iMuggle Productions / PXLFix Update

Posted: August 30, 2010 by Ally in General News
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We’ve got a quick update.

We are still in the process of planning PXLFix and working out the kinks, as well as developing new themes and applications, but current time constraints are going to push us back a bit.  With Cody’s school schedule and my regular schedule divided between my regular job and TiPb, it makes it hard for us to get together and really hammer away at things like we’d like.

As for repairs, we’ll take repairs on a case by case basis for now and we’re aiming to have a PXLFix site and mail-in service up and running late fall/early winter.  In between now and then, we may have some theme updates for iTopple pushed out as well as some new themes (we’re still figuring out 4.x file systems and trying to work out some bugs that even other devs are having issues with).

So until then, bear with us. And if you have any questions or concerns, or repairs, feel free to contact myself or Cody.  As we make progress or have any news to share, you guys will be the first to know.

Thanks for supporting us and being so awesome!

Ally and Cody

iMuggle Productions Is Expanding…Introducing PXLFix Repair Service

Posted: August 1, 2010 by Ally in General News
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Hey guys!

Big news for you today! iMuggleProductions is expanding.  Cody and I are going to start offering repair services.  Our repair service will be going by the name PXLFix.  We’ll have a brand new site up soon just for PXLFix as well.  We’ll be taking not only local repairs but mail-in repairs.  We’ll have more details soon on this as far as pricing and extensive info.  We’re kicking this off right away.  For now, if you need a repair you can contact myself or Cody for information (contact info below).

We’ve been offering repairs locally for a while now and have had quite a few clients so we’ve decided it’s time to expand our services.  To start off, we’re offering repairs for iPhones and iPods. We’re going to expand this to other electronic products soon (Macs, PCs, cameras, etc).  If you have something other than an iPhone or iPod you need repairs on, for now, you’ll need to contact Cody and I on a case by case basis. The main reason for that is we’re trying to build up an inventory.  For now, iPhone and iPod parts are somewhat easy for us to maintain in stock.  As we grow, we’ll hopefully be able to keep other parts constantly in stock.  So for anything else, we’d need to order parts, so turnaround time could be slower than it will be for an iPhone or iPod (for now anyways).

Here’s what we’re offering:

  • iPhone repair (1st gen, 3G, 3GS, iPhone 4)
  • iPod repairs (all generations)
  • iPhone part swaps (different colored backs for the 3G and 3Gs, as well as the white iPhone 4, but as a side note, for right now we will ONLY swap the back panel on the iPhone 4 to white.  The front panel is what is causing so many problems and we don’t recommend anyone using the front panel right now as it pretty much doesn’t allow the proximity sensor to work properly and you’ll create more issues for yourself than it’s worth)

With part swaps, you will be sent back the original part to your phone as well.  If you need warranty work done or need to swap your phone through Apple, keep in mind you can not take it into an Apple store with custom parts installed.  We will also be offering reasonable prices for services like swapping back as well.  We’re still debating pricing schemes but it may be as little as $10 plus shipping to swap parts back and when you get your phone swapped, if you’d like custom parts installed on the new one, just pay shipping.  For now, we’ll go on a case by case basis. So contact Cody or myself for pricing on any repairs or swaps listed above.

And the best part is, if we can’t fix it, you don’t pay. We’ll even reimburse your shipping costs.

We’ll have a site up for PXLFix as soon as humanly possible but for now, you can contact Cody or I via any one of the following methods:

Ally
General Inquiries: ally@imuggleproductions.com
Repair Inquiries: ally@pxlfix.com
or contact me on Twitter here:  @iMuggle

Cody
General Inquiries: cody@imuggleproductions.com
Repair Inquiries: cody@pxlfix.com
or contact Cody on Twitter here:  @ElfMinion

Updates and New Themes coming soon

Posted: June 28, 2010 by elfminion in Uncategorized
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Hey everyone, sorry for the lack of updates on the site lately, Ally and I have been very busy. But here is what you should look forward to:

-Updates to iTopple

-iOS4 compatible Theme

-New Themes

-”The App” for the Apple App Store.

I hope everyone i as excited as we are about this. We are buckling down and pushing them out as fast as we can. Another new development for us is we are implementing our own Hardware repair center. We will be working on iPhones, iPods, and every Mac you may have problems with. We know you are tired of paying ridiculous amounts for repair on your devices, so we have decided to offer a fair amount for repair costs. We will post a pricing scheme and more information in the coming weeks.  Keep stopping by for more updates, and of course, follow us on Twitter for more frequent updates.

Ally: @imuggle

Cody: @elfminion

Take Care!

Downgrading from iPhone OS 4.0 to official 3.1.3

Posted: April 25, 2010 by Ally in Tutorials
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Alright guys, I’ve seen a LOT of people with bricked iPhones and issues with 4.0 – for me, I’m a dev but I also have a day job. 4.0 would not allow me to use any of my everyday apps such as Evernote, 2Do, etc.. Those are apps I can not go without, so I was forced to downgrade.

