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Iphone 4s No Service Fix

I know alot of people are so angry about this problem and i am one of you but i managed to follow this issue inorder to find a solution and finally after alot of work, i managed to find the problems that cause it and found a solution for every case possible.

let me start with the problems that cause this issue.

CASE 1 (SIM Cards): Iphone 4s requires a specific sim card wiring technique different a little bit than before.

Solution 1: Simply contact your carrier and order the newest sim card available. ( 128K better than 64K ) and it case the new micro sim card did not work, order a regular sim card and cut it to the size of the micro sim.

CASE 2 (Carrier Network) : Iphone 4s has 2 antennas giving it the ability to connect to 2 signals at the same time causing the signal to shift from one hotspot to another without cutting the network. but to achieve that, the connection between the two spots must be perfectly synchronized and from the same type ( ex: 3g to 3g or edge to edge or gprs to gprs or 2g to 2g. any light mismatch will cause the phone to lose the signal and never be able to abtain it back ( No service will appear, and you are forced to restart your device or reset network setings ). and unforunately, we dont have the option in the iphone 4s to restrict our device to a specific network type unlike older devices. Im not sure that apple can fix this issue with an update, its the responsablity of the network companies to remove such errors from their infrastructures.

Solution 2: Order the 2g only sim card or a 3g only sim card, and it will work perfectly untill a better solution is found " but both solutions have advantages and disatvanteges. The 2g line will let you obtain a very good signal all over the country but you will not be able to connect to 3g network.

while the 3g line will let you obtain a good signal only in specific areas in the country but you will be able to use cellular data. or if you have a factory unlocked device, you can try to swith to a different carrier

Case 3 ( Iphone Software ): Sometimes, when you udate your device firmware or download any ios, there is a possibilty of an orror to occur without being noticed and that error will not also be noticed during the installation of the firmware, ending up on your device causing fialure.

Solution 3: 1- download latest itunes 10.5.1

2- download a fresh ios 5.0.1 ( from itunes not from iphone device )

3- Go to DFU mode, Open itunes and restore as new iphone (to avoid any remaining traces of previous corruption or error)

4- Go to Settings --> Phone --> Sim Pin and turn it OFF

5- Turn On airplane mode and wait 15 seconds

6- Turn OFF airplane mode

7- Go to Settings --> Carrier --> Automatic ( turn it off and select your network manually )

Case 4 (Iphone Hardware): some series of the 4s and specially the first serie delivered, had a problem in teir sim reader, and to help you more to identify this seire, simply go to Settings --> General --> About and check the model number if it starts with MD2 then you are not lucky and you phone may never work with your carrier

Solution 4: if you have a factory unlocked device, please consider changing the carrier and give it a try 90 % of the times it work, other than that, you must take your iphone back and order a replacement.

I will be happy to answer any question

< Edited By Host >

iPhone 4S, iOS 5.0.1, Factory unlocked brand new device

Posted on Nov 26, 2011 4:50 PM

115 replies

Dec 21, 2011 1:10 PM in response to Community User

you cant i thought u could, i verified this on google and found a website where u can do it yourself if im not mistaken. check it out!!!!!!!!!!!http://www.iclarified.com/entry/index.php?enid=657 well if i can change the imei and make my own i dont think the phone company that is locked to would be able to verify the IMEI correct lol ?and no its okay codeslayer. i appreciate all the help and time you have to offer and if i dnt get my phone fixed ima just go and buy another one since im so anxious to use my phone

Dec 21, 2011 7:57 PM in response to juanortiz

Juan, Apple iPhones are locked by verifying the IMEI number in Apple servers. Not the carrier servers.

Another thing is, the link you sent me refers to the iOS 4.1 or below.

So its totally understandable that you cannot change the IMEI number of your phone and trick Apple 🙂

Dec 28, 2011 4:42 AM in response to Community User

Thankyou.

I downloaded the tweaked version that Apple released later on and did a restore with that and its working fine now. No network problem yet. been around 2 hrs.

Hector96

Level 1

4 points

Dec 30, 2011 4:00 PM in response to Community User

Okay here is my story...

Purchased my phone on Nov 4th nothing but problems with coverage. AT&T support reset network,replace sim card and finally restore phone to receive "tweaked 5.0.1" update. Nothing worked keeps searching for signal.

Replaced phone worked fine for 24hrs then the dreaded searching for signal error came up again.

Replaced sim card still acting up!!!!

Okay dig deeper.....

I noticed that my sister asked me if I received a picture she had sent which I did not.

So she sent it to me again and low and behold I lose signal.

No really!!!!

Asked her to send it to my wife same thing she lost signal.

Okay the fix.

With iMessage turned off the iPhone could not process the picture and in the process I lost signal

Turned iMessage on....... Shazaam problem solved.

