bladox.com

freefall · Joined: 18 Dec 2007 Posts: 16

I'm hunting down this problem for quite a while already. I'm a German T-Mobile customer and have had exactly the same problem, like many other German T-Mobile customers as well.

See this thread...

I know pretty well what is going on, but still, I've got no real safe way to fix the problem.

First, this is what happens: The TSIM works fine and does its job - faking the phone into believing that the propper SIM card is inserted - perfectly well. But after a while, there's a SMS-PP download command received from the network. This command tries to transfer data (I guess it is EDGE configuration data, but I'm still not absolutely sure about this) from the network to the SIM card. The transfer seems to work well, but the last response expected by the SIM card is missing. This makes the phone restart the SIM card since it doesn't behave as it is specified. This cycle is repeated four times. After that, the iPhone rejects the SIM card for not being spec conform.

The solution which helped most often is to do a complete downgrade / jailbreak / activation / upgrade cycle again, but with your own SIM / TSIM combo in the iPhone. Unfortunately, this kills all data on the iPhone.

I am pretty sure about the EDGE configuration hypothesis. So turning off EDGE may help. Also, it is possible, that the com.apple.carrier.plist and com.apple.operator.plist links in /var/root/Library/Preferences are pointing to the wrong provider. Removing these links and relinking to /System/Library/Frameworks/CoreTelephony.framework/Support/UnknownCarrier.plist may help as well. But those solutions are not reported to work well (while I'm still sure that they should do the trick).

This is not a TSIM problem, so returning TSIM to Bloadox will not help much.

Cya,

freefall.

stevearm · Joined: 11 Jan 2008 Posts: 16

freefall, thanks for providing more information on the problem.

I've tried installing Services.app and turning off EDGE that way and at first I thought it worked, but my signal still keeps dropping every so often. And also, everytime I open up Services.app, it seems to reset EDGE back to 'on' again. To be fair though, even though it drops signal for about 5 seconds every few minutes... the phone's not come up with the 'No SIM card inserted' once yet, which is progress I suppose! At least this way it seems to working, with temporary drops in signal every so often. I do say YET though as knowing my luck it'll say No SIM insterted any second now. Still, i'd like to still be able to use EDGE, or GPRS in t-mobile's case in the UK.

You say doing the downgrade/jailbreak etc... process might work using the T-Mobile + turbosim combo and that this erases all data on the iPhone. Obviously things that are synced using iTunes isn't a problem but ideally I'd like to keep my text message conversations. I thought iTunes backed these up at every sync. Is it not possible to restore this data on a newly restored iPhone?

freefall · Joined: 18 Dec 2007 Posts: 16

stevearm · Joined: 11 Jan 2008 Posts: 16

Ok my phone's been working fine for the past 30 minutes or so. Signal's not dropped once I don't think but obviously EDGE is switched off by Services.app. Rather not switch it off manually by changing those entries freefall, just in case I need to use it for those 2/3 minutes while out and about before the No SIM message comes up.

Texts are definitely backed up by iTunes, but it's just a question of whether or not they're restored back onto a factory restored iPhone.

Do you know that doing the whole restore/downgrade/jailbreak/activate etc... process again with a Tmobile sim in definitely fixes the problem? Has there been lots of success with other people doing this?

freefall · Joined: 18 Dec 2007 Posts: 16

Some have reported that even cleaning the contacts did the trick. But most reports of success came from people doing the "big thing", including myself.

Ah, by the way, I am able to use EDGE without a problem after doing the restore stuff. But I'm still investigating and am trying to find a better solution with specific editing of some configuration file.

Cya,

freefall.

silverdragon · Joined: 12 Jan 2008 Posts: 14

Looking hopefull here.. had sim in for 15 mins so far without any signal drop, and made a call to 150 in that time.

stevearm · Joined: 11 Jan 2008 Posts: 16

What method did you use to fix it? ^

silverdragon · Joined: 12 Jan 2008 Posts: 14

I've done absolutely nothing, leading further to think its some changes t-mobile have done in network, and either undone, or fixed, over this weekend, that are propagating through network.

silverdragon · Joined: 12 Jan 2008 Posts: 14

After working fine for several hours last night, its doing it again this morning.. most annoying.

freefall · Joined: 18 Dec 2007 Posts: 16

The problem is initiated by the network, so when it happens depends on when the command is sent to your mobile.

Cya,

freefall.

healeydave · Guest

That is annoying, because it makes it really hard to establish a fix also.

If we are suspecting a problem with the incomplete network messages being sent as stated by FreeFall. When we try different things, how are we able to know that the problem is cured because it could just going through a grace period like SilverDragon experienced yesterday.

I have a customers handset here that really needs to go back to him today because he sent his SIM with it Smile

The problem was quite obvious yesterday with a TurboSIM, and would show up quite quickly. I put one of those cheap clones in that seemed to drop signal after a txt message was sent.

I had received some Network messages which informed me to delete them.

It seems quite stable this morning so I switched back to the TurboSIM and it is still stable.

Dilemma:
Is it temporary, like SilverDragon's experience?

Or could it be the network messages have sorted the problem out in a similar way to FreeFall's tip on Restoring the phone whilst having the T-Mobile SIM in place?

Damn you T-Mobile, I know if I send this phone back, its gonna start playing up by the time the guy gets it :-/

stevearm · Joined: 11 Jan 2008 Posts: 16

Seems to be working fine for me since yesterday afternoon. I had originally turned EDGE off which seemed to do the trick but tried putting it on this morning and it still works fine even with it on.

Hopefully it'll last.

silverdragon, still screwing up I take it? Very annoying.

freefall · Joined: 18 Dec 2007 Posts: 16

In my case it's working stable for a few weeks now.

I guess it's something the network only does ones. As soon as the iPhone is "configured" that way, the network won't repeat this message.

Today, we discussed the issue and came to a new hypothesis. If you insert your SIM card into a phone which it hasn't been used with, yet, you'll get a SMS by your provider, resulting in a simple message popping up and telling you about your phone number. Maybe it's this message which isn't handled well. That, in turn, would point back to - well, not TSIM but at least applesaft.

Cya,

freefall.

silverdragon · Joined: 12 Jan 2008 Posts: 14

not aware of any such messages here, and besides, it had been working just fine for over a month with no issues, its only as of this last weekend. still issues this evening, keeping o2 payg sim in for now.

silverdragon · Joined: 12 Jan 2008 Posts: 14

Ok.. fingers crossed, I tried again last night at 9pm, and its now been working fine for nearly 22 hours without any hiccups, perhaps it now really is fixed?