That’s right. Will and I are among the very first handful of people in Dubai with working iPhones. After confirming from the only guy we knew with an iPhone that the anySIM unlocker was working with an Etisalat SIM card, we made my sister buy us two US-spec 8GB models and FedEx them immediately. 2 days later we had iPhones. 7 hours after that they were working with Etisalat. By working, I mean everything: Phone, WiFi, data on Etisalat’s GPRS network, YouTube, AppTap, hacked apps, voicemail, everything (except, of course visual voicemail…)

From the shitty pic above, you can see inbox mail messages (from Pop GMail), some unauthorized apps, the “ETIS” in the upper left corner, and the WiFi signal. Sweet.

Of course I have got many of the same gripes as everyone else so far, but overall I am simply amazed. This phone is so much better than anything else I’ve used it is hard to describe. Still no excuse for it being locked in the first place (greed) or for there to be no copy/paste, IM, or a unit conversion calculator. The mail client is definitely 1.0 release and needs a lot of work. Screen is smudgy but the brightest and crispest thing I’ve ever seen. The OS is quick and responsive, usable and intuitive, and the rest of the built-in apps are fantastic. I’m in love.

As for the unlocking, we followed the instructions on hacktheiphone.com and modmyiphone. It took a lot of trial and error for the first unlock. After we did it once, it was easy. Some quick advice: DO NOT under any circumstances run anySIM more than once, even if the first time fails. Running anySIM on already somewhat modded firmware bricks the iPhone and you have to start from scratch. PAIN IN THE ASS. anySIM also gives a really misleading error even when it works. It says something like, “‘Unlock failure.The flash operation succeded but the unlock commands failed. you might want to check the baseband manually using minicom.” In 90% of the cases, the flashing actually worked. Just restart and viola! If you run anySIM at this point you’ll get this error, “Unlock Failure Could’t locate bytes to patch.” Then you’re fucked. Start over.

For those of you in Dubai trying to get Etislat’s ridiculously expensive GPRS network (2 fils per kb, that’s about 5-10dhs per webpage) working with a WASEL pre-pay account, the settings are simple. Go to the EDGE section of the network control panel and set the APN to “Etisalat.ae”. Username and Password make blank by deleting the AT&T settings. That’s it. Of course, you need one of the newer Etisalat SIM cards and have subscribed for the data feature. (If you have a post-pay account, I do not know what the settings are, so please don’t ask.)

So, that’s it. iPhone is unlocked and opened up, warranty is voided, but it works around the world. I have a week or so longer to gloat before the rest of Dubai catches on OR Apple figures out a way to destroy this thing. Wish me luck.