According to Josh Smith, editor of Notebooks.com, even though the iPhone 4S jailbreak is on the way - and while many users are excited about the ability to customize and do more with the iPhone 4S - there are a number of reasons you shouldn’t jailbreak your new iPhone.
Writing in his latest Gottabemobile newswire column, Smith says that, while an iPhone 4S jailbreak will deliver the iPhone experience many have been looking for, jailbreaking is not for everyone.
The biggest issue, he says, is that users will be voiding their warranty and, even though the jailbreaking process was ruled legal in 2010, Apple was very clear that doing so voids users’ warranties.
And, he notes, whilst there are many times you can restore to a standard Apple iOS version before going in for repair, this is not always going to be the case.
Users will also lose Genius Bar support on the iPhone – in the past some users have been able to get support by not mentioning that their iPhone is jailbroken, but again, if the Genius finds out that the handset is jailbroken, you may lose out on support.
The third issue with jailbreaking, says Smith, is that there are usually no more is fast upgrades to new releases of iOS.
“If you are waiting for the jailbreak, you should also avoid installing iOS 5.0.1 to your iPhone 4S. This isn’t as big of an issue for small upgrades like this, and in the case of [earlier versions] a jailbreak was available very quickly. But, when it comes to major upgrades that bring new features, you may be forced to wait a while, or go back to a stock iPhone experience”, he explained.
There is also the problem, he says, of a lack of a seamless experience, meaning that, if you are a fan of the iPhone experience, and don’t want to chance a buggy or slow iPhone, you may want to pass on jailbreaking.
Apple, he asserts, has many controls in place to keep apps from slowing down your iPhone, but jailbroken apps don’t need to stick to these guidelines.
“Many users who have gone back from jailbreaking cite a poor user experience and buggy nature of their jailbroken iPhones as a reason for going back to normal. If you know exactly what you are doing, or don’t mind troubleshooting to find out what is causing an issue, you will be OK, but many iPhone owners I know don’t want to hassle with things like this”, he says
“Finally, consider the security risks. If you have a jailbroken iPhone and are installing apps from various sources, one of them could contain malware. The threat of malware has caused concern for Android users, and so far we haven’t seen a large number of malware infested jailbreak apps, but the threat remains. If you do jailbreak, be vigilant about what you download”, he adds.
The good news is that Smith does not preach on the subject of not jailbreaking the iPhone in his column, Infosecurity notes, but he does spell out the disadvantages. He has forgotten, however, the point out the potentially serious issue of drive-by downloads on a jailbroken iPhone.
Ultimately, he says, jailbreaking your new iPhone 4S is up to you. “If you know what you are doing, you can follow these instructions to jailbreak your iPhone 4, and stay tuned for how to jailbreak the iPhone 4S and iPad 2 as soon as the tools are available.”