Good times! It looks like Dev Team's UltraSn0w unlock works with an iPhone 3GS that's been jailbroken via purplera1n. But be warned: Some users are reporting mixed success.
On Friday, George Hotz (aka the guy who unlocked the original iPhone 2G) released his purplera1n iPhone 3GS jailbreak tool.
On the Dev Team's decision to wait until iPhone OS version 3.1 is released, Hotz sniped:
"Normally I don't make tools for the general public, and rather wait for the dev team to do it. But guys, whats up with waiting until 3.1? That isn't how the game is played. We release, Apple fixes, we find new holes. It isn't worth waiting because you might have the "last" hole in the iPhone. What last hole...this isn't golf. I'll find a new one next week."
Meanwhile, Dev Team has posted a video with details of its upcoming iPhone 3GS unlock.
And while many of us were off eating ribs or playing with fireworks, Geohot was busy releasing purplera1n RC2. Amongst a variety of fixes, including less flakiness in the payload, RC2 adds support for more versions of Windows (Vista, Windows 7, International, and 64-bit). Sorry Mac folks, Hotz says an OS X version is coming shortly. Update: Purplera1n RC2a has now also been released for the Mac.
If you're frothing at the mouth to give Purplera1n a try, iPhone Hacks iClarified has a pretty good step-by-step guide. But note: We've not yet tested it ourselves. As with all beta software, try it at your own risk and, please, remember to back everything up first.
I'd also recommend reading through the comments over at George Hotz's blog. Some users have reported random SIM lock-outs and Wi-Fi issues after installing UltraSn0w. Many others are reporting success:
"Louis said...Excellent Jailbreak program! RC2 seems to work better than RC1. Make sure you restore your iPhone 3GS with the original firmware 3.0 from Apple, then run Purplrra1n RC2 from Windows. You must have a valid ATT SIM card to activate the phone, then run Freeze to install Cydia. After rebooting, update Cydia and install ULTRASN0W, then you are ready to use any SIM card you have. Enjoy a jailbroken and unlocked iPhone 3GS!"
Have you tried it? Let us know how it went. Assuming you actually do see a need to jailbreak or unlock, will you wait for OS 3.1 and Dev Team's "official" jailbreak instead? [On The iPhone]