In trying to setup my new iPhone 14, and transfer data from my iPhone 12, the recommended process did not work. The new phone kept trying to install iOS 17.0.02 repeatedly (3 times at least) and at the end of each successful install, asked to download 17.0.2 again. Now neither the 12 nor the 14 are operable as a mobile phone until I find an Apple Store. Anyone else have this problem?
I just encountered this issue with my wife's new Iphone 14 pro we purchased today and needless to say it is quite annoying so I'm going to summarize the experience, problem and solution briefly (as I understand it) so that others may not have to be bothered by this as much as we are.
What happened: My wife said it was time to upgrade her phone so we went and bought an iphone 14 pro for her because I like mine. We buy the phone for full price and walk out with the new phone and her old phone because they only would give her 20 bucks for it. We assume we can set it up and transfer the data ourselves since Verizon wants to charge 30 bucks for that after we just dropped over 11 hundred on a new phone with no discount. The sales guy gives us a vague description of what to do and does not even turn the new phone on.
The problem: We take the new phone home and start a phone to phone transfer thinking we just saved 30 bucks because I knew how to do this from my phone (i got mine 6 months ago roughly). The phone gets to the point of updating ios and then just hangs on the install for 2 hours then I try again and it hangs again. Then again but there is no progress bar or anything to indicate its doing anything.... By holding down the power button on the 14 pro you can select start over so I tried it too many times before getting smart and accepting it wasn't going to work.
Finally I go into the new phone with my wifes apple ID (do not restore anything just go in with the apple id and password). Once I get into the phone I go in and realize the new phone is 1 ios update behind the old phone. I update the new phone to the same ios. I reset the phone (erase all data and settings but NOT THE ESIM!). This now loops me back into the new phone as if I had just brought it home but running the same IOS version as the old phone.
THE SOLUTION: NOW that I have both the old and new phone running the same IOS; phone to phone transfer works perfectly.
Why might this be happening. I think the most logical explanation is that verizon got the shipment of phones before a new IOS came out and Verizon does not want to train their people on how to get around this issue so they train 1 person in the store and charge for his time to update phones for apple. Maybe apple will have a rep at verizon soon I dont know. The sales guy vaguely mentioned I might have to update the phone before I can do a phone to phone transfer but he could not give me detailed instruction on how to get into the new phone without restoring anything and then how to wipe it without deleting the esim.
By the way, this is the very last question when you are resetting the phone at the bottom of settings/general). It does not confirm your choice so make sure you dont delete the esim as this might complicate thing further!
We bough the phone at 3pm and its now 11pm. My wife thinks her phone is defective and does not want to use it, and I'm secretly celebrating my win...
Its all bad BUT I HOPE THIS HELPS YOU ALL
Summery: If you buy a new phone you need to make sure its on the same version of IOS as the old one to do a phone to phone transfer. I believe an icloud restore gets around the issue but most people are doing phone to phone because they are out of space on their icloud. In any case, to update the new phone you have to go past all the restore stuff and just log in using the apple id and password. It might not even need to be the id of the person using the phone but I didn't try this. Then go into the setting of the new phone and update it to the version your old device is using. I see a ton of potential issues here with older devices not being able to go far enough and new devices being upgrade past the point your old device can go accidentally as apple give you the option to skip over updates but not go back...
Here we are. Once you have matched the IOS versions phone to phone transfer will work after you reset your new phone again (NOT THE ESIM) because this then loops you back into the new phone where phone to phone transfer gets prompted. THEN you can fully update and setup the new phone and leave the old one behind. It is also wise to turn off cellular on the old phone if your going to use it like a mini ipad or music player or something. The battery will last longer and the devise will work better with that turned off.
I just encountered this issue with my wife's new Iphone 14 pro we purchased today and needless to say it is quite annoying so I'm going to summarize the experience, problem and solution briefly (as I understand it) so that others may not have to be bothered by this as much as we are.