Hope it works

djcweb

Level 1

0 points

Jan 10, 2012 3:00 AM in response to Hector96

The firmware 5.1 beta3 released today fixed the problem.

New version of operator 11.1, new modem version 1.5.04 and the toogle to disable 3G is some new features.

Still 12 hours and carrier operating normal with no loss service.

VIVO SP 11 - Brazil.

Jul 6, 2015 2:58 AM in response to Community User

its been almost about 3 weeks since i updated to ios 5.0.1 ( 9A406 )

and that happened because i was really frustrated and angry about losing signal, no service, sim failure, no sim and lots of problems.

at the begining, everything was working perfectly, no errors and i was able to send / recieve messages make calls and never lost the network or missed a call.

but i noticed that whenever im in a low coverage area, my device showed the no service message and it took about 10 min to get the signal back.

but i found a way to force it to catch a signal much faster and that is by calling myself from the same number.

but 3 days ago, i waked u having the no sim error ! and for a second, it felt really bad, then the situation occured again after 6 hours, then i waked up in the last 2 days having the same problem and nothing fixed it other than restarting my device or reseting network settings. and the frequency of losing the signal increased dramaticly.

i think 5.0.1 ( 9A406 ) was a temporary fix and it was aimed to calm us or make us think that our problem is solved what gives apple extra time to find a solution ( although i think that they never will ).

Jan 24, 2012 5:56 PM in response to sandeepfromdoha

So far, this solution seems to have worked for me.

I did an over-the-air 5.0.1 update (direct to my iPhone 4S without connecting it to iTunes) last night. In the morning I was surprised to find an "Invalid SIM" message on my phone.

I have encountered the "No Service" and the futile "Searching..." problems this morning, which led me to this forum. I could not use my Cellular Data Network/3G, could not make calls nor texts. Multiple, frustrating phone reboots and DFU mode didn't solve it. Then I chanced upon this reply and it looks like my phone is back to normal again. I have yet to see if the problem will recur after a few hours.

I remember turning on the "Automatically Send" diagnostics report because I saw a lot of kernel panics in my phone last night. It has always been off and I didn't think turning it on would cause a problem but apparently, it's what made my phone go bonkers. If any of the complicated solutions didn't work for you, you can try this one instead. Hope this helps.

General > About > Diagnostics & Usage > Don't Send

sandeepfromdoha

Re: Iphone 4s No Service Fix

Nov 30, 2011 5:01 AM ( in response to vishal2901)

Guys. I found the reason for Sim failure. I was thinking that this error occurs at any time, there is no particular time or event that throw this particular error. I think the diagnostics report in the phone is the

Main reason of this failure. I tried taping of sim, different sims, restoring. But nothing has worked so far. So i switched off the diagnotics n usage setting to not send automatically. It has worked for me. Try this solution..

Jan 24, 2012 6:50 PM in response to gracedisgrace

UPDATE:

Looks like I spoke too soon. I don't think the solution above completely solved my problem. 😟

My iPhone 4S was working fine again, til I went to another area with (probably) poor network signal. I lost signal inside the elevator as I was going a couple of floors down. When I stepped out, I tried switching it to Airport Mode on, then off and the service successfully came back. When I went back up to where I initially was, my phone couldn't seem to locate the network, until it says No Service again. I had to turn my phone off then on again for the network to come back. I currently have three bars of network signal but I don't think I really do as I couldn't make calls, texts, nor use 3G. 😟

Jan 24, 2012 7:53 PM in response to gracedisgrace

Im on my third iphone 4s only thing has worked for me with my last phone its dont ipdtaed to ios 5.0.1 stay away and kept it on ios 5.0

Ben

Jan 25, 2012 3:47 PM in response to benjaminfromqueretaro

Looks like my 4S is finally fixed. I just did another upgrade as per this tutorial, which supposedly addresses the no service problem specifically: http://iphone-and-i.blogspot.com/2011/12/fixing-iphone-4s-signal-problem.html. The poster and I happen to have the same carrier and are from the same country. This is also the "official" solution that Apple has brought up, as you can see here http://support.apple.com/kb/TS4148.

It's been 15hours and my iPhone is working as it should be. The kernel panics are now gone as well (this is what gave me the brilliant idea of upgrading over-the-air to 5.0.1 in the first place) so it really looks like the 5.0.1 9A406 build worked. Keeping my fingers crossed that it doesn't go back to losing its network at random.

