The following hassle became apparent when I restored an iPhone 4 to a iOS 7 BETA version. You are supposed to file issues for everything, even something that annoys you as infrequently as this. This one has been annoying me for several years now.
So I finally logged it as rdar://14425938 and on Open Radar.
Unlocked iPhone should not require SIM Card to be activated
Summary
As a developer I have a ton of iOS devices around for testing purposes. To avoid hassles I bought most of them directly from Apple or paid a fee to have the SIM lock removed.
However when restoring an iPhone you still are required to put a SIM card into a phone or otherwise you get an “Activation Failed” message.
Steps to Reproduce
- Remove the SIM card from a sim-unlocked iPhone
- Restore iOS (e.g. any 7 seed)
- After choosing your country and WiFi, try to activate
Expected Results
- A SIM-unlocked iPhone should activate over WiFi without requiring a SIM card
Actual Results
- Activation Fails with an “Activation Failed” error message
- You have to start over after placing any SIM card into the phone to activate it
Regression
This problem existed since forever.
Notes
This is a big hassle and worry for me because I don’t have as many contracts as I have iPhones. Also for most testing purposes you don’t need any cellular data in iPhones, but just WiFi. Also some day I might have only Nano SIMs left if everybody is on an iPhone 5 and then I wouldn’t have any SIM card available to activate older iPhones.
If I buy a SIM-unlocked iPhone from Apple or pay to unlock any iPhone after contract I should never again be forced to put a SIM card into this phone.
