Month: February 2009

How to Unlock the Huawei E220 HSDPA modem

Huawei e220 or Vodafone e220 is the HSDPA modem we usually get from Dialog Telecom or Mobitel GSM (probably from Airtel) when we purchase a mobile broadband connection. But usually it’s operator locked, so we can’t switch between networks when the current ISP starts treating us like dust, If you’ve read my previous post you know I have my reasons to unlock the Huawei e220 modem I got from Dialog Telecom. Here I’m gonna explain how I did that and I’ll try to be as simple as I can. But Feel free to ask for help if u need any.

e220

Disclaimer: I’m not responsible, nor will be held liable, for anything you do with the information I provide in this tutorial. Use it at your own risk.

Ok, since we are done with the traditional “Disclaimer” Lets see what you have to do.

First you’ll have to download the following tools.
e220 CardLock UnLocker
e220 Updater version 11.117.09.04.00
QC Mobile Analysis Tool
And a Hex editor. But if you do it correctly you can do it with an ordinary text editor too 😉

Or you can download and extract this file. It contains all the tools we need for the job, including a lightweight portable hex editor 🙂

Basically, Unlocking the e220 is simple as running the E220 CardLock Unlock tool and entering the unlock code and pressing the “Ok” button. But that’s when you “know” the unlock code.

unlock

So how do we find the unlock code for our modem? that’s where the other tools come in handy.

Plug your modem to the computer and run the E220 Updater. Wait till it detects your modem and then press the “Cancel” button. yes! Cancel it! This is just to make it easier for the “real tool” to identify the modem.

e220UpdateNow open the QC BQS Analyzer and click on Hardware forensics menu, select Use Com/USB Port
QCMob-1Now the “QC Com Diag” window should be open. Most of the time your modem and com port is automatically selected on the Serial Com port drop down list. If not you’ll have to select it manually. And then click on the “Send Cmd” button and wait till the message “Successfully sent command” appears on the bottom right.
QCMob-2

Now Select ” Read EFS” from the Diag Functions drop down menu and Click the “Lets go” button. When it asks, enter the file name e220.bin and save it. A message saying “Successfully read EFS” should appear.

QCMob-3

Now its time to do some hex reading 🙂 Open the e220.bin file from your Hex Editor. And search for the ASCII string Sd, (including the comma) or Search for the for the Hex string 53 64 2c
After few random characters you’ll see a clean 8 digit code. Believe me, it’s easily recognizable and guess what! thats our Unlock code 😀

HexOnce you’ve found the unlock key all you have to do is enter it on the CardLock Unlock utility and click “OK” And your modem is… Unlocked!!! 😀

Hope this will be helpful. I’d absolutely love to know your views on this. Good luck with unlocking your modems 🙂
-seejay

Why I unlocked my HSDPA modem (and why you should too)

As usual it’s old news to my twitter followers that I’ve unlocked my Huawei e220 HSDPA modem I bought with the Mobile Broadband connection from Dialog Telecom. It was operator locked and could only be used with Dialog. Well I must say that I loved mobile broadband. I absolutely loved the fact that I had internet access wherever I go. But unfortunately Dialog has been doing everything possible to ruin that amazing experience. When I got this connection they promised 3.6mbps but I’ve never ever experienced anything more than 1mbps with this. And sometimes the DNS servers get messed making the connection totally unusable.

“Well, they’ll improve the quality of the service eventually and we’ll have a good speed one day” that’s what I thought, but boy was I wrong.

Few weeks back I found that Dialog has officially “changed” the speed of the mobile broadband to 1mbps, It was changed on their web site too. But wait! Then what about the connection I purchased? what about the so called “very very fast” (hilarious! I know! but that’s how they advertised it :p) Internet connection which was supposed to be 3.6mbps???
What came to my mind for the first time was “WTF! who do they think we are? how do they expect to get away with this???” well answer is simple. They perfectly knew that there’s no way they can provide 3.6mbps speed but they LIED! why? why not? They are the *all mighty* Dialog Telecom, and we are just helpless customer fuckNuts.

“They’ve paid us already, So why bother, they can’t switch to any other provider since it’s operator locked” that’s probably what the people at dialog must be thinking.
Well Dialog, I’ve got news for you, Anything which can be locked can be unlocked, at least it’s true with the HSDPA modem you sold us 😛 And thats exactly what I did 😛 and now I own a fully functional Huawei e220 HSDPA modem 😀

The Unlock process was pretty easy and, NO I didn’t pay any money to any company to unlock it 😛 I did it my self after a fair bit of Googling (Thanks to opendns we can still brows the web which is almost impossible if you are using Dialog’s crappy DNS servers 😛 if you are still using them you should seriously try http://opendns.com you’re gonna luv me for suggesting it :P)

Anyway, the first question I got via twitter was “are you gonna switch to Airtel now?” My answer was “No!”

No, I won’t be switching away from Dialog right now. Why? Simply because I’ve agreed to use this connection for 6 months and I will act according to that. Then why did I unlock this? Simple, After 6 months I’m free to do anything, but they know that I can’t switch to any other network and use this modem so they DON’T CARE. But now, since I can switch between networks and still use the same modem, they know I will! and that’s what keep these money hungry companies like Dialog from screwing the customers. And thats exactly why we all should do it! That will teach them a lesson to treat their customers with some respect.

There are lot of places to find ways to unlock the HSDPA modems. And my next post which I’ll be writing tomorrow morning, will also be a how-to on unlocking Huawei e220 which is the most common HSDPA modem in Sri Lanka. Almost all my friends have this model so there’s a good chance you have the same. Let me know If you have any other model. I’ll always be happy to help.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not paid by Airtel or any other company or individual to take down Dialog telecom(LOL!) And this is not just about Dialog. This is true with Mobitel or even with Airtel. My point is that the customer should always have the freedom to switch to a network which offers good quality service. And If they don’t offer that. We should fight for it! I just took the first step.