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iPhone Jailbreak/Upgrade: More on iTunes 1600 error

By on October 7, 2008 in Posted In: iPhone, Tips & How-to, Unlock iPhone

Earlier, I have written up a post about possible causes & solution for iTunes 16xx error that some of the readers encounter during iPhone jailbreak or upgrade. I, however, have missed one point for 1600 error that occurred when you try to restore the custom firmware (created by WinPwn or Pwnage Tool) in iTunes.

This point is specially for those who have already pwned the iPhone once and plan to upgrade to new firmware version (Say, from 2.0 to 2.0.2 / 2.1) using WinPwn / Pwnage Tool. When you come across the below prompt, you should answer “Yes” and follow the instruction to put your iPhone in Recovery Mode instead of DFU mode.



Recently, when upgrading a pwned iPhone from 2.0 to 2.1, I tried to put it into DFU mode and restore the custom using iTunes. And iTunes prompted me with error 1600.

At first, I wondered if I did not put the iPhone into DFU mode properly. But it’s not. So, I tried to put it into recovery mode instead. And, it works perfectly with custom firmware install. So, when you encounter error 1600 again, ensure you are using the proper mode.

How to put iPhone into Recovery Mode

To put your iPhone into recovery mode, first disconnect your iPhone from USB cable and power off your iPhone. Then hold the ?Home? button and connect USB cable again. Keep holding the ?Home? button until you see a dock cable pointing to the iTunes icon (or yellow triangle for older version of iPhone or Steve Job logo for pwned iPhone). Now you are in recovery mode.

About Simon Ng

Founder, developer and chief blogger of simonblog.com
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  • Rob

    Hi there Simon,

    thanks for the info on the 1600 error…I tried to DFU after re-creating the custom install from scratch, and itunes kept coming up with said error…googled error, found your blog (even tho on evil Windows [joke!]) I found your solution perfect on mac as well…Although successful with custom restore from recovery mode as you suggested I had a recurrance of the iphone freezing up on the apple icon with spinning wheel just below it…this occurred after I tried to restore from backup of iphone…there must have been some corruption in the backup…set phone back into recovery…let itunes check server…deleted back-ups…option-clicked custom restore…set phone up as new…and all is well!

    Again thanks for the advice…

    Rob

  • David Ong

    Hi,

    I am getting error 21 and cannot jailbreak my iPhone 2.1.

    Can anyone help?

    Thanks.

    David

  • Wiecher

    Hey,

    In recovery mode i have a 1600 error… and in DFU mode itunes says: 21 error…

    Can somebody please help me??

    Thanks,
    Wiecher

  • John

    I am getting the same thing as you wiecher I get the 1600 error… and then th 21 error this sucks i not having my iphone unlocked can someone please help!

  • Peter Cernak

    This really works. Always when I tried to restore my 2G iPhone I got 1600 error message. I put my phone into “recovery mode” as descirbed (turn your phone off, press and hold home button a then connect the usb cable. Connect cable to iTunes logo will appear. Then I restored phone via customized firmware from Pwnage tool. Thanks for idea.

    • http://www.applerepairneworleans.com Apple Repair Store New Orleans

      it doesn’t really work for everybody. stop spreading false information.

      • http://www.kcphotography2012.weebly.com RetroTime

        Doesn’t work for me either.

  • Nico

    Thanks a lot, this saved my day. I just got the newest Pwnage Tool to create a custom 2.2 firmware for my 3G. Now this one works great.

  • http://celestri.org Manish J

    thanks man, you saved the day! 2.2 is great.

  • Lev

    Respect, man! It worked! ;)

  • adrian

    I’ve just received my iphone with 2.1 firmware installed (virgin).
    I’ve got a version of 2.2 jail-broken firmware.
    2 things:
    1. When I ran the 2.2 update by hitting shift restore, I got the 1600.
    2. When I tried this post’s solution, I received the 1604.

    I had to put the phone back into 2.1 (non jb) to get it up and running again.
    Anyone know of anything else I can try?

  • adrian

    hey all,
    I have successfully jailbroke my 2.1 iphone.
    I had to pwn 2.1 then install 2.2 custom.
    all good.

  • Jones Ong

    Dear all,

    I live in Singapore and I have a previously 2G iphone (bought in US) in jailbroken 1.1.4 firmware. Recently I wanted to upgrade it to either 2.1 or 2.2 with Pwnage and Ziphone (I tried with all the methods I have found on the internet so far, including iClarified, modmyfone, iPhone Hacks, etc) but none works for me…

    I keep getting the ‘Connect to iTunes’ screen and iTunes showed error messages like (1), (21), (0xE8000001), etc… I’m really lost… What’s happening?

    Can anyone PLS HELP? Pls email me directly if u can… thanks do much!

