Internet tethering allows you to use the iPhone as a modem and share the Internet connection with laptop. It’s a great feature come with iPhone. However, for certain reasons, not every carrier supports the tethering feature. If your carrier does not support tethering for iPhone, that’s another good reason for jailbreaking.

Recently, cirdan and sbingner have developed a hack called TetherMe that enables tethering on jailbroken iPhone even your carrier does not officially support the feature. As claimed, the hack should work with any carriers and supports all iPhones with iPhone OS from 3.0 to 4.0.1.

TetherMe has been tested to work on all iOS versions from 3.0 to 4.0.1 and works by telling the iPhone to allow tethering on any APN that is used for iPhone data. As a result, you should not be charged extra from your phone company as all tethering data appears to come from the phone itself.

TetherMe also bypasses signature checking and allows you to edit your carrier bundle manually if you so desire. This is required to enable MMS functionality on T-Mobile. TetherMe does NOT enable the loading of APN configurations from .mobileconfig profiles at this time.

The hack is available on cydia for US$1.99 only. To use the hack, you can simply launch cydia and search for “TetherMe”. After installation, reboot your iPhone to effectuate the change. There is no icon for this hack. Once rebooted, you can go to Settings -> General -> Network to turn on Internet Tethering. Alternatively, you can also install Tethering Toggle for SBSettings.

For now, TetherMe can only support tethering on iPhone. If you are using iPad 3G, please don’t install it as TetherMe does not work with it yet.

Other than TetherMe, you can also check out MyWi app that can also share the iPhone’s Internet connection with other devices (e.g. iPad).

As always, feel free to leave us comment and share your thought.

FaceTime, one-tap video calling, is one of the notable features comes with the iPhone 4. After I got my iPhone 4, I have tested out the FaceTime feature with my friend. It’s really cool and fun. I have tried video calling on other mobile phones but there is no phone in the market that can give such fun experience as iPhone 4’s FaceTime.

Due to certain reason, however, Apple only allows you to use FaceTime over WiFi. Thanks for JailbreakMe. With jailbreaking, you can now have a couple of ways to use FaceTime over 3G network.

As said, these tools only work on jailbroken iPhone. If you haven’t jailbroken your iPhone 4, check out this guide and use JailbreakMe to jailbreak it first.

If you are ready, you can simply choose one of the following cydia apps to enable FaceTime over 3G:

My3G

My3G is a great hack for jailbroken iPhone. It tricks iPhone apps to believe that they are on WiFi instead of 3G. So, by using My3G app, you can enable FaceTime over 3G. My 3G is available via cydia or RockApp for US$3.99 but it also offers free trial. To use My3G, simply search “My3G” in cydia and install it on your iPhone. If you can’t find it, you may need to add the modmyi source (http://apt.modmyi.com) in cydia.

Once installed the app, go through the Rock setup process with a username and password. Then launch My3G with the default settings. That’s it! You can now use FaceTime over 3G.

You can further check out the FaceTime over 3G (via My3G) from 9to5Mac:

FaceBreak

Unlike My3G, FaceBreak is specially designed for FaceTime. By installing FaceBreak, it automatically adds an option in Settings that allows you to enable FaceTime over 3G. FaceBreak is available in cydia for US$1.49. You can simply launch cydia, search for “FaceBreak” and purchase the app.

How much Data will FaceTime over 3G eat up?

Both apps work great and give you the flexibility to use FaceTime over 3G. However, you better sign up an unlimited data plan with your carrier in order to use FaceTime over 3G. It eats up quite a large chunk of data. According to 9to5Mac, FaceTime uses up around 15MB of data for a 5-min video call. That’s around 3MB of data per minute! So beware if you are not using an unlimited data plan.

For T-Mobile users in United States, you may fail to send MMS after you jailbreak and unlock your iPhone running on iOS 4.0 or 4.0.1.

This is a known issue. Developer from pushfix has developed a solution to fix the MMS problem and the patch is freely available on cydia.

To fix the MMS problem on T-mobile US, you can simply follow the step-by-step procedures:

1. Launch cydia. Tap “Manage” -> “Sources”. Then tap “Edit”, followed by “Add” to add a new repository source.

2. Enter “http://cydia.pushfix.info” for the cydia/APT URL and tap “Add Source”.

3. Tap “Done” and go to “Search”. Search for “T-Mobile US MMS Fix”.

4. Install the MMS fix on your iPhone.

5. After installation, go back to home screen. Tap “Settings” -> General –> Network –> Cellular Data Network.

6. Verify the settings. It should be set with the below values:

APN: wap.voicestream.com
MMSC: http://mms.msg.eng.t-mobile.com/mms/wapenc
MMS Proxy: 216.155.165.50:8080
MMS Max Message Size: 1048576
MMS UA Prof URL: http://www.apple.com/mms/uaprof.rdf

7. Restart your iPhone to effectuate the change.

Once restarted, you should be able to send MMS on the T-Mobile network using your jailbroken iPhone.

