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Okay so first off, I have an iPhone 4 CDMA (Verizon), but haven't had cell service on it for two years. Not that that matters but thought I'd throw it in there, that it only works with wifi.

Now that that's out of the way, about a month ago I downloaded iOS 7 Beta 5 without a dev account (I know, but I couldn't help it). I had the same problem that I've seen other question here on, where people couldn't restore to iOS 6.1.3 in order to get the public release of iOS 7. So, I went to ipswdownloader and downloaded iOS 6.1.3 (CDMA), backed up my iPhone, and then restored it with the 6.1.3 software/firmware. My iPhone then restarted, and took me through the process of setting up a new iPhone. But, unlike anything I've seen before, it's asking to activate it as if it is brand new and under devices in iTunes, my iPhone's name is not there, it just says 'iPhone'. I figured I could just set it up and then restore backup but when I try to activate it through iTunes (because it can't find a server if I try from the phone) I get this error message:

We could not complete your iTunes store request.

The network connection was lost.

There was an error in the iTunes store. Please try again later.

I thought maybe because everyone in the world (literally) is downloading iOS 7 and maybe apple's servers were overflowing but I can connect to the iTunes store from iTunes, just not with my phone. The other thing is, even though I cancelled service on this phone almost 2 years ago, it still said Verizon as my service provider, now it says 'No Service'.

Obviously my phone completely reset. Please tell me there is something I can do to activate it and get all my apps, photos, etc back on it

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  • yeah i did the same thing i updated and i resored it to the thing but its still ios 7 and it says i cant get in because i dont have a developers accout and i cant acsess my ipod on itunes im freaking out but i hope it works like u said!
    – user57414
    Sep 18, 2013 at 22:46
  • yea hopefully it works. I was able to at least activate my iphone but servers are still too full to update.
    – samrap
    Sep 19, 2013 at 1:12

1 Answer 1

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The activation servers were overwhelmed presumably by the volume of activity on launch day. Now activation fails for a different reason - Apple is no longer signing iOS 6 software during the restore process.

Once you get your OS activated either through iTunes or over the air, you will be able to load your backup as you had planned.

Apple would surely make it easier on a segment of its customer base if the service status page were kept updated thusly….

enter image description here

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  • Okay, so to clarify, once the servers get less traffic I can activate my iPhone even though I don't have service and it will be just like any other restore? Right now I'm just worried that the entire thing has been reset
    – samrap
    Sep 18, 2013 at 20:50
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    If you don't have cellular service, you will need to activate using iTunes connected over USB or Wi-Fi, but the device will ask if you want to set up as new, restore from iCloud or restore from iTunes once iOS 6 is activated and the setup assistant runs.
    – bmike ♦
    Sep 18, 2013 at 20:59
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    apple.stackexchange.com/questions/102171/…
    – bmike ♦
    Sep 18, 2013 at 21:00
  • I am having the same issue, My iPhone 4 is originally unlocked tho. But I have no idea why i can't activate it... And yea As you said, I can access the iTunes store from the iTunes with no problem, but not while the iPhone is connected. I shouldn't update it :(
    – user57403
    Sep 18, 2013 at 21:04
  • Well, like bmike said and like my original prediction, apple's servers are obviously full. what i wasnt sure on is if the activation part was normal, but from his answer it is. many people are having this issue, for example discussions.apple.com/message/23014504#23014504 we're just gonna have to wait it out until things slow down
    – samrap
    Sep 18, 2013 at 21:09

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