  • http://deleted Jones Ong
  • http://www.simonblog.com Simon Ng

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  • FogCityNative

    Hey, thanks so much . . . the tutorial from iClarified on how to use Pwnage Tool Mac 2.2.1 to upgrade to iPhone firmware V2.2 without upgrading the baseband is so wrong and incomplete. For those of us who already have a jailbroken 2.1 3G phone following their tutorial results in failure to restore with a 1600 error. Despite what is shown in the tutorial, Pawnage Tool does not provide the same tools and prompts as QwkPwn in that the steps to get to DFU mode are not there in the application. Putting the phone into DFU mode anyway using the instructions in the tutorial only results in a failure to restore with the 1600 error.

    Your solution worked perfectly by holding down the home key while connecting the USB cable. I am now a subscriber to your blog . . . good job, you saved the day!

  • http://yackel.wordpress.com Rick

    I too am getting the error 21, possibly because I restored to factory and then tried to pwn. I get 1600 when I answer NO and 21 when I answer YES. I have to find the 2.1 file and try it.

  • Ramesh

    I tried upgrading my iPhone 2G to 2.2 which was bought by me unlocked. It got locked and now it says make emergency call . How do I restore it back and ge it unlocked?

  • http://deleted Jones Ong

    Simon, you are the man! Got my 2G iPhone successfully pwned! One thing I dun get it… how come there is still an error (1) message when the phone triggers iTunes to start up… ??

    Nevertheless, I realised the main difference in pwning 2G and 3G… and that WAS my mistake because I used to pwn my other 3G phone successfully so I thought 2G was the same. I was stupid enough not to realise the “YELLOW NOTE”…

    2G: If you do not use an authorised carrier, u must check ‘Activate the Phone’
    3G:If you do not use an authorised carrier, u must UNCHECK ‘Activate the Phone’

    BOOT / REBOOT logo: Jailbreakers do not neccessary need to have the Steve Jobs or Pineapple logo, simply uncheck the two logo boxes and you’ll get the original Apple logo.

    By the way I’d also learned that if u wanna a customised boot logo, it is not as simple as creating the PNG files with photoshop.

    I read from somewhere that the PNG files are embedded with some script so I’m sure DevTeam has also done some scripting work on their pineapple.

    Cheers! :)

  • http://deleted Jones Ong

    oh by the way… cydia can’t start… sigh…

  • Henry

    Let me say, thank you!
    I had hours playing around with this (I thought it was a firmware error).

  • likes

    Thank you soooo much!!! After a week of upgrading. whew! ill try cydia and other apps later if it will work properly. Thanks again. God bless!

  • Sam

    Yes! thank you! I could not figure this out at all! thank you so much

  • sailingaction

    I have built a custom FW 2.2.1 in latest Pwnage tool to jailbreake an 3G iPhone on ATT that already is on FW 2.2.1 and the latest modem FW. I checked for that it has not been pwn before, and unchecked activate since it is already legit with ATT. I sent the custom FW and she uses a PC. In iTunes we get the 1601 error all the time using DFU mode. She is now getting a USB hub to see if that helps to avoid connecting directly to the PC.

    However I read here that you could do a normal restore without DFU, and use recovery mode. Will that work with a custom FW that has checked for “that is has not been pwned before, or do I have to make a new one?” I appreciate any suggestion solutions for this please…

    Thanxs

  • Mike Leal

    Thank you! You’ve saved me alot of frustration =)

  • dahab

    worked like a charm you saved me dude thank you so much

  • J.E.Turner

    This worked-around my 1600 error but it didn’t FIX it. I used it to load a 2.2.1 CFW from coderetard.com (preserves the 2.28.00 baseband) and I got no signal (can’t connect to my carrier). I’m using AT&T and don’t need the unlock at the moment so I tried to load the unactivated 2.2.1 CFW (preserves baseband) from the TPB torrent (contains both). I still got 1600 and still needed to go into Recovery Mode to get around it. The good news is that I now have a signal and am on 2.2.1 with thw 2.28.00 baseband. The BAD news is that One1 says that Pwnage firmwares are slow…
    http://www.modmyi.com/forums/general/381201-how-have-blazing-fast-jailbroken-phone.html

  • Biff Treehorn

    Doesn’t work. Soooo frustrating! I’m now left with a bricked iPhone! I keep getting the 1600 error message.

  • Wedge

    I’m going from jailbroken 2.2 to jailbroken 2.2.1 via the instructions on iClarified, which stated I should use DFU mode. Got the 1600 error over and over.

    I just tried it in standard recovery mode per your instructions, and it looks like it worked like a charm. Thanks!

  • nathan

    THANNNNNNNNNNNKKKKKKKKKKKKK UUUUUUUUUUUUUUU
    THATS THE ONLY THING I DIDNT KNOW
    THANXXXXXXXXXX

  • JoseLuis

    Im trying and even when its kinda weird, its working…. =/ jajaj thx

  • Jason

    Thanks! That worked. Great tip! Now running pwned 3.0

  • urbanelectron

    ay carumba! holy cow! This is exactly what i needed. I was sooooooooo scared, but it worked and sky seems bluer and i’m going to go do nice things for people all day.

    yeay!

