It’s only been a handful of days since Apple released their iPhone OS 3.1.3 firmware update through iTunes, and the iPhone Dev Team has already come out with a way to jailbreak the new firmware. The new firmware does little more than fix buggy battery level indicators and Japanese language keyboards, so most of you probably won’t need to install the update. But, there’s invariably going to be a subset of jailbroken iPhone users that can’t resist the urge to update to a brand spankin’ new firmware. For those of you in this group, the iPhone Dev Team has released PwnageTool 3.1.5 to jailbreak iPhone OS 3.1.3!
The PwnageTool utility creates a custom iPhone restore file that you can use to update and jailbreak your iPhone in one felled swoop. PwnageTool 3.1.5 will strip the iPhone OS 3.1.3 update file of its newer baseband modem firmware and replaces it with an older version that can be unlocked with ultrasn0w – this allows you to keep using your iPhone unlocked on any GSM carrier in the world. If you were to update your currently unlocked iPhone 3GS to iPhone OS 3.1.3 without PwnageTool, iTunes will replace your iPhone’s baseband firmware with a new version that cannot be unlocked.
For those of you using a newer iPhone 3GS or had previously updated your firmware to a newer version (05.11.07), you’re going to want to avoid updating to iPhone OS 3.1.3 altogether, if you plan to use your iPhone on unofficial GSM carriers. As long as you stay at iPhone OS 3.1.2, you can jailbreak your iPhone 3GS using blackra1n or PwnageTool and then run GeoHot’s blacksn0w unlock utility to free your iPhone of GSM lockdown.
Get PwnageTool 3.1.5 here.