Using an iPhone without the phone...

[jedimattk]

I recently inherited my grandma's first-gen iPhone, when she upgraded to the newer 3G. AT&T had disabled that phone's service, so it was no longer connected to their network, but it still had the SIM card in it and everything. When she gave it to me, it worked perfectly fine.

After a day or so, I decided to go into settings and clear the phone (reset all settings and erase all data.) After doing so, it rebooted and displayed a message stating, "No SIM Card installed! Insert a new SIM card with no PIN lock to activate iPhone."

It will not sync with iTunes either. Of course, I haven't taken the SIM out or anything; it's still there, but the phone just won't recognize it. I don't want cell service with this phone; I mostly want to use it as an iPod touch with a built-in camera and mic. Please tell me there's some workaround for this!

Thanks,
Matt

[juls1585]

make sure the phone is updated to firmware 3.1.2 and then go to blackra1n.com and download the program. it will jailbreak and hacktivate the phone so you can skip over the sim card situation from what i believe. others can confirm for sure

[psylichon]

Just take the SIM card out and replace the empty tray. It will show NO SIM as the carrier and you will of course get no phone service. But wifi and everything else will work fine. I think this is what you're looking for.

[jedimattk]

I took the SIM card out, but it's still stuck on the locked "No SIM" screen. Ditto for trying to jailbreak it - I ran blackra1n and it said it was done, but after the iPhone rebooted, it still gave me the hopeless error message.

Ideas?

[juls1585]

error 2001?

[jedimattk]

Come again?

[juls1585]

What was the error number

[jedimattk]

Blackra1n said it was done, it just didn't load after rebooting like it was meant to. I don't believe it gave me an error number, unless there's somewhere specific I'm supposed to look to find one.

[juls1585]

restart your phone?

[jedimattk]

Never mind, I made it work. I used iTunes to update it to the latest firmware, THEN used blackra1n. It consistently gives me a "No SIM Card" error when I turn it on, but otherwise it works perfectly.

[CassaFrass]

I've been browsing around a while to see if you can do that without a service plan but there seemed to be varying answers on whether or not you can use the iPhone at all without the phone aspect of it or people just not answering because they didn't understand why you would want to an iPhone as basically an iPod touch. (I'm going to Europe in 2 months and would get an iPod touch but I want the camera and I can get an old iPhone from friends for cheaper)

Basically, what I wanted to ask was if what you did enabled you to use WiFi, the iPod feature, and apps you just not make calls/text (obviously, since you have no service plan)?

[psylichon]

I'm a little confused. I still have my old V1 laying around with no sim card and it boots up fine (says no sim for carrier) with wifi and full functionality... just no phone service. Did things change with the 3G or 3GS? I suppose I could just pop the sim out of my 3GS, but I'm lazy.

[scrappygolden]

This is what I'm trying to find out as well and am afraid to sync my old iPhone to iTunes in case it screws up my new 3GS. Can we use the old iPhone as basically an iTouch?