Now a lot of posts say to use iRecovery. For me, iRecovery never seemed to work quite right and put both of my iPhones into an infinite loop of DFU death. Here’s an easier way…
1.  Download iPhone OS 3.1.3 official firmware. You can find all past firmwares here.  If you choose a lower firmware, that’s fine too, this should work.  Make SURE you download the correct firmware for your device. For the 1st gen iPhone, you need the firmware for 1,1 phones – for the 3G you should get 1,2 firmwares, and for the 3GS – you need 2,1.

2.  Download Blackra1n from blackra1n.com

3. Open iTunes, hold down the alt/option key (ctrl key on a PC) and click restore. You’ll get a window pop-up, navigate to the 3.1.3 or whatever version you downloaded in the first step. Let it run, it will fail. That’s okay.

4. Repeat step 3. (Don’t know if this is technically necessary, but I always do it twice.) It will epic fail again.

5.  Now instead of using iRecovery and typing in commands that may or may not pull your phone out of an endless loop, open blackra1n. Click “Make it ra1n!” Give it a few seconds, your phone screen will go black.

6.  Now completely UNPLUG your phone.  Do a hard reboot (hold down home and sleep buttons until the phone shuts off, keep holding them until you get the Apple logo, then you can release them.)

7.  You should now have the normal connect to iTunes/slide for emergency screen instead of the restore connect to iTunes screen.  You can now plug your phone back into your computer and re-sync through iTunes like normal.

Now as far as I know, if you upgraded to 4.0, you can NOT jailbreak again. You will be able to successfully downgrade to whatever firmware you want, BUT – it will NOT change your baseband, which will be stuck at 4.0 – so until there is a jailbreak working with 4.0, I don’t recommend trying to jailbreak. A tethered one on 3.1.3 MAY work with the new jailbreak.  Or you can try the jailbreak released for devs for 4.0 – again, I’m not responsible for what you do to your phone.  I have a feeling the 4.0 would probably be okay, but I wouldn’t risk it, and I’m not about to test that theory.  I’ll wait.  For me, it’s more important to have a functioning device.

Any questions, concerns, leave em in the comments.

-Ally

iPhone 3GS Repair Videos

Posted: April 11, 2010 by Ally in Tutorials
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We have a YouTube channel now! Subscribe here: www.youtube.com/iMuggleProductions

Alright, this has been a long time coming, these videos have actually been on my iPhone for a while, I am a master procrastinator extraordinaire! Either way – here are some teardown videos we did a while back of how to swap out the glass or LCD in an iPhone. So if you’re out of warranty or have water damage, this may be for you (if you feel comfortable doing so), but hey, if you don’t want to lay down the cash to buy one outright, it may be worth a shot. Glass and LCD aren’t that hard to replace.

Part 1 – Disassembly:

Part 2 – still disassembling and separating LCD from glass, swapping out

Part 3 – starting reassembly:

Part 4 – Reassembly and turning phone on:

Not the best tutorials in the world, but we were somewhat in a hurry and didn’t have much to work with. (Another reason I need to quit procrastinating and just buy my d90 already).

Happy 21st Birthday Cody! (@ElfMinion)

Posted: April 9, 2010 by Ally in General News
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Hey guys, quick off-topic, tonight at midnight means it’s Cody’s 21st birthday! If you have him on Twitter, be sure to wish him a happy 21st!! (April 10th)

4.0 Update / New Finding

Posted: April 9, 2010 by Ally in General News
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So first and most interesting, anyone else noticing 4.0 seems to play different video formats it never did before? My iPhone has fought me for years (since the first one) when it came to syncing pictures and videos that were in a format that Apple didn’t support. Basically anything other than mp4. Well, my Videos event synced just fine onto my phone and it’s playing files I know were not mp4. Whether it is re-encoding on the fly or just supporting more file formats is beyond me as I haven’t had time to look into it further. Definitely interesting though!

Oh, and as for the facebook issue, it appears to only be an issue when trying to upload screenshots, not actual pictures you take. I figured this out earlier. Don’t know if the camera is saving screenshots in a way Facebook does not like or what, but that seems to be the issue.

More later… still digging, it’s going to be an extremely long night.

iPhone 4.0, first impressions (+ some little bug fixes)

Posted: April 9, 2010 by Ally in General News
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New Dock, sharper icons

Alright, so I’ve had a full day or so to mess w/ 4.0. My initial impressions are pretty great. Few bugs, which are more than expected. But before starting this, I’m going to say, again, if you are not a dev and do not plan on using 4.0 as a development tool, wait until the official release. But here’s a brief run down of my findings so far, and for you developers who have experienced a couple bugs, such as BoxCar and facebook issues that maybe shouldn’t be happening, I’ve included a bit at the bottom showing some workarounds I found…and some that still stump me…

First off, here’s some screenshots of the main UI. Folders will be a welcome addition. I would have liked an expose type feature but after messing with folders, I managed to skim down my app page number from 10 to simply 3, which is more than manageable.

Screenshots…

Inside a folder. Only 12 apps max (for now)

Creating folders severely minimized home screens..

For those of you having issues changing the wallpaper on 4.0, do it through the wallpaper area in settings, not through your photo apps, that seems to be a bug and that solution is currently not working.

You can now choose your own wallpaper for the homescreen.

