How to make your Orange Cellular modem SIM free (or how can you save two business days)

After putting up with low speeds, high latency and bad reception from my Orange operator I’ve decided to move to Pelephone (which has the BEST coverage in the country in case you didn’t know).

While purchasing, I was presented with only one option:
Buy a Cell modem + Sim for 99 NIS/Month - The deal consists of 9.99 NIS for Sim and a whopping 80 NIS for the Cell modem. In exchange you’ll get 5GB traffic with 3.6MBp/s and 200KBp/s for the rest of the month.

For all of you who don’t know, if you already have a Cell modem like me Pelephone offers a smaller package of 1GB of traffic with 7.6MBp/s and 200KBp/s for the rest of the month for only 45 NIS, no package , no commitment for more than one month, pay as you go. The only issue is that this offer only applies for those with an iPad… and Pelephone are really strict and verifies if you have and iPad or not:

Seller: “Do you have an iPad”
Me: “Sure”
Seller: “Good enough for me”

After purchasing this package I faced a different problem, my Option iCON 225 was SIM locked and I had to unlock it to use the Pelephone SIM.A short conversation with an Orange representative discovered the bitter truth: one must place the modem in customer service for two days for it to be unlocked.I enjoy wasting my time like the next guy, but something told me there’s another way so I kicked the guy over the 25-yard line (laces out, of course) and used some Google-FuAs it turns out, someone had already wrote a Python module for unlocking Option iCON 225 so no much work had to be done.

Simply follow the instructions in the link below and you’ll be good to go:http://dogber1.blogspot.com/2010/01/unlocker-for-option-gio225.html

There will be two modules:Msm_unlock – This will load a new firmware to your modem and generates a new unlock codeMsm_apply – This will use the generated unlock code and turn your modem to SIM free

C:\msm-unlock-v1.6>msm_apply.py
msm_apply.py v1.6
Copyright (c) 2009 dogbert <dogber1>, http://dogber1.blogspot.com</dogber1>
This scripts applies the unlock code of Option 3G modems (Icon 225).
Searching for serial ports...
Application serial port: COM3
Please enter the unlock code:
45668462
Unlocking modem...
Disabled PN lock
Unlock successful.
done.

Two days saved ^_^

Update:A month after unlocking the modem, it will start acting a bit funny and won't connect to the new APN.Simply change the APN back, log using your previous SIM and change the APN and SIM back