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HOWTO: restore an iPad using only Free Software
Feb 14th, 2018 by miki

Thanks to the fine people at the libimobiledevice project, who bothers to reverse engineer Apple products, I recently succeeded in resurrecting a relative’s iPad stuck in a boot loop (something with jailbreaking, running Sydia, missing an iOS update and attempted Sydia removal) without any use of proprietary tools.

This is a brief recipe of the procedure done using Ubuntu 16.04.

As the required tool from libimobiledevice, idevicerestore, is not packaged in the Ubuntu libimobiledevice package we need to build this from scratch from the sources.

iPad during recovery

iPad in recovery mode during firmware download using libimobiledevice

  1. Install build dependencies
    sudo apt install libusbmuxd-dev libplist-dev libplist++contents under-dev libzip-dev
  2. fetch and build libimobiledevice main library
    cd
    git clone https://git.libimobiledevice.org/libimobiledevice.git
    cd libimobiledevice/
    ./autogen.sh
    make
  3. fetch and build libirecovery library
    cd
    git clone https://git.libimobiledevice.org/libirecovery.git
    cd libirecovery
    ./autogen.sh
    make
  4. fetch and build idevicerestore tool, using the homebuilt libraries
    cd
    git clone https://git.libimobiledevice.org/idevicerestore.git
    cd idevicerestore
    CFLAGS="-I$HOME/libirecovery/include -I$HOME/libimobiledevice/include" LDFLAGS="-L$HOME/libirecovery/src/.libs \
    -L$HOME/libimobiledevice/src/.libs" PKG_CONFIG_PATH=~/libirecovery:~/libimobiledevice/src ./autogen.sh
    make
  5. put the iDevice in recovery mode (iPad = press power+home until screen with “iTunes+cable” symbol appear, see image above and check Apple support for details), make sure it has adequate charge or it will refuse (red battery flashing)
  6. perform the actual restore, asking for flashing of latest firmware (~2.5GiB automatically downloaded), this will probably get you in trouble if you desire to jailbreak the device. I noticed while writing this post that the below actually doesn’t run the tool using the libraries built above, but I’m leaving it as it was done because it “worked for me” (TM) and I can’t experiment further because I haven’t got access to any iDevices (and desire to keep it that way):
    sudo $HOME/idevicerestore/src/idevicerestore --latest
    NOTE: using cached version data
    Found device in Recovery mode
    Identified device as j71ap, iPad4,1
    Latest firmware is iPad_64bit_11.2_15C114_Restore.ipsw
    Verifying 'iPad_64bit_11.2_15C114_Restore.ipsw'...
    Checksum matches.
    Extracting BuildManifest from IPSW
    Product Version: 11.2
    Product Build: 15C114 Major: 15
    INFO: device serial number is DMPM4V3SFK15
    Device supports Image4: true
    Variant: Customer Upgrade Install (IPSW)
    This restore will update your device without losing data.
    Using cached filesystem from 'iPad_64bit_11.2_15C114_Restore/058-86080-124.dmg'
    Found ECID 6653578882512
    Getting ApNonce in recovery mode... 03 6b cc ac 57 8a b4 29 29 c1 a9 fe e4 97 54 3b a8 36 59 5a 
    Trying to fetch new SHSH blob
    Getting SepNonce in recovery mode... df 5c ad 67 48 bd 38 b4 6f 72 0a 5c b0 81 87 c3 95 37 4a da 
    WARNING: Unable to find BbChipID node
    WARNING: Unable to find BbSkeyId node
    Request URL set to https://gs.apple.com/TSS/controller?action=2
    Sending TSS request attempt 1... response successfully received
    Received SHSH blobs
    Extracting iBEC.ipad4.RELEASE.im4p...
    Personalizing IMG4 component iBEC...
    Sending iBEC (710360 bytes)...
    Recovery Mode Environment:
    iBoot build-version=iBoot-4076.30.43
    iBoot build-style=RELEASE
    Sending AppleLogo...
    Extracting applelogo@2x~ipad.im4p...
    Personalizing IMG4 component AppleLogo...
    Sending AppleLogo (22709 bytes)...
    ramdisk-size=0x10000000
    Extracting 058-85997-124.dmg...
    Personalizing IMG4 component RestoreRamDisk...
    Sending RestoreRamDisk (59978774 bytes)...
    Extracting DeviceTree.j71ap.im4p...
    Personalizing IMG4 component RestoreDeviceTree...
    Sending RestoreDeviceTree (101420 bytes)...
    Extracting kernelcache.release.ipad4...
    Personalizing IMG4 component RestoreKernelCache...