Note: The MMS fix is for T-Mobile US only. And, it only works on iOS 4.0 or 4.0.1.

[via Redmondpie]

Earlier, I showed you a way to fix the “Different SIM Detected” error after hacktivation with the phonebook sim. That method does resolve the error but it involves quite a lot of manual procedures. Probably, iPhone beginners will find it difficult to follow.

Thanks for PushFix to bring us an easier way to fix the issue. You no longer need to manually copy the Lockdown folder via iPhone Explorer as described in step 5 to 10 of the earlier guide. PushFix has released a cydia package called “Hacktivation Patch” that automatically patches a system file on your iPhone.

Simply install the patch and the “Different SIM Detected” error will vanish. The patch supports iPhone 3G/3GS running iPhone OS 3.1.2, 3.1.3, 4.0 or 4.0.1, as well as, iPhone 4 running iOS 4.0 or 4.0.1.

Here is the complete procedures to apply the fix.

1. After jailbreaking your iPhone with JailbreakMe, insert your phonebook sim card to activate the iPhone.

2. Launch cydia. Tap “Manage” -> “Sources”. Then tap “Edit”, followed by “Add” to add a new repository source.

3. Enter “http://cydia.pushfix.info” for the cydia/APT URL and tap “Add Source”.

4. Tap “Done” and go to “Search” to search for “Hacktivation Patch”.

5. Install the “Hacktivation Patch”.

6. Reboot your iPhone to enable the patch.

That’s it. Once you have rebooted your iPhone, the patch should fix the “Different SIM Detected” error. Let me know if the fix works for you.

I have just tried out the Frash hack that we have covered yesterday. As you can learn from the version number (i.e. 0.0.2), the hack is still under testing. But it does work as promised and lets you view Flash-based content (e.g. banner) on most websites.

If you want to be an early adopter of Frash, you can now install it on your iPhone via cydia.

Apparently, the hack only works on jailbroken iPhone 3GS and iPhone 4. If you haven’t jailbroken the iPhone, check out this guide and use JailbreakMe to jailbreak it first.

If you are ready, here is the procedure to install Frash on iPhone.

Procedures to Install Frash on iPhone

1. Launch cydia

2. Tap “Manage” -> “Sources”. Then tap “Edit”, followed by “Add” to add a new repository source.

3. Enter “http://repo.benm.at” for the cydia/APT URL and tap “Add Source”.

4. Tap “Done” and go to “Search” to search for “Frash”.

5. Tap “Frash” and install it.

6. Once installed, reboot your iPhone.

That’s it. After reboot, you can now run flash in mobile Safari.

How to Use Frash in Mobile Safari

To use Frash, just go to any website with flash content to test out. If there is any flash content in a website, Frash will automatically detect it. You can simply tap on the “Flash” label to play the flash.

As Frash is not official released yet, it may not work with all types of flash content. Sometimes, it may even crash the mobile Safari. If you find the Frash hack impact your Internet browsing experience, simply uninstall it using cydia, followed by rebooting the iPhone to completely remove Frash.

Thanks for @comex, the developer of Frash, to bring Flash to iPhone. Now, this is the best reasons to jailbreak iPhone.

As always, remember to leave us comment and share your experience on the Frash hack.

In late July, we covered a way to activate iPhone with a what-so-called Phonebook SIM card. Early adopters reported that the method worked great and they could easily hactivate the iPhone without an official sim. Lately, however, it was reported the phonebook sim card does no longer work.

What it turn out is that the phonebook sim hack has brought up to Apple’s attention and they immediately developed a fix to block it out. Recently, if you use phonebook sim card to activate an iPhone, you will get a “Different SIM Detected” error and are prompted to connect to iTunes.

That’s really discouraging when you encounter this kind of error. However, someone has already developed a fix to resolve the “Different SIM Detected” issue.

Procedures to fix the “Different SIM Detected” Issue

1. Restore your iPhone to iOS 4.0.1 via iTunes

2. Once it is restored, insert the phonebook sim card to activate the iPhone.

3. After the activation, remove the phonebook sim card.

4. Open Safari and go to http://jailbreakme.com. Slide the “slide to jailbreak” to kick off the jailbreak process.

5. After the jailbreak process completes successfully, launch cydia. Install both “afc2add” and “ultrasn0w”.

Note: The “afc2add” is a service for USB file browsing and the “ultrasn0w” is to unlock your iPhone.