What happened: My wife said it was time to upgrade her phone so we went and bought an iphone 14 pro for her because I like mine. We buy the phone for full price and walk out with the new phone and her old phone because they only would give her 20 bucks for it. We assume we can set it up and transfer the data ourselves since Verizon wants to charge 30 bucks for that after we just dropped over 11 hundred on a new phone with no discount. The sales guy gives us a vague description of what to do and does not even turn the new phone on.
The problem: We take the new phone home and start a phone to phone transfer thinking we just saved 30 bucks because I knew how to do this from my phone (i got mine 6 months ago roughly). The phone gets to the point of updating ios and then just hangs on the install for 2 hours then I try again and it hangs again. Then again but there is no progress bar or anything to indicate its doing anything.... By holding down the power button on the 14 pro you can select start over so I tried it too many times before getting smart and accepting it wasn't going to work.
Finally I go into the new phone with my wifes apple ID (do not restore anything just go in with the apple id and password). Once I get into the phone I go in and realize the new phone is 1 ios update behind the old phone. I update the new phone to the same ios. I reset the phone (erase all data and settings but NOT THE ESIM!). This now loops me back into the new phone as if I had just brought it home but running the same IOS version as the old phone.
THE SOLUTION: NOW that I have both the old and new phone running the same IOS; phone to phone transfer works perfectly.
Why might this be happening. I think the most logical explanation is that verizon got the shipment of phones before a new IOS came out and Verizon does not want to train their people on how to get around this issue so they train 1 person in the store and charge for his time to update phones for apple. Maybe apple will have a rep at verizon soon I dont know. The sales guy vaguely mentioned I might have to update the phone before I can do a phone to phone transfer but he could not give me detailed instruction on how to get into the new phone without restoring anything and then how to wipe it without deleting the esim.
By the way, this is the very last question when you are resetting the phone at the bottom of settings/general). It does not confirm your choice so make sure you dont delete the esim as this might complicate thing further!
We bough the phone at 3pm and its now 11pm. My wife thinks her phone is defective and does not want to use it, and I'm secretly celebrating my win...
Its all bad BUT I HOPE THIS HELPS YOU ALL
Summery: If you buy a new phone you need to make sure its on the same version of IOS as the old one to do a phone to phone transfer. I believe an icloud restore gets around the issue but most people are doing phone to phone because they are out of space on their icloud. In any case, to update the new phone you have to go past all the restore stuff and just log in using the apple id and password. It might not even need to be the id of the person using the phone but I didn't try this. Then go into the setting of the new phone and update it to the version your old device is using. I see a ton of potential issues here with older devices not being able to go far enough and new devices being upgrade past the point your old device can go accidentally as apple give you the option to skip over updates but not go back...
Here we are. Once you have matched the IOS versions phone to phone transfer will work after you reset your new phone again (NOT THE ESIM) because this then loops you back into the new phone where phone to phone transfer gets prompted. THEN you can fully update and setup the new phone and leave the old one behind. It is also wise to turn off cellular on the old phone if your going to use it like a mini ipad or music player or something. The battery will last longer and the devise will work better with that turned off.
Do not do the phone to phone transfer, get to the update first and then do an iCloud backup restore instead and it should work. I just had this issue with a customer who just bought an iPhone 14 Pro Max and we went through a phone to phone 3 times before we tried an iCloud back up restore and the update went through okay this time. Hope this helps!!!
I hope I posted the correct link, if so it works.
New phone turn on, don’t transfer any data. Use your Apple ID. THEN update to 17.0.2
Next reset the new phone.
Then I was able to do a phone 2 phone transfer.
I did try and start an iCloud back up… but it was going to take an hour, so I changed tactics…
Have your iPhone 12 update to the newest version then manually set up the iPhone 14 skip the update page and continue once the iPhone 14 is set up go to General>Software Update> update it to the newest version once updated hit General>Transfer or Reset iPhone>Erase all Content and Data then start the setup process and it will transfer all your data
This worked for me. I did need to call Apple Support to be able to figure out the intricacies of deleting my Apple ID and password to be able to get into Settings and get the latest software update loaded into the iPhone 14. I’m glad you get warnings about how not to delete e-Sim. Once the software was updated everything transferred over like a charm in minutes. FYI, you can reuse the same Apple ID and password after you’ve got the new phone set up. This only took me seven hours to accomplish the setup. Why does Apple not sell phones with the latest software? I must have gotten one that had been sitting on the shelf for a while.