    Sending RestoreKernelCache (13226783 bytes)...
    About to restore device... 
    Waiting for device...
    Device 3fb0f5cc97b83c61c85d4b8333796d9e536a4c83 is now connected in restore mode...
    Connecting now...
    Connected to com.apple.mobile.restored, version 15
    Device 3fb0f5cc97b83c61c85d4b8333796d9e536a4c83 has successfully entered restore mode
    Hardware Information:
    BoardID: 16
    ChipID: 35168
    UniqueChipID: 6653578882512
    ProductionMode: true
    Starting FDR listener thread
    About to send NORData...
    Found firmware path Firmware/all_flash
    Getting firmware manifest from build identity
    Extracting LLB.ipad4.RELEASE.im4p...
    Personalizing IMG4 component LLB...
    Extracting applelogo@2x~ipad.im4p...
    Personalizing IMG4 component AppleLogo...
    Extracting batterycharging0@2x~ipad.im4p...
    Personalizing IMG4 component BatteryCharging0...
    Extracting batterycharging1@2x~ipad.im4p...
    Personalizing IMG4 component BatteryCharging1...
    Extracting batteryfull@2x~ipad.im4p...
    Personalizing IMG4 component BatteryFull...
    Extracting batterylow0@2x~ipad.im4p...
    Personalizing IMG4 component BatteryLow0...
    Extracting batterylow1@2x~ipad.im4p...
    Personalizing IMG4 component BatteryLow1...
    Extracting glyphplugin@2x~ipad-lightning.im4p...
    Personalizing IMG4 component BatteryPlugin...
    Extracting DeviceTree.j71ap.im4p...
    Personalizing IMG4 component DeviceTree...
    Extracting recoverymode@2x~ipad-lightning.im4p...
    Personalizing IMG4 component RecoveryMode...
    Extracting iBoot.ipad4.RELEASE.im4p...
    Personalizing IMG4 component iBoot...
    Extracting sep-firmware.j71.RELEASE.im4p...
    Personalizing IMG4 component RestoreSEP...
    Extracting sep-firmware.j71.RELEASE.im4p...
    Personalizing IMG4 component SEP...
    Sending NORData now...
    Done sending NORData
    About to send RootTicket...
    Sending RootTicket now...
    Done sending RootTicket
    Waiting for NAND (28)
    Checking filesystems (15)
    Checking filesystems (15)
    Unmounting filesystems (29)
    Unmounting filesystems (29)
    Creating filesystem (12)
    About to send filesystem...
    Connected to ASR
    Validating the filesystem
    Filesystem validated
    Sending filesystem now...
    [==================================================] 100.0%
    Done sending filesystem
    Verifying restore (14)
    [==================================================] 100.0%
    Checking filesystems (15)
    Checking filesystems (15)
    Mounting filesystems (16)
    Mounting filesystems (16)
    About to send KernelCache...
    Extracting kernelcache.release.ipad4...
    Personalizing IMG4 component KernelCache...
    Sending KernelCache now...
    Done sending KernelCache
    Installing kernelcache (27)
    About to send DeviceTree...
    Extracting DeviceTree.j71ap.im4p...
    Personalizing IMG4 component DeviceTree...
    Sending DeviceTree now...
    Done sending DeviceTree
    Certifying Savage (61)
    Flashing firmware (18)
    [==================================================] 100.0%
    Updating gas gauge software (47)
    Updating gas gauge software (47)
    Updating Stockholm (55)
    About to send FUD data...
    Sending FUD data now...
    Done sending FUD data
    About to send FUD data...
    Sending FUD data now...
    Done sending FUD data
    Fixing up /var (17)
    Modifying persistent boot-args (25)
    Unmounting filesystems (29)
    Unmounting filesystems (29)
    Got status message
    Status: Restore Finished
    Cleaning up...
    DONE
  7. The iDevice should reset and boot into the new firmware.
iPad during firmware flashing using libimobiledevice

iPad during firmware flashing using libimobiledevice

If you want to interact with iDevices from within Ubuntu during ordinary use, you could also install some utils and plugins for that. Below will fx. add a context menu in nautilus with info about the iDevice and install the ideviceinstaller command line utility which can be used to administer installed applications on the device.

sudo apt install libimobiledevice-utils nautilus-ideviceinfo ideviceinstaller

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© 2023 Mikkel Kirkgaard Nielsen, contents CC BY-SA 4.0