If you have upgraded your iPad, iPhone 4, iPhone 3GS or iPod Touch 4G/3G to iOS 4.3 for testing purpose and now you are facing any issues with your favourite apps on this new release or you want to downgrade your device to jailbreakable iOS 4.2.1 / iOS 4.1, here is complete step by step guide to downgrade iOS 4.3 to previous iOS versions.
This downgrade process is only for those who have saved SHSH Blobs to Cydia servers for iOS 4.2.1 and iOS 4.1 and we hope you all have done so.
If you are still on iOS 4.2.1, we highly recommend you to save the blobs before upgrading iPhone to iOS 4.3. You can either use TinyUmbrella on Windows and Mac Systems or iSHSHit app on your iPhone.
Steps to Downgrade iOS 4.3 to iOS 4.1 or iOS 4.2.1:
Step 1: Download the required IPSW firmware you want to restore on your phone.
Step 2: Open”Hosts” file in NotePad from this location in Windows OS: C:/WINDOWS/system32/drivers/etc
If you are Mac user, navigate to GO -> Go to Folder and enter the path “/etc” and open the file “hosts” with TextEdit.
Step 3: Now add the following hostname at the end of the file as shown in the screenshot below. Save the file.
74.208.105.171 gs.apple.com
Step 4: Open iTunes and connect your device with the PC via USB cable and put your device into DFU mode. Here is how you can get DFU mode on your phone.
- Turn off your phone.
- Now press Power button and as soon as you seen Apple Logo, press Home button while keeping pressed Power button too.
- Keep holding down both button for about 10 seconds.
- After 10 sec, release Power button but keep holding Home button until iTunes recognizes your iPhone. You should keep the PC volume high to hear New Device Detection sound.
- Let go the Home button. At this point your iPhone screen should be blank (black in color).
Step 5: From the iTunes sidebar select your device. Now press the “alt” (option) button on Mac or left “Shift” button if you are on Win and then click on “Restore” button in the iTunes.
This will make iTunes prompt you to select the location for iOS 4.2.1 or iOS4.1 you downloaded in step 1.
Now sit back and let iTunes restore iOS 4.2.1 or your iPhone/iPad/iPod Touch. During the restore process you may see unknown error messages (1013, 1004 etc), just ignore these errors.
At this point your iPhone may be stuck in recovery mode, showing that “Connect to iTunes” screen. To get rid of this recovery mode, download TinyUmbrella and click on “Exit Recovery” option.
Update: A detailed post on “How to Kick out of Recovery Mode” is posted here. TinyUmbrella seems to be not working to get rid of Recovery mode after downgrading iOS 4.3 to iOS 4.2.1.
That’s all. Now you can use the software mentioned here (tethered jailbreak) or here (untethered) to jailbreak your iPhone.
Downloads:
Hi, I have a big problem. I installed 4.3 beta. I have my shsh backed up at saurik (cydia) servers and even locally with TinyUmbrella 4.21.07. I have tried via saurik servers (hosts file) and with TinyUmbrella’s server. I keep getting error 1015 over and over. I tried the “Error 1015 fixer” after installing the libusb filters and nothing. I tried “kicking” out of recovery mode the Ipad with TinyUmbrella and it restarts to the same “connect to iTunes” logo. I have restored with the original .ipsw 4.2.1, I have tried again the 4.3 ipsw and nothing with neither. I think one big problem is that when I connect the device, in Tiny Umbrella the ECID is different each time I connect it (Dec and Hex) and it is never the same as the original one, I don’t know why this happened. I tried another computer with a clean install of itunes and nothing. I have read lots of forums and tutorials and everyone seems to be going out of the restore (or DFU) modes easilly after that restore but I cant. My Ipad was first jailbreaken with redsnow but later I restored it to factory settings because I didn’t liked it jailbroken, so when I installed the FW 4.3 it was not jailbreaken. Sorry to bother, hope someone can help me.
I just used “update” from 4.3b2 back to 4.2.1 on a non-jailbroken iPhone 4. Worked fine from my Mac on 10.6.6 with iTunes 10.1.2.
guys you need to jailbreak 4.3b2 then put the iphone into PWND DFU and install custom 4.2.1ispw
and how did you jb the 4.3b2? i tried it with that therterboot stuff and prejailbroken ipsw but it didn’t work for me…
not working! :(
Doesn’t work
this did NOT work for me, i have my 4.2.1 SHSH blobs with tinyumbrella..I’ve changed the hosts file in /etc everytime i try to restore i get stuck in recovery mode 1015 error in itunes, then trying to use tinyumbrella to kick it out of recovery but it just restarts my ipad back in recovery mode >_< now i'm f'ed…