Resurrecting an iPad: Apple 0, Jailbreakers 1

When I was asked recently if I could attempt to work my magic on a bricked iPad, I was not exactly thrilled. I know very little about iPads: Son has one but other than doing the initial set up some months ago, I haven’t seen it since. However, as (Ex)Husband pointed out, I do own an iPhone and an iMac, so it couldn’t be too difficult, could it?

It could.

Although the iPad was happy to start (and sometimes even showed the Apple logo) it then switched to a white screen. The only other thing it did was show the red battery warning icon after a fairly short amount of time, necessitating stopping the process and leaving it to charge for at least 20 minutes, as recommended by Apple.

I filled these minutes by searching the Apple site for ideas. I then carried out their ideas but guess what? None of them worked and the iPad remained bricked.

(Ex)Husband suggested borrowing Son’s iPad, doing a back up and then putting the back up on the sick iPad: a swift search revealed this would not work as Son’s iPad is much newer and is now running a version of IOS that Apple refuse to allow first gen iPads to upgrade to.

It soon became apparent that there was not going to be any help from Apple. Apparently, the only help they might offer would be to people whose machine is still in warranty, in which case, they suggest you return it to the Apple Store and get it exchanged. Not very helpful when the device is on its second owner and way out of warranty.

Finally, I realised that as the iPad was as good as dead already, it was time for sh*t or bust manoeuvres, in other words, Jailbreak time! Within five minutes, I had found both suitable software and instructions to deal with it. Within a further five (including a couple spent fighting with the iPad to force it into DFU mode) the iPad finally began to boot…..the Apple logo appeared…….a white screen did NOT appear……a Home Screen appeared! Oh happy days!

So what is the point of this tale? The point is that APPLE should be supplying software to get their users out of trouble, they shouldn’t have to rely on searching for Jailbreaks. How can it be that I can spend literally hours fiddling around following Apple’s instructions to fix one of their devices and yet have the tablet up and running in minutes when using unauthorised software?

How can they stop supporting a device that they released only a couple of years ago, leaving the owner without the option to sort out serious software meltdowns by upgrading the OS?

Furthermore, why the hell is there no proper Off switch on either the iPad or the iPhone? No way of taking the battery out? Does it really make sense to have swipe the screen to turn the thing off? Of course it doesn’t. I am aware of the pressing the sleep button and home button at the same time trick but it is so, so fiddly and if you miss the right moment to stop pressing, the damn thing starts to boot again, especially if, like me, you have twitchy fingers!

While I am at it, I may as well rant about a further Apple design fault – the lack of delivery receipts for SMS messages on the iPhone. This is a really important feature, practically every other phone has it, so why not the iPhone? Surely not because they want you to encourage your friends to buy an iPhone, just so you can get read receipts by using iMessage?!

 

The Curse of the Toolbar

In the course of my work, I am often presented with computers that are creaking so much it is a wonder they haven’t given up altogether. Their worried owners are sure that they have not got a virus (and quite often they are right!) but whatever could be causing this slow down?

Nine times out of ten, the answer can quickly be found by checking out the state of the internet browser. It is a rare day indeed when I find one that is not awash with toolbars, so much so that there is often very little window left! There are search toolbars, AV toolbars, smiley toolbars, you name it, there’s a toolbar for it. And all of them, to a bar, merrily processing data in the background, even if the user is not actually interacting with the toolbar at the time.

Most of the time, there is nothing sinister going on (although malware can and frequently does arrive in the form of a toolbar or other ‘helper’ application) but these add ons play havoc with the computer’s resources and leave it with the performance capabilities of a swimmer in a tank of thick porridge.

Knowing how people love to cling to their possessions, even if virtual, I always ask customers if they are actually using the problematic programs. Most of them respond that they have never used them, they just somehow got installed when they were installing or updating something else and yes, they would love me to get rid of them, which I am happy to do.

Why oh why do software companies persist in pushing these rubbish applications on us? It is not just the dreadful effect that  they have on performance , it is also the fact that they don’t even do what they are supposed to do! The search results from one of the toolbars I tried  recently bore no relation to the query and reminded me of long ago mid 1990s searches, when the search engine was in its infancy. As for the so called antivirus toolbars, it seemed that pretty much everywhere was on the banned list.

All this is bad enough but it is not even as if the user has freely chosen to install this stuff – a moment’s inattention failing to uncheck a box or choosing an express rather than a custom upgrade/install and the crapware sneaks in on the sly.

So pay attention next time you install – think before you click!