My iPhone upgraded itself to ios 6.x and promptly lost the ability to charge or connect to iTunes. I have some battery power left and want to know if I can downgrade over the air and if so how.
thanks
dave
iPhone 3GS, iOS 6.1
Apple has never supported or offered any means to downgrade iOS.And iPhones don't upgrade themselves, it requires some user interaction whether updating over the air or via iTunes.
Did you try a simple reset, or if that doesn't work, a restore?
Yes, I've tried all the appropriate button pushing. One time it did start charging again and I assumed it had got over the problem but unfortunately it hadn't so I lost my chance then to go back to a previous version. So I put in a new battery which has some charge and it will fire up but still won't connect to iTunes or charge. Hence the question.
As for upgrade itself, well, it did! The upgrade had been sitting on my phone for a while because I didn't want it to upgrade. Then I turned it off for a flight home and when I turned it back on it started the upgrade and said I needed to be connected to iTunes. No option to get out of it. If it had done so before I boarded I would have been stuck as it had my boarding pass on it. As it was I had to borrow someone's phone to get in touch with the taxi that was picking me up.
And your comment "never...any means to donwgrade" then given that I can download the previous iOS and then select it from within iTunes to install the downgrade suggests to me that it is supported.
Dave
No, downgrading is not supported and Apple stop signing previous versions of iOS when new versions become available, so you are very likely to get error messages if you try and permanently brick your iPhone so that you have a useless iPod instead of a phone.
Since my iPhone currently has the behaviour of a brick, or rather, in less than 20% of battery life it will have, then I've not a lot to lose, have I? :-) In the mean time I'll muddle along with this Android phone.
Dave
I suspect one of a few possibilities:
I'm sorry, I thought I was clear on the timescales in my original message.
1) Phone upgraded itself to ios 6.x
2) Loses capability to charge or connect to iTunes (lots of people seem to have this problem when I look at other forums)
3) Did all the appropriate press and hold combinations - I've used Apple devices for several years and am quite familiar with them.
4) It charged once but again after being turned on again it went back to the ignore everything state.
5) Bought a new battery just to check it wasn't the old battery being drained so fast it couldn't cope.
6) Phone works but still doesn't charge or connect to iTunes.
7) That's where I am now - asking the question about whether it's possible to donwgrade without the use of iTunes. I have donwloaded ios 5.x and know that through iTunes I can get that to be restored but as I can't connect to iTunes...I ask the question...
Dave
What do you mean you can't connect to iTunes?
Final answer: No you can't dowgrade.
Zephyrgyn wrote:
I'm sorry, I thought I was clear on the timescales in my original message.
5) Bought a new battery just to check it wasn't the old battery being drained so fast it couldn't cope.
No where in your list of actions do you indicate that you attempted to correct the problem by restoring the phone.
Standard troubleshooting steps include:
Restart
Restore
Restore as new
You can do all the button pushing you want, but if you didn't restore the phone, you missed major steps.
Unfortunately, step 5 of your timeline forfeited your ability to get it serviced by Apple.
You can not downgrade, either with or without iTunes.
Quite right, I wasn't as explicit as I could have been.
Yes I did all the usual standard troubleshooting steps including all the types of resets.
"Can't connect to iTunes" - at no time since the upgrade to ios 6.x has iTunes recognised my iphone when I've plugged it into my laptop with a variety of (apple) connector cables. Only once did it start charging after the upgrade but then stopped again after I recycled the power.
Then you may want to try and find a reputable 3rd party repair shop and see if they can help you.
As I indicated, now that you've opened the phone, Apple won't touch it. If you've already restored it as a new device, that should have rectified any software problems. The only thing left is hardware (unless, of course, the phone was jailbroken or hacked, in which case all bets are off).
Thanks. Can't see why the hardware would fail because of a s/w upgrade but it seems to have happened to many people.
Sorry, software DO NOT cause hardware failure.
Zephyrgyn wrote:
Thanks. Can't see why the hardware would fail because of a s/w upgrade but it seems to have happened to many people.
Correlation does not prove causality.
ckuan: Don't be silly, of course software can stop hardware from working.
Meg: trite but perhaps you mean co-incidence not correlation.
Not working is NOT hardware failure, get your facts right.
How can I downgrade my 3GS to IOS 5.x without itunes?
