This is something different from our regular posts.  Since we have not done a show regularly in a while, I figured I’d throw this together for the tens of people who visit each month.  This post is not meant to be a source of technical help or technical explanation (e.g.: Tethered vs Untethered, Baseband preservation, etc.).  For either of those, always remember that Google Is Your Friend.

iOS 4.1 has been out for a while, and just recently two jailbreaks have been released; greenpois0n and limera1n.  I chose to use greenpois0n as my method for no particular reason.  Before I go any further, I must tell you that jailbreaking your iPhone is frowned upon by Apple, and it will void your warranty.  For the completely inexperienced, you are also opening your phone up to potential security vulnerabilities.  If you are not a technical person, please consult your most trustworthy geek before continuing.

The first step I took, was to use TinyUmbrella by semaphore (notcom).  I used this to backup my SHSH blobs.  Whether or not your choose to backup your SHSH, download TinyUmbrella.

Second, I downloaded and installed AptBackup in Cydia.  This is a nice tool which will backup a list of all installed jailbreak apps, and then assist in restoring all of these apps once you are re-jailbroken.

Next, transfer any purchases from your iPhone into iTunes, and backup your iPhone.  I said BACKUP, not just a Sync.  Both of these can be done by right-clicking your phone in iTunes, and selecting the proper action.

The next thing I did was download and apply iOS 4.1 from Apple within iTunes.

Wait… wait…. wait……. wait……….. wait……………. wait………….

iTunes has found a problem verifying the device’s software.  I still had TinyUmbrella loaded, and I selected “Exit Recovery” – then the phone kicked into ‘brand-new iPhone’ mode, and I was prompted to plug it into iTunes.  I re-launched iTunes, and when prompted chose to ‘Restore from Backup of xxxx’ (where xxxx is the name of your device).

Wait… wait…… wait……… wait……… wait………. wait……. wait………. wait…………. done!

At this point, you can verify that the new iOS is installed, and your apps & data have been reinstalled.

Choose your jailbreak, and run the program.  Follow any instructions that may be on-screen or that you may have read from their website.

After the jailbreak is complete, you will either have Cydia or you may need to install it from a special icon.  Run Cydia and install the complete set of updates it has available.

Search and install AptBackup, and then choose “restore” from that menu.  Depending on how many jailbreak apps/settings  you had, it may take a while.  Once it is finished, it will automatically reboot your phone.

At this point, my phone looked very strange – it was missing all of my App Store apps, but had all of my Jailbreak apps.  As soon as I loaded up ‘Settings’ (which seemed to take much longer than usual), and then exited – all of my apps were there in the exact places I had them configured to be before.

Just to be safe, I ran another backup in iTunes, and saved my SHSH blobs again.

That’s it!  You have to be patient, especially when upgrading and restoring all of your data.  Don’t forget to run your post-jailbreak activities, namely changing your root password.

Happy jailbreaking and have fun!