Jul 6, 2015 2:58 AM in response to Community User

hello eveybody. i have the iphone 4s since almost 3 months and since day 1 problems started, losing network, no service, sim failure and battery draining. and since day 1 i was trying to find a fix. after contacting may carrier they told me that it is a software-hardware incompatibilty between the 4s ios and the sim card and the network signal frequency of the carrier company. and i had to wait untill the new sim cards are produced. Meanwhile i was using another carrier company sim cards and my iphone worked much better. after that apple released ios 5.0.1 (9A406) so i returned back to my old carrier sim card and it worked good but some problems remained. 3 weaks ago my carrier company delivered the new sim cards although my phone was working fine. but for curiosity purpose, i tried to install ios 5.0.1 (9A405) again using the new delivered sim card, and no problems showed and i was able to call and text anytime. so i discovered that the no service and the no sim errors are generated due to sim-ios incompatibilty. but the battery draining and the latency in recovering the network after moving from a low coverage area to a good coverage area remained, and everytime i went into the elevator, underground, or any place with low coverage area, i lose the network and no service appeared "wich is normal" but if i go back to a high coverage area, the no service message remained for almost 10 minutes minimum "wich is completely not normal". more investigation about this problem and contacting apple bug reporting service and lots of trials, i discovered that this case is the main issue and it is behind the battery draining. Simply it was the diagnostic and usage reporting. whenever u enter a low coverage area, your phone loses network, causing an error generation, so your iphone tries to send this error message to apple server while you are without connection, it tries again and again and again without success, so the os shuts down the process of sending the error report and the network reception shuts down " you can simply monitor the procedure by installing the configuration utility from apple website " and monitor the configuration log where you can see the process happening untill shutting down the carrier reception retrievel function. so the solution and only solution was to turn off the diagnostic and usage sendind data automaticly. and after doing that, battery and no service error completely fixed.

SO TRUST ME THIS IS THE SOLUTION AND FOR BEST RESULTS

- ORDER LATEST SIM MODEL FROM UR CARRIER

- INSTALL IOS 5.0.1 (9A406)

- REMOVE SIM PIN

- TURN OFF DIAGNOSTIC AND USAGE AUTOMATIC SEND

- USE YOU PHONE UNTILL BATTERY DRAINS AND SHUT DOWN THEN RECHARGE TO 100% "to refresh it and calibrate it"

Wish u good luck and let me know your feedbacks.

Feb 18, 2012 9:59 PM in response to Community User

Okay I think I may have it. I have my factory unlocked 4S jailbroken and with SB Settings you can toggle off 3G. Whenever I do that it stays connected. If the 3G is on then I'll get service and at times it will go into a searching state and then no signal and then comes back on. But when 3G is off so far so good. Leave it to a jailbroken application to fix apples mistakes. Personally I'm waiting for someone to buy this because I'm sick of apple.

I spoke to soon it still does it but not as much. It mainly does it when I'm holding the phone and when I'm not I get a full signal. Not this all over again...

Feb 19, 2012 4:01 PM in response to Grandmstrbud

So I called Apple and guess what I get a brand used refurbished iPhone as a replacement. Mine is brand new and still has the plastic front and back on it but that doesn't matter they are sending me a refurbished one. Oh thank you very much apple I can't wait to get it and sell it and get a Galaxy Nexus. I've already done sold my iPad 2 64GB 3G for a Android tablet and can't wait to do the same with this wonderful iPhone.

BumpyDog

Level 1

0 points

Feb 26, 2012 12:31 AM in response to Community User

I reside in South Africa. We have 3 iPhone 4S's in our house. 2 X 32 Gig factory unlocked, 1 64 Gig factory unlocked. The 32 Gig iPhones were purchased in NYC, and the 64 Gig was purchased in London. The 32 Gig phones work perfect, but the 64 Gig from the UK is rubbish. Since I got this instrument early December last year all I have had is "No Service", "Searching", and "Invalid Sim", everyday, several times a day. I have tried everything mentioned in the forum, more than once. What I do know is that the promlem is not;

The Carrier

The Micro Sim Card, 64k or 128k

The Normal Sim cut to fit the Micro slot

The Battery

The New version IOs 5.0.1 (9A406)

The turning off of the Diagnostic and Usage Data

The MD2 serial number batch

The Pin activation

Airplane Mode

Resetting the Network

The 2G or 3G sim Cards

I have done all of the above several times, but alas, this phone remains to behave badly, and continues to give me the dreaded "No Service","Searching" and "Invalid Sim". I have no idea what it could be other than a hardware failure or software failure that has no qiuck fix. I suggest that you all try to have these sick phones replaced by Apple. I have read that a lot of these posts are from European countries. It could be something to look at. Perhaps one of the hardware suppliers to certain batches of phones has a problem.

taazztmc

Level 1

0 points

Mar 1, 2012 2:33 PM in response to Community User

i bought a new factory unlocked iphone 4s and faced a problem of failure in message sending and outgoing calls. the signals get droped after few minutes.. the outgoing calls get failed .. i cant send messages or make calls. sometimes it goes to as invalid sim card and some times it appears as no service. what the **** is going on . i spent that much money to face all this. help me out with this one please. what should i do..???

Iphone 4s No Service Fix