6. After running ultrasn0w, it is supposed your iPhone is unlocked but you will still receive the “Different SIM Detected” error. Next, download iPhone Explorer, which is a freeware for browsing iPhone’s file system. The software is available for both Mac and PC.

7. Connect your iPhone to computer via USB and launch iPhone Explorer.

8. Browse to the folder /var/root/Library and delete the “Lockdown” folder.

9. Download the patched version of lockdown folder from here.

Note: You need to register before you can download the file.

10. Copy the “Lockdown” folder to /var/root/Library (i.e. the same location as the Lockdown folder you have just deleted in step 8).

11. Restart your iPhone to activate the fix.

That’s it. I hope this fix works for your iPhone. As always, feel free to leave comment and share your experience.

Probably you have already jailbroken your iPhone using JailbreakMe. But some users reported that they are stuck at purple screen after slide the “Slide to jailbreak” slider.

I also experienced the same problem when I used JailbreakMe for the very first time. What I did was to restart my iPhone and then I could go through the whole jailbreak process smoothly.

If you are still stuck at the purple screen after reboot, iPhoneDownloadBlog mentioned a more detailed solution that you needs to clean up the browser cache. Here are the procedures:

1. Go to Settings -> Safari and then tap “Clear Cache”. Tap again to confirm the cache clean up.

2. Tap “Clear History” to clean up the browser history

3. Tap “Clear Cookies” to clean up the cookies

4. After you clean up the browser cache/history/cookies, reboot the iPhone

5. Once rebooted, point the mobile Safari to http://jailbreakme.com and try again.

If jailbreakme.com doesn’t work for you, you can also try http://jailbreakme.modmyi.com. For detailed instructions of jailbreak procedures using JailbreakMe, you can refer to the earlier post.

Remember to leave us comment and let us know if the solution works for you or not.

As an iPhone 3GS user, I have upgraded to iOS 4 right after Apple announced the public release. So far, I am quite happy with the update. Multitasking, unified inbox, folders and spell check are some of my favorite features. Apple’s engineers also tweaked some of the UIs to improve the responsiveness. Perceptually, I think iOS 4 offers better performance over the previous OS.

However, it is another story for iPhone 3G users. Many users claimed that iOS 4 is not a crappy update. In the Apple’s technical support forum, you can find lengthy discussion (38 pages) about the performance issues of iPhone 3G after upgrading to iOS 4. Users complained the UI is less responsive. It takes 5 seconds to open SMS app. The iBook app runs so slow and even the unlock slider works slower than before. These are just some examples of the complaint. Someone has also posted a video demo on YouTube to show you the slow performance after the iOS upgrade.

Obviously, the difference in performance for iPhone 3G and 3GS is due to the different computing power. The iPhone 3G is riding on a 412MHz ARM 11 chip, while the processor of 3GS model runs at 600MHz. Added to that, the 3GS model has 128MB RAM more than its predecessor, that also contributes to the speedier performance.

The limited computing power of iPhone 3G, however, shouldn’t be an excuse for Apple to deliver a crappy OS for millions of existing 3G customers. Recently, as reported by Wall Street Journals, Apple finally takes action to investigate the series of complaints related to the performance issues. Probably, it may be addressed in the upcoming iOS release.

Some Recommendations Before Apple Offers the fix

If you are an iPhone 3G user, here are a few recommendations.

For those who are still running iPhone OS 3.1.3, keep using it. At the mean time, I do not recommend the upgrade. Just stay away from it until Apple releases iOS 4.1. Especially, don’t help your wife or girl friend to upgrade the 3G to iOS 4. Here is an interesting post from the Apple’s support forum:

I hear about os 4.0.1 coming up next week.
Hope they fix all the problems. Yesterday i upgrade my wife’s 3g and now she want to kill me.

On the other hand, if you have already upgraded to iOS 4, you may consider to downgrade it back to iPhone OS 3.1.3. Lifehacker offers a great downgrade guide that you may find useful. However, it’s not as straightforward as you think.

If downgrade is not an option, you can try out these fixes that possibly improves your iPhone 3G’s performance:

• Double hard-reset – Interestingly, some users reported that a double hard-reset can improve the performance. I do not have iPhone 3G to test out the solution but some claimed the solution works. If you have no idea how to hard-reset your iPhone, check out the instruction here.
• Disable Spotlight Search – According to an iPhone 3G user in ModMyi forum, you can simply turn off spotlight search to boost the performance on iOS 4. To disable spotlight search, go to Settings -> General -> Spotlight Search and deselect all items.

