping other users.

Ziphone was the first unlock solution for firmware 113. Lot's of people used it and it worked simply and successfully. However Ziphone for firmware 114 involved downgrading your bootloader irreversibly from 4.6 to 3.9. Lots of users were not comfortable with this and many newbies weren't aware of it only to discover the issue later.

That's why when iPlus was released it was the recommended solution because while it downgraded your bootloader unlike Ziphone the process was reversible by software. That's why lots of people recommend iPlus not because they don't like Ziphone for some reason. If you are downgrading bootloader permanently you should know, right?

There is also the politics of it, Ziphone was made by an individual who lifted code from the group that works together on the iPhone unlocks, without their permission. From the end users perspective this may hardly matter, after all if it unlocks your phone that's what matters, right? Wrong, no single person can do this alone, it requires a group to work together, so maybe for a version or 2 someone who has lifted code can give you a short term solution but then what? Especially since this individual is on record to admit he can't code.

The dev-team - this is the group that is working on the iPhone unlocking and from whom the author of Ziphone has taken code without permission - support iPlus and iLiberty/iLiberty+ which both unlock firmware 114 in a reversible manner. Since there is NO POINT CLOSING DOORS and irreversibly downgrading your bootloader naturally this was the recommended way to unlock 114 untill Pwnage came along.

Now the dev team have released what is called Pwnage. This is much safer than Ziphone or iPlus/iLiberty because the unlocking happens on your computer and not on the phone. The Apple firmware file is itself modified on your PC and then uploaded to your phone via iTunes. So no more of the processing happens on your phone via a ram disk. They also have a new tool called bootneuter which allows you tremendous flexibility in terms of bootloader upgrades/downgrades and unlocking that was previously not available.

One of the authors of this program is musclenerd. He recently explained why Ziphone is more dangerous than iPlus/iLiberty because of the way it sets up the ramdisk on the phone. Now I am not an iPhone coder and do not understand the intricacies but he obviously has more credibility when explaining this than some random person and I personally have no reason to doubt what he is saying. Other readers can make up their own minds, the information is there.

The bottom line is not all newbies are going to have all the information and perspective that people who have been doing this for some time have. I would strongly advice they spend the time to understand the issues. Before I would always recommend iPlus/iLiberty+ for unlocking firmware 114 and now Pwnage because its a simpler and much more elegant solution to unlocking your iPhone. Its a step up and vastly superior to what we had before.

Now that information is available which I have written in good faith, the community and all you guys are more important to me than being a fanboy or promoting something, my only interest is sharing what I know. The rest is up to you.

Posted by: jlim

raulbe - that's a good post. I do agree zibri should have put it in bold somewhere that your phone came with 4.6 BL OTB, then it gets downgraded if you select DO IT ALL.

I'm not quite convinced with the 2 pass approach (with regards to RAMDISK) vs the 1 shot approach ziphone is taking though. Technically, I can understand why it could be safer, but if everything goes well, then there's no advantage. The question becomes when something goes wrong, what was the cause?

Now, are you convinced also that ALL or 99% of the wifi problems are caused by ziphone? I'm not, coz' it worked for me w/o any hitch and I'm sure countless of folks did not have a problem either. So, those who had a problem w/ ziphone and subsequently used iLiberty+ and the likes claim it fixed their phone. So they chalked it up to ziphone and people who merely read postings on the forums then re-inforced this notion that ziphone is bad.

But I've also read postings where people having wifi using iLiberty+ and the likes as well and they in turn use ziphone to fix their problem.

Bottom line, I still think it is user error or quirks in the unlocking/jailbreak process. Chances are if the same user use the same method again, doing it carefully, going through the restore mode properly and resetting everything, it'll work.

Having said all that, when 1.2 comes out, I'll be waiting for at least a month after that to see how everything played out rather than jumping in right upon buying an iPhone and using ziphone.

I could care less if no one else uses ziphone, but regardless of whether he lifted/collaborated on the original code, zibri still released the first one step easy to use unlocking solution and I as well as others successfully unlocked our phones w/o any issues.

I'm sicked of reading all the stickies on Hackint0sh warning users that ziphone can break their wifi and every post claiming all wifi problems are due to ziphone.

Posted by: raulbe

I can understand your reaction now. You are probably as sick of the dev-team fanboys as I am of the Ziphone fanboys. Fanboys only cloud issues and that does not help anyone here.

Posted by: jlim

Fanboys are never great for discussions and only serve to annoy, waste bandwidth and clutter the forums.

I wish there could be one concise and authoritative forum where check and balances are in place.

Posted by: cohen11

i unlocked mine with zIphone and i checked my bootloader and it's a 3.9.. if i resotre it with itunes to 1.1.4 will it go back to 4.6? and i also want to knwo my phone is week 39 so im guessing i bought it BL 3.9 but when i upgraded to 1.1.2 and 1.1.3 and now 1.1.4 did it go to 4.6 or stay at 3.9?

Posted by: JEsTer10

no itunes doesnt mess with the bootloader. at the date you bought yours it is 3.9bl stock. it stays this way no matter what you do with itunes. the only way to change it, though you have no reason to, is with pwnage. (or hardware methods of course, yuck)

Posted by: mariomartinez

Hi
I am a 1.14 AT&T customer and used liberty+ last week, will I obtain any benefit by using pwnage now? if so do I have to restore my phone or just install pwnage?
Thank you
Mario

Posted by: Lestat_d

Current expectation is 2.0 firmware will require pwnage

Posted by: hart1583

How do I check what BL I have on my phone? I just jailbroke mine via Zi, didnt activate or unlock. Did it still downgrade mine?

Posted by: toomer

Quote:

Originally Posted by raulbe

Now the dev team have released what is called Pwnage. This is much safer than Ziphone or iPlus/iLiberty because the unlocking happens on your computer and not on the phone. The Apple firmware file is itself modified on your PC and then uploaded to your phone via iTunes.

Great info there -- I was wondering why Pwnage was considered so revolutionary ... but now that totally makes sense!

Thanks!

Posted by: jlim

To check the BL version, download a tool call BBInfo via the Installer.