GameCenter appears to be extremely cool. I haven’t played with it but I’ve thumbed through the settings and some of the features in the SDK. For game developers, this will be a welcome addition. The Plus+ network and others are okay, but having multiple networks is a pain, this should simplify it. (For any devs who have gamecenter set up, add me. Don’t know if you can utilize features yet or it will tabulate but I’m interested in knowing more about GameCenter.)

GameCenter, Apple's own version of a Live Service..

Alright, some things seem to have some bugs… here is one I have NOT figured out, if anyone knows a workaround… FaceBook (surprise!)… now a lot of people report having this issue in 3.1.3 and even before that… I never had it, so can anyone tell me if they are NOT getting this when trying to upload pictures to facebook in 4.0?? (Also another reason why people trying to install 4.0 that aren’t devs should stay away. Apps can go all crazy on you, as they don’t have compatibility yet.)

FaceBook Picture Fail in 4.0

Now here is another issue I did find a workaround to. In Boxcar, on 4.0, many devs have reported having issues receiving notifications. Turn OFF all your noticiations, save, turn back on, THEN go to Quiet Time, turn it on (or off – just change it from what it currently is), save, go back in, readjust and save. That fixed mine and I’ve been getting notifications just fine.

Change Quiet Time in 4.0 for Boxcar to fix not receiving notifications.

As far as other features, I’m still digging into the SDK and the software itself, character count in text seems to be working now… A lot of people are saying it’s not, but I don’t think it kicks in until you have over 50 chars…

Character count in 4.0, little buggy right now, but seems to work

I didn’t start playing with 4.0 until this morning – as I didn’t get around to installing it until about 2am last night. Most of my time has been spent digging into APIs and such. But these are my initial impressions and such. I think 4.0 is definitely a step in the right direction.

How to PROPERLY install a beta OS on an iPhone!!

Posted: April 9, 2010 by Ally in General News, Tutorials
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Alright, I see a LOT of confusion on Twitter and several forums about why users are getting error 13 and several other issues such as lagginess and feature set issues with iPhone beta 4.0

Let’s clear some of this up right now. If you are a developer, you should know better than to install a beta OS with iTunes. ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS use Xcode when installing a beta!! The current iTunes version 9.1 is not made to be compatible with 4.0 yet. Backups are broken, that’s a given as the file system changed, but other than that, it’s just not a good idea.

Second warning, for most of the people getting errors, if you are installing a beta OS from a PC, you are going to get error 13 or worse. And more importantly, if you do not have your UDID on file with a developer as a test device through the developer portal, please do not install a leaked or unofficial copy of 4.0 through a torrent or any other means! You are asking for issues. When the official 4.0 comes out, iTunes could put you in a world of hurt. Not to mention, it’s not going to load everything correctly.

Now here is the proper order to install a BETA iPhone OS, such as 4.0:

1. Make sure your iPhone UDID is on file in the developer portal as a test device. This is a 40 digit number that can be found through XCode, or an easier method is to plug your iPhone into iTunes, click where it shows your serial number and it will change to your UDID. That’s the number you need.

2. Once you have your iPhone linked in the developer portal, then you can download 4.0 or whatever beta OS. Once the .dmg file finishes downloading, extract the IPSW. (I always save it to my desktop, easiest place to browse to).

3. Open XCode – if it does not bring up the organizer window that identifies your device and gives you the option to use it as a test device, go to Window —> Organizer. From there you should see your device. Click use as test device.

4. Next, you should see what OS your phone is running, click that drop down menu and select “Other Version” – now navigate to where you saved the beta IPSW. Let this process run and do not disturb it!

5. After this process is done, AGAIN, click use as test device. (You may have to open iTunes and let your phone activate first). But make sure you do that.

6. After this is done, then you can sync all of your things like normal from iTunes.

Again, please use Xcode to install beta OSes. It is in Apple’s FAQ and this is the way you should always be installing a beta OS.

If you are using a PC or having someone add you to their developer account solely for the reason of playing with 4.0, you are running a risk. I do not recommend installing a beta version of an OS on your everyday phone that you can not go without. NOT a good idea! If you aren’t a developer or have no reason to have the beta, it’s better to leave it be and wait for an official release. I understand people are curious, but be advised, a beta OS will have bugs, and you will have to deal with them. Developers understand this to the fullest and work with eachother. The point of the beta being release is for developers to make their apps compatible and to access and utilize new APIs. If you brick your phone or have issues, I doubt you’ll get any help out of Apple with a beta OS unless you have a dev license.

Consider yourselves forewarned!

iTopple update coming, new themes, news

Posted: March 10, 2010 by Ally in General News, Jailbreak
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Hey guys!

We haven’t forgotten about updates. We did some hardware teardowns which I will get up this weekend. Also, update for iTopple! With a working overlay that will format any apps from the app store. Also new UI bars, a calculator, etc..

Also we plan on working on some more themes soon. So watch for those.

Not too much news on our official apps yet. We’ve taken on a few new projects. Cody recently had surgery (yesterday) so we will have a little delay as he heals and gets back to normal 100%. So keep him in your thoughts.

Until next time,

Ally

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