Please let us know if the solution works for you and stay tuned about any related update.

The multitasking feature is the most notable feature in iOS 4. If you’re owner of iPhone 4/3GS, you can enjoy this feature after the OS upgrade. However, due to the limited memory and slower CPU on iPhone 3G, multitasking is intentionally disabled by Apple.

But this shouldn’t limit iPhone jailbreaker from using it. With jailbroken iPhone, there are a couple of hacks available via cydia that lets you enable the multitasking feature.

Features Hack

First, it’s a cydia hack called “Features”. The hack lets you enable the missing multitasking feature via Winterboard theme. The package comes with a “multitasking” theme. You can simply enable the theme to turn on the multitasking feature.

To install the hack, you can fire up cydia and search for “Features” to locate the package. Please note that the hack is only for iPhone 3G running iOS 4. If you are using iPhone OS 3.1 or lower, the hack will not work for you.

zToggle

Developed by Razi Iqbai, zToggle is another cydia hack for you to enable the multitasking feature. Same as “Features”, the hack is only for iPhone 3G running iOS 4. Please don’t install it on other models of iPhone.

Once you install the hack, launch zToggle and flip the “Multitasking” switch to ON. Then follow the instruction to respring your iPhone to effectuate the change. You’ll be able to use multitasking after the respring.

Both hacks are free, but zToggle offers a better interface for you to toggle between the multitasking feature.

Warning: If you have already use redsn0w or PwnageTool to enable the multitasking feature during jailbreaking, DO NOT install the hack. If you want to use any of the above hacks, you’ll need to jailbreak your iPhone but without selecting the multitasking option in the jailbreak process of redsn0w/PwnageTool.

How can I close the apps running in background via multitasking dock? Are all apps displayed in the dock running in background? Since the launch of iOS 4.0, I have received these questions from my friends and some of the blog readers. So I think it is better to write a blog post to share the procedures with all of you.

The multitasking feature is the most notable update for iOS 4.0. As you may know, you can double press the Home button to bring up a multitasking dock that shows all those apps running in background. You can simply tap on any of the app icons and switch to your desired app instantly.

How to Close Multitasking Apps

To close an app in the multitasking dock, you can just tap and hold an app icon until it wiggles. Then you can tap on the minus symbol and terminate the app.

That’s it. Simple, right?

Are all Apps displayed in the Dock Running in Background?

That’s the answer for the first question. What about the second question? Are the apps shown in the multitasking dock running as background apps?

Not really.

Unlike the cydia app “Backgrounder” that automatically puts app to run in background, Apple takes another approach to deliver multitasking feature while preserving battery life and performance. The app is not supposed to run in background by default. It is up to the application developer to enable the multitasking capability via the multitasking API. Apple provides seven multitasking services in iOS 4 including:

Background audio – Allows your app to play audio continuously. So users can listen to your app while they surf the web, play games, and more.

Voice over IP – Allows the VOIP app to run continuously. Users can now receive VoIP calls and have conversations while using another app. You can even receive calls when your phone are locked.

Background location – Navigation apps can now continue to run while you are listening to their iPods, or using other apps. iOS 4 provides an efficient way to monitor location when users move between cell towers. This is a great way for your social networking apps to keep track of your shared locations.

Push notifications – Receive alerts even when your app isn’t running.

Local notifications – Similar to Push notification but the notification is sent locally instead of via remote server

Task finishing – If your app is in mid-task when user leaves it, the app can now keep running to finish the task.

Fast app switching – This will allow users to leave the app and come right back to where they were when they left – no more having to reload the app.

Not all Apps Support Multitasking… It Really Depends on the Developers

For those without technical background, you may not understand the above multitasking services. But one point I would like to highlight is that not all iPhone apps support multitasking. Only those apps implemented one of the above multitasking services can be run in background. If the developer does not update the apps and make use of the multitasking functionalities in iOS 4, that app will just behave the same as you run in it in older version of iPhone OS.

How to Tell the Difference

Apparently, multitasking is a prominent feature for iOS 4. However, one thing that may confuse some of you is the apps displayed in the multitasking dock. You may also notice that the multitasking dock contains all recent applications that you have launched, no matter the app supports multitasking or not. But there is no way to tell whether the app is running in background until you switch to it. If the app resumes to the point where you left off, you can tell the app supports multitasking. When you switch to some of the apps, they go through the launch procedures and start all over again. Clearly, these apps do not support the multitasking feature.

Hopefully, this post can give you a basic understanding of multitasking feature in iOS 4 and you should know how to close those multitasking apps.