This is ridiculous, I never had such a bad experience with any Apple device before. I buy these overly expensive pieces of tech especially for the convenience of use Apple offers usually. But now I am sitting here for over 5 hours trying to set up my new 14 max pro with my old 13 mini (on 17.0.2) and nothing works. Every new attempt has new problems, for example now the blue pixel code wasn’t recognised which connects the new with the old phone, then after using the manual connection code the wlan password wasn’t transferred and had to be typed in manually (after finding it out). The attempts before that one stuck at the update to 17.0.2 on the new device, which just didn’t proceed, so I broke up after waiting almost an hour every time. I couldn’t install it from ICloud because the new device needed to be on 17.0.2 as the back up was to use it. I followed then the other hints here, installed the new phone and did the update to 17.0.2 and then a reset. Now there is finally a transfer running between these two, I am looking forward to the next problems till I can use my new phone… I just wanted to share this horrible experience and waste of time with you and point in the direction which so far seems to work for me.
Once the new phone is updated to the the same ios version as the old phone go into settings then general on the new phone. At the bottom of general you will see "Transfer or reset phone."
You will select that then choose "erase all content and settings." When you do this it will ask if you want to reset the esim and the answer is no. The esim contains the carrier data I believe so if you reset that then you have to go back to carrier and have them re-add the phone to your account I believe but I'm not entirely sure on that. In any case; you don't want to reset it because it might mean a trip back to the carriers store.
Once the reset is complete on the new phone after updating it to the same IOS as the old phone, the new phone should function like you just pulled it out of the box so you can do phone to phone transfer as normal.
This sounds like a good workaround. But it is completely unacceptable that I just walked out of an Apple store with a new phone and not one associate warned me I would have this problem. How can Apple knowingly let customers waste hours of time?
Can this be done without iCloud back up?
That is most helpful, and I have done just that except one thing. I don't follow what you mean by
reset your new phone again (NOT THE ESIM). Could you explain how to do that? I have both phones updated to IOS 17, but am not certain how to reset and not do whatever ESIM stands for.
Correct. My instructions are for Iphone 14 pro specifically, but I imagine it would apply to most/all apple mobile devices. Esim was a recent change to the iphone. I think it happened on iphone 13 or 14. Before this it was a standard sim you would physically swap if needed.
In any case, I hope it worked for you.
Glad to hear. I believe its more of an issue that Apple is updating IOS more (which is good) so if the stores have their inventory for a month or more, they will likely be out of date. But at the same time Verizon does not want to take responsibility for updating the phones they are selling to make it easy for the customer without charging a fee for it. I blame Verizon (and other carriers that charge to migrate your phone) over Apple. Apple could/should make this a non issue though by making the migration process a lot more robust. It would not be hard for them to add a check before the migration process that tells the person they need to update their device first rather then a never ending progress bar that never does anything and leaves you wondering what you should do next.
Me also!! I just purchased the 14 pro yesterday. I have been trying to get this phone transferred. It WILL NOT update to IOS 16.7.2. I’m so disgusted.
I’ve tried installing it every different ways but it won’t pass the software update portion. Wth man? I’ve waited to catch sales for the TWO phones I just purchased and I PAID IN FULL. I can’t use one of them. My daughter’s went over without a hitch.
I don’t want to go to an apple store. I’m away in THE COUNTRIEST town in this state. THERE IS NO APPLE STORE!!!! Heck the nearest grocery store is 20 minutes away and the BORDERING STATE. HELP!!! I want to use my I feel like a disappointed child.
Have you found the miracle cure? I am on my 6th attempt myself…
Cannot Set Up New iPhone 14 - iOS 17.0.2 in a loop
