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Level 1

10 points

iphone 2.0 problems.

well, this is just lovely. i didn't save my text, so i get to retell the story. and i'm not going to shy away from some of my editorial either, since i think that good dialogue (not empty crabbing) is a valuable part of these forums.

i have a 1st gen iphone that i upgraded to 2.0 when it was released. i had little to no problems at first. sure, i had a couple of apps here and there that were unstable, but that was either the app's fault or manageable.

all of a sudden on thursday i started having problems with the device. every single non-apple app that i've bought crashes seconds after opening. i assert that it can't possible be the apps, since it's highly unlikely that all of my purchased apps are bad. other problems are that when i load music into the phone, it shows up in the iphone interface window in itunes (in the colored bar at bottom), but when i disconnect the phone... no media anywhere.

my solutions have been to all of the ones you could possibly read about: hard reset, restore, restore without backup... the big one was deleting mobile support files and preferences, uninstalling itunes, and restoring the phone from freshly downloaded firmware but only after a new install of itunes, permissions repair and a restart.

you would think that would start me with brand new completely clean slate. nope. same problems.

i'm convinced that the problem is that a restore isn't actually a true restore and that it only replaces certain files of the system, possibly leaving behind corruptions and other crap. i can't imagine why else wiping things new and doing complete restores with no backups and installing the apps fresh, would do this... i mean seriously.

i'm miffed at the amount of time i've wasted with the tragically long syncing that i've had to do repeatedly. i'm miffed about the hours troubleshooting. and i'm miffed that my phone hardware is completely fine and that this is absolutely a software issue. i think that's a valid point to consider as the backdrop for troubleshooting any of this, and pressing for more lasting solutions. why was it released under these conditions?

anyhow... that leaves me where i am. no apps work. no media is available, and "fresh" restores don't help. does anybody have alternative solutions that they can suggest? i'm open to anything. let's talk!

j

<Edited by Moderator>

20" Core 2 Duo, eMac 1.0, CoreDue Mini, Imac 17" Core 2 Due, MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.5.4), i have stupid tons of peripherals

Posted on Aug 2, 2008 12:11 PM

Best reply

Michaelworks

Level 3

695 points

Posted on Aug 2, 2008 12:29 PM

My first question is whether or not you performed the iTunes update on Thursday (it came out this week). Second, did you download the software to go to 2.0 using iTunes, or did you get the pre-release that was found on their servers (it turned out to be for the 3G and not 2G). So where am I going with this? I would find where iTunes stores the original download, delete it, and cause iTunes to think it needs to download the correct version, as if you hadn't previously updated. The store also allows you to "re-purchase" applications and download them again. This would allow you to delete all of them and start fresh. If my comments above don't cause any ah-ha's, it may be that an app update is corrupt and messing everything up. I am a firm believer that system maintenance be a regular part of ownership. I run Onyx on my Mac's and it seems to save me from all or many of the issues that other users have from Apple updates. I do the same for my Windoze systems using my tried and true utilities. I think the same needs to be done on the iPhone. If you have used the same system to jailbreak your wife's phone that you have issues with 2.0, you have no guarantee that the jailbreak software remnants aren't the culprit. I suggest that you sectionalize your troubles, testing each area and eliminating them one-by-one from the equation.

Michael

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356 replies

Ollerich

Level 1

0 points

Sep 12, 2008 6:36 AM in response to Alexander Newman

2.1 is out, so lets hope the best!

Striker

Level 1

16 points

Sep 12, 2008 8:11 AM in response to Ollerich

Hey everyone, as I said last night, my problem reappeared (and my music DISappeared) again last night under iTunes 8.0 (but OS 2.0.2). I am downloading the 2.1 update right now.... Has anybody seen this FIX their problem instantly yet?

Wish me (and us) luck....

Sep 12, 2008 8:19 AM in response to Striker

Same thing happened to me. I downgraded to 7.7 and things worked fine for a month. I was very gentle about installing new apps and upgrading existing ones. I even upgraded to 2.02 without a problem.

I upgraded to 8.0 this weeks and everything was working good.

I foolishly decided yesterday to download and install 6 or 8 new apps...

After the install I even used one of the new ones for a while and thought, "gee, maybe I should re-boot my phone or something".

This was a mistake. After the reboot the phone is borked, no 3rd party apps, no music. sigh

Let's see if just installing 2.1 fixes the problem. The update has been downloaded, but the upgrade is insisting on backing up my borked iPhone.

Striker

Level 1

16 points

Sep 12, 2008 9:00 AM in response to David Boroditsky

HEY EVERYONE-- IT SEEMS THAT (FOR NOW) IPHONE OS 2.1 DOES FIX THE PROBLEM!! The problem resurfaced for me the other day a day after I stupidly upgraded to iTunes 8.0. Then this morning I downloaded the new iPhone OS 2.1 upgrade and installed it. At first, it did NOT fix the problem. But then, on a whim, since we all know now that the problem is related to the digital rights management features, I downloaded an App from the AppStore on the iPhone (yes, from the iPhone itself--wasn't I brave?)... After I **input my account password** and installed the test App, I am HAPPY to report that it WORKED!!

