With the new iPhone 3.0 firmware upgrade, there seem to be a ton of complaints about iPhone 2G, 3G, and 3G S having issues with the wifi working on the phone. It seems that the iPhones ability to maintain signal strength has been hindered in some form from the new update. Apple has said that the way the wifi is set-up on the 3.0 Firmware has been altered in order to increase battery life when wifi is in use on the iPhone (6 hours iPhone 3G, 9 hours iPhone 3G S).

Judging from the huge amount of complaints on the Apple discussion board, they have missed the mark. I upgraded one of my 1Gen iPhones and my wifi stopped working all together. It seems to be a random problem from iPhone to iPhone, but the fact that it is occurring on all 3 generations of iPhones seems to indicate that it is definitely a software issue. This may explain the quick release of 3.1 Firmware soon to be available.

Currently Apple has released the iPhone SDK 3.1 beta 2 to developers, which is usually a good indicator that a public release of the official firmware is right around the corner. I’m sure they will also attempt to patch up more of the security holes that were exploited on the 3.0 firmware as well as fixing the wifi problems. Lets hope that this firmware update will be the solution and allow us to have fully functioning iPhones again…

Now that the new iPhone Firmware 3.0 has been released, you can now send MMS (picture messages) on your iPhone like the rest of the world who owns cell phones. What took Apple so long, who knows. Also AT&T seem reluctant to offer MMS on the iPhone just yet. They are suppose to be offer the service close to the end of the summer. For the 1st Gen. iPhone (2G) users, sorry but this feature was left out for some reason are the other. There are ways around this, but that’s for another post. Please take a healthy dose of “At-Your-Risk” before proceeding.

There are a couple of things you will need to do before you get started with the process:

-Modified version of the AT&T_US.ipcc

-iPhone 3G on OS 3.0

-iTunes 8.2

-Another AT&T phone other than an iPhone

Now that you have all the key components, we need to set up iTunes
to start IPCC Updates. I have listed the methods for doing this on MAC OS X and Windows 32 & 64Bit operating systems.

Set-up IPCC Updates for iTunes 8.2

Mac OS X

1. Close iTunes

2. Open Terminal (Applications -> Utilities -> Terminal)

3. Run the command: defaults write com.apple.iTunes carrier-testing -bool TRUE

Windows 32 Bit

1. Close iTunes

2. Go to Start then Run and type CMD

3. Run this command: “C:\Program Files\iTunes\iTunes.exe” /setPreflnt carrier-testing 1

Windows 64 Bit

1. Close iTunes

2. Go to Start then Run and type CMD

3. Run this command: “C:\Program Files (x86)\iTunes\iTunes.exe” /setPreflnt carrier-testing 1

Copying the IPCC to your iPhone

1. Open iTunes & plug in your phone

2. Click on your phone in iTunes(under device settings)

3. Windows Users: hold shift and click “Check for updates”.  MAC OS X: hold alt and click “Check for updates”

4. Select the IPCC you downloaded earlier.

*AT&T family plan user can skip 7-11

1. Remove the sim cards from both the iPhone and your other phone
2. Place the iPhone SIM card into the other phone
3. Turn on the new phone
4. Make a phone call or two (your voicemail works)
5. Log in to your myWireless account at wireless.att.com
6. It should now show the phone you put the  SIM into. If not, repeat step 4 a few times (Citical Step)
7. Go to the “Features”
8. Select a “Messaging Plan”, (non-iPhone)
9. Click next and go through all the legal blah-blah-blah
10. Now MMS  should be activated on your account
11. Switch your SIM back to the iPhone from the non-iPhone
12. Restart you iPhone

Let us now how it works out for you by leaving a comment.