Possible to turn off ONLY cell radio?

Question

Level 1

9 points

Possible to turn off ONLY cell radio?

I work for a hospital and with the iPhone gaining popularity, we're starting to see them in the hands of doctors and other employees. Being a hospital, we require cellular phones to be turned off while in the building, but we also have a hospital-wide 802.11 wireless network that's been cleared as safe by our Biomedical Engineering department.

I know that airplane mode shuts off ALL radios in the iPhone, but is there a way to turn off ONLY the cellular radio and leave the wifi radio on so that people can continue to use the wireless network?

Mac Mini, MacBook, Mac OS X (10.5.2)

Posted on Mar 10, 2008 4:58 AM

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Answer 1

Mar 10, 2008 5:08 AM in response to k8ysv

if you make a pin number on the simcard when the iphone turns on it will say sim locked press ok and this will turn of the cell radio when you want to unlock try to make a call it then ask you again to unlock the sim protection press unlock type the pin number in and its back on

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Answer 2

k8ysv Author

Level 1

9 points

Mar 10, 2008 9:27 AM in response to oliverButlin

Sorry, not sure what you mean by "make a PIN number on the simcard". The idea would be to have a way for the individual users to do this simply.

I'm guessing this isn't currently an option but thought that perhaps I was missing something. I'm hoping that if you can't currently do this, that the capability is included in a future software update. This would be a HUGE deal to those in the healthcare industry.

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Answer 3

ChrisJ4203

Level 10

236,309 points

Mar 10, 2008 9:30 AM in response to k8ysv

Cellular phones allow for the addition of a PIN for the SIM as a security feature. When you turn the phone on, you must enter the PIN to enable the cellular phone to make phone calls. I'm not sure, however if it disables the radio portion of the cell phone because even without the PIN, you would still be able to make an emergency call. That would mean the phone would have to transmit/receive. I really cannot answer if that would meet the requirements of the hospital.
Hope this helps you.

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Answer 4

Mar 10, 2008 1:40 PM in response to ChrisJ4203

If the purpose is to have no rings. Just put in silent ring mode. Otherwise, I beleive you would have to shut it off totally or use airplace mode to turn off the cell portion of the phone. Bluetooth and WiFi both have a switch that allows you to turn them off as desireded, but the cell portion does not.

Message was edited by: CorwinRathe

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Answer 5

MobileDev

Level 3

565 points

Mar 10, 2008 2:40 PM in response to k8ysv

One would think that, since Windows Mobile phones have a control page dedicated just for turning on/off each radio, Apple would've done the same thing.

If you remove the SIM, supposedly (haven't tested it) the GSM functionality should be disabled. Not sure about this, since I don't know if the emergency call mode is still available. (Gave my phone to my son; have only a Touch now.)

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Answer 6

ginguar

Level 1

15 points

Mar 10, 2008 5:31 AM in response to k8ysv

If you had airplane mode on would that do it or does that also turn off wifi?

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Answer 7

Mar 10, 2008 5:34 AM in response to ginguar

Airplane mode turns off all radios - cell, wi-fi, and bluetooth.

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