@fsusmithc2: too bad :)

iAirmanshirk

That's pretty awesome.

videoCWK

vietnamese and electronics go together like peanut butter and jelly

vitrium

Wow, that's some serious soldering skill. Couldn't imagine attempting this.

newgalactic

@xaflatoonx: Only update to software 2.2 modifies the baseband chip firmware. Maybe the further updates won't. Read the full article, it's actually quite interesting.

pettiblay

I remember last summer when i was in Nam me and my uncle went to get a cell phone and the store was this crazy little chop shop. I dont think they know what a locked phone is over there.

snakepliskin

i am assuming upgrading will lock it up again since its still a software unlock at the end of the day....

ass kickin skill though!

xaflatoonx

For some reason this makes me think of Tom Cruise's eye-replacement surgery in Minority Report.

RacecarBoobTat

I would imagine that not only is the chip strongly glued to the board but it is likely surface mounted and those contact points are tiny as hell. I'm not that bad with a soldering iron but I don't think I could de- and re-solder the chip without frying something.

But then again, I have no interest in the iPhone. ;)

fsusmithc2

LOL just buy one from the guy who has a phone already done. It's like buying a trimmed Nikon 10.5mm Fisheye that's trimmed.

HJTravels

any code added to get copy/paste?

veedubu

i see at least 8 ESD opportunities near the terry-cloth work surface... want to count them?

quasimotto

Jesus, and to think I was just getting annoyed at just trying to solder wires...

thebigcheese

The work isn't that difficult. You have to shield components from heat then use a heat gun to heat the chip. The heat will soften the adhesive and melt the solder (The chip can take the heat if you don't over do it). Then it's just a matter of carefully removing the surface mounted chip.

A soldering iron isn't needed or used. The best and safest way to reinstall the chip is to clean up the board, then use resistive tweezers to solder one lead at a time. Working under a microscope, this isn't difficult, just tedious.

About 30 minutes for the whole job if done right.

I worked as a technician in a factory environment testing and repairing circuit boards built similarly. We usually turned this kind of job over to a rework tech that does nothing else all day.

I've done much more difficult jobs than this.

framitz

@framitz: you win.

flunkycarter

@lostarchitect:

I've never had any interest in hunting bear, but I do have over 35 years experience as an electronics technician and have a NASA high reliability soldering certificate.

framitz

Is that a SIM extractor I see over in the top right hand corner? I remember all the hype when the iPhone 3G came out and the box included one of those, what a thrill.

Wess

@framitz: and THEN you shot a bear!

lostarchitect

@iAirmanshirk: Would you try it on your iphone? That doesn't look to user friendly...

Jrsy is the dude, playing the dude disguised as another dude

@RacecarBoobTat: Watch out for the sour milk and rotten sammich.

Jrsy is the dude, playing the dude disguised as another dude

Obviously these Vietnamese haven't heard of mortgage bailouts, welfare & "social" change.

heroineworshipper

Not a difficult procedure. Anyone experienced with surface-mount components will tell you the same (and it looks like a few already did).

hooked-on-tronics

@framitz: You should have taken care of the LHC solders then. No reliability in those...

Sottren

ok, so this kind of Unlock is forever, as in it stands over the updates?

logicaly the answer is yes...

shpe11

as a Vietnamese person, I have witnessed the ginormous community devoted to these practices, locally in the US and abroad. Most Asian community supermarkets have a cell phone shop inside and very often sell unlocked phones side by side traditional carrier locked phones. In fact many currently sell 3G iPhones using the TurboSIM unlock method, not the best method of course, but a stopgap until software unlocks have been ironed out.

And yes, it's a shady grey area with a lot of this business, but business is business.

AdamHoang

@fsusmithc2: Like many things, using the right tools is important. In this case, a small heat gun and solder paste. Even a clumsy git like me can successfully solder most BGA and leadless packages that way. The key to the magic is the surface tension of the liquid solder.

rocketgeek

I'm a year into a 1st Gen iPhone contract and 6 months in a 3G iPhone contract. From what I recall, aren't the phone carriers required by law to unlock the phone after the end of the contract? I wonder what method AT&T will use. (Just future speculation).

SwapMeet

@quasimotto: Sissy boy! ESD is a myth, used on pansies to explain away DOA products...

bpapa9013

Just buy the black Turbo SIM to unlock your iPhone 3G. I got mine on eBay for around $25.00 including S&H. Recommend staying away from the cheap brown knockoff version as this one tends to catch on the SIM pins (3 of them) in the iPhone. The Turbo SIM unlocks other models, not just the iPhone.

imagine-engine

a job like that in USA will cost at least 10 times more. that's why companies are outsourcing jobs

SmallShark

@framitz:

famitz. It may be easy to do this, but do you have any idea how hard it was to figure all this shit out?!
First the 5.8BL dump, then the loss of 2 iphones, worth 2800, plus other overhead costs for all those workers, and THEN hoping no one would steal that shit.

Most people overlook the fact that it is truly hard and insane to get to that point.

N41

Number_41

At my work people do this kind of thing all the time. The only thing I don't get is why do they actually need to dismount the chip? Usually you can get a programmer to go over it and sit on the right leads really pretty like. Then you just power the chip and reprogram it!

I just can't wait for people to start using things like FPGAs in consumer electronic devices. That could really make life difficult to crack the stupid thing.

strobedream

And the only way to do this is to have schematics and code for the chipset, something only apple should have. If we all had our hands on those manuals/code, this could be performed by my 11 year old cousin. How did they get this, I would like to know

jncarlos

ASians are haXX0rs! (w3 r4wk!)

derekyap

Hardware hacking is extremely popular in Vietnam.
I got my blackberry pearl hardware unlocked there last year for 200,000 VND (about $13 USD)
There is not a phone that they could not unlock.

Somadis

I bet that guy could unlock anything with those nails...sheesh!

cossist

@rocketgeek: Liquid Solder: not just the key, or the magic. It's the key to the magic.

iatw

And people think jailbreaking voids the warrenty

gamecrazychris

@heroineworshipper: WTF does that have to do with anything?

dangster

Can they jailbreak my 2nd Gen Touch too pls?

outeast

@framitz: So a Vietnamese electronics pirate performed a hardware modification that is difficult to everyone except for NASA engineers? I'm still impressed...

booo