Dear nerds.

[tyggerjai]

I have an iPhone. I think 2g, 16g. It has the latest firmware, but no sim card (Don't ask. This is China, alright?). So I can't apparently use it for anything - even with an unsupported sim card it doesn't seem to ... do anything.

Now. I don't, actually, want to make phone calls with it. I want mostly to use it as a handy portable wifi device. Does anyone know if that's possible, with an unsupported sim? And, y'know, how to do it? The interwebs tends to assume that you have a supported sim and can work from there, it seems.

Comments

[drwally.livejournal.com]

I can only speak from my experience with the touch - the setup may be quite different. But it should be able to access any unsecured wifi easily, and allow you to enter a usr/pswd on any secured. Once it's in there, it will jump wireless points ad nauseam. There may be a setting on the iphone to tell it to 'prefer' wireless over 3G when available. Easiest way to check for wireless is to use maps or youtube apps, I guess it will try to look for them.

However yeah - there may be some proprietary unlocking required, a bonding with a phone service provider before any of that is even enabled.

Maybe jailbreaking is the way to go...

[drwally.livejournal.com]

I was interested in your question and I found that yeah, you would need to jailbreak it as it requires SIM activation. You might be able to jig it with an inactive SIM or the like.

http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=321344

The final post is the one.

[tyggerjai.livejournal.com]

Wait. The iPod touch does wifi?

[neefsck.livejournal.com]

Yes.
Quite well too.

[drwally.livejournal.com]

Yeah it's great it's like everything the phone has minus the phone plus 32 gb.

[tyggerjai.livejournal.com]

Ah. But it doesn't send Cyrillic SMS....

[damned-colonial.livejournal.com]

Neither will any phone without a SIM card.

[tyggerjai.livejournal.com]

Very true!