I also noticed some improvements to iPhone 2.1: new "erase data after 10 unsuccessful password attempts" feature, more customization re: picking sounds on or off, a new "restriction" option to HIDE camera(!), and in iTunes itself, App storage size now shows up as "green bar". Cool, eh?

p+j Author

Level 1

10 points

Sep 12, 2008 2:52 PM in response to David Boroditsky

i'm going to give you a little reassurance here, david.

i wouldn't say "foolishly" you decided to download and install apps. that is the normal use of the phone, and having to tiptoe around that isn't a good solution. that's part of my insistence, and has been all along. so you weren't being foolish. if you did something that required you to be an on-egg-shells user, you didn't have a good foundation from the go, and it may well have happened anyways.

let us know how the 2.1/8 combo goes. i would love to put it on, for that one security feature alone.

p+j Author

Level 1

10 points

Sep 12, 2008 3:07 PM in response to macjeff

alright, you convinced me. i'm doing it. here goes nothing...

Sep 12, 2008 3:42 PM in response to p+j

I agree about the "foolishness" not being more than just using the product for what is intended to do.

After the 2.5 hour backup (not the normal backup, but another special, un-cancellable backup in a modal dialog box the update proceeded and completed. My music was there, but the apps still did not work.

I then instigated a sync and all is well.

I'm not sure I have to heart to stress test it yet, perhaps I'll leave that to others.

Sep 12, 2008 6:11 PM in response to David Boroditsky

David Boroditsky wrote:
I'm not sure I have to heart to stress test it yet, perhaps I'll leave that to others.

I just got back from a business trip and am performing the majorly inconvenient forced backup at the moment. My plan is to totally go gung ho with the stress testing this weekend. I either want to be convinced the problem is fixed (or the chance of catching the disease is extremely remote) or prove that it is still there. I'm not going to hold back. I do not have as many apps as a lot of you (about 60 or so) though.

-Karen

macjeff

Level 1

0 points

Sep 12, 2008 7:37 PM in response to kbell-tiger

Rather then do the backup to install 2.1 it is faster to do a restore and then reinstall the apps. I did a restore and reinstalled 100 apps in less then 1 hour!!!

Also the apps install faster and for some odd reason take up less space on the phone then they did before. Maybe it installed them twice last time since it took so long...LOL

Jeff

p+j Author

Level 1

10 points

Sep 13, 2008 7:03 AM in response to kbell-tiger

exactly my plan. did everything last night. wasn't so bad, although i wish they'd have thought to ask about the backup.

anyhow, things went fine, my phone seems to be behaving rather crisply, and we'll see. i'm certainly not going to shy from using it. i DL'd an app last night and it seemed to be okay. music still there, apps still open. i'm going to do a couple of syncs and music management today, so we'll see.i've got about 50 apps on the phone, and to the surprise of many, i actually use about half of them regularly.

Sep 13, 2008 6:56 PM in response to kbell-tiger

I've bitten the bullet, and two backups and an install later I appear to have a working 2.1/8.0 setup. All apps that I've tried (including the koi in their little pond) are working fine. I also purchased a "dollar" app, which installed very briskly and started up and ran fine, so the update passed that test too. I was really impressed with the app's install speed, especially since it was done over the wifi, at the other end of the house. Previously it was sluggish at best. The speedup was between 5 and 10 times, at a very rough estimate. But see also below.

I had replaced my internet router to an 8.11n spec (replacing an 8.11g) a couple of hours before I did the update, and the signal picked up by the "2.0.2" phone was initially nice and strong - and stable - even in the dead spots, and outside the house as well. I'm not so sure that the wifi hasn't gone backwards since the f/w update to 2.1, though, as the signal pickup seems to have gone back to being either a bit weaker or more intermittent than when I first got the new router installed. Given the speed of the app install, I would lean towards more intermittent, not weaker: until I have any other evidence to the contrary, that is.

So I will continue to monitor the wifi. The response when the phone is latched to the wifi is a lot snappier - a combination of the faster 8.11n and (possibly?) the f/w update.

Anyway, +caveat emptor+: I can only blame myself for jumping in early yet again ; ). But 2.1 isn't exactly early, and neither is iTunes 8.0. \[Speaking of the latter and OT, not too sure that I like the "Genius" reporting the contents of my library to Apple. Even though Apple claims that it's anonymous, I'm not sure a. that I believe them and b. that the RIAA, et alia, wouldn't try to force Apple to hand over the data at some point down the track. But that's a problem for the iTunes threads, and it's not as though "Genius" is enabled by default, either ; ).\]

The fact that iTunes 8 (apparently) hasn't hosed my phone yet is an enormous plus (even though it really should never have had to have been)!

iphone 2.0 problems.