  • http://mikelightman.com mikelite

    still works on 3.1! thanks man

  • http://williamzhou.com William Z

    Works much better than standard DFU mode! Thanks a bunch!

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  • josua waddell

    dude you are the s*%# thank you for that

  • Ricky

    Worked for iphone 3gs 3.1!!!
    Big Thanks!

  • http://www.taranfx.com Tech guy

    Thanks, I was actually following How to unlock jailbreak iPhone 3.1.2 guide, faced this iTunes error. Thanks to your tips, I’m all back up and running thanks :D

  • Will

    That is exactly what I needed I think — not the black-screen DFU mode, but the connect-to-itunes recovery mode. The restore seems to be actually running now, instead of constantly giving me the 1600 error. Thank you!!

  • Elizabeth

    Thank you soo much! I just tried to upgrade my 2G to 3.0 (i’m not sure i want to mess w/ 3.1 just yet) and was mortified to think i had killed my iPhone.
    I used recovery mode instead of DFU after i received the error message and it is downloaded to my iPhone as I type. Thanks again!! :)

  • nate

    just wanted to say thanks cuz this helped me.

  • Chris

    This worked!! Thanks!!

  • Arnie

    That worked for me, cheers!!

  • reza

    thanks! saved me a lot of grief. all other posts insist you go into dfu mode, which i kept going into, and that failed. some posts mentioned recovery mode, but no instructions on how to get into it.

  • spaceorizer

    when attempting to shift-restore custom fw’s, itunes (9.0.3.15) would return error 1600. i needed to use iREB to trick itunes into restoring. worked nicely.

  • Nicholas

    THANK YOU!!!!!!!

  • penix

    Worked, thanks.

  • geust

    thx,helped solving error 1600 while going from 3.1.3 to 4ios

    • tjr

      hey how did u get it to work going from 3.1.3 to 4? i made a custom file using sn0wbreeze but i keep getting the error 1600. i tried ireb but it does not work. this method fixes the dfu mode error 1600 but does not actually restore the custom ipsw for me. itunes just stays on the “preparing iphone for restore” screen

  • http://igeeksfaq.blogspot.com/ Dan Ang

    I am able to fix the error 1600 without going into recovery mode. Check out my fix at http://igeeksfaq.blogspot.com/2010/06/fix-itunes-error-1600-during-iphone.html

    • http://www.applerepairneworleans.com Apple Repair Store New Orleans

      How is this different that the op’s post?

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  • Morten

    I foolishly tried to JB iOS 4.1, and after getting severeal errors in cydia, and no Game Center, i decided to go back to 3.1.2…
    using DFU mode gave me the 1600 error, but with the help of this guide, i managed to fix it :D

    THANK YOU :D

  • mandee

    i keep getting a error message 6 unable to restore how can i fix this…. i have and i pod touch

  • Sauci

    Dude, i just wanted to let u know that YOU ARE MY F*****G HERO. I’ve been sitting here for almost 6 hours now trying to fix my phone and its working now that i used recovery mode v. DFU

  • mya

    thank you, you saved my life. I restaured my iphone by error and it blocked it. nothing was working. I absolutely had to reinstall a filmware and I always had 1600 error with pwnage tool.

    thank you

  • Jonata’

    Muito obrigado !

  • T-Dub

    my problem is similar to post 47 tjr im stuck in recovery mode and i keep trying to restore using the firmware created by sn0wbreeze 2.2.1. and itunes just shows ( preparing iphone for restore.. then giving me error 1604…. help please!!!

  • Phaek

    I just had the same problems as everyone else; jailbreaking (4.3) and getting errors.
    DFU: Error 1600
    Recovery: Error 21

    I was using sn0wbreeze software that injected the original *.ipsw image with Cydia and such.

    After several hours of insanity I found out the problem – I wasn’t doing it in the right order!

    [MAKE A NEW IMAGE WITH SN0WBREEZE, THEN FOLLOW THE INSTRUCTIONS IN THE PROGRAM WITHOUT QUITTING THE PROGRAM] – it solved it for me!

  • Roy

    Hi,

    I have an iPhone 3G, updated it a few weeks ago to 4.2.1 and JailBreaked it and Unlocked it.
    However phone has been slow to react, guessing it cannot handle ios4.’

    Trying to roll back to 3.1.3, i keep getting the 1600/1602 itunes error.
    Tried iREB and RecBoot, my phone goes into DFU mode, but the error keeps occuring. Tried also recovery mode with the itunes usb logo and still the error keeps coming!!

    I am using a custom ipsw from sn0wbreese.

    I have tried everything and can’t figure it out, hope someone can advise.

    Regards,

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  • Osuman

    Thank you so much man !! I’ve been trying for 4 days to unlock my iphone 3g but nothing worked and I finally decided to use whited00r which was giving me that error with iTunes!!

    restore mode did work for me !

    again thanks a lot !!