Joy of Tech had an interesting take on the name of the new iPhone 3G S. It’s entertaining but it does point out one issue…the name of the new iPhone is anything but creative.

[Joy of Tech]

• Make sure your iTunes software is updated to version 8.2
• Plug in your iPhone & sync it normally (this will create a backup to restore in case something goes wrong)
• Hold ALT (Mac only) or SHIFT (PC only) and click the “Restore” button
• Select your downloaded file
• After the sync finishes, it will ask if you would like to sync your phone as a new phone or restore from a previous, restore from a previous device

That’s it! You should have a fully functional iPhone 3G running OS 3.0. A couple quick sidenotes, MMS does NOT work yet on AT&T, it will not be available until later this summer. I was also unable to find any apps that took advantage of the newly added Push notification ability. It is thought that this won’t release until the official date.

Disclaimer: I accept NO responsibility to anything that happens to your phone, computer or any other device during your attempting this upgrade. DO THIS AT YOUR OWN RISK!

Edit: The filenames for the original iPhone as well as the iPod Touch have been found and can be seen below.

• 1st Generation iPhone: iPhone1,1_3.0_7A341_Restore.ipsw
• iPhone 3G: iPhone1,2_3.0_7A341_Restore.ipsw
• iPod Touch: iPod2,1_3.0_7A341_Restore.ipsw

[Gizmodo]

Want a new iPhone 3G but don’t want to sign a 2 year contract or even use AT&T’s service? Lucky for you, now you can get one! AT&T and Apple have both started selling the Apple Iphone 3G without any contract. If you’re looking to use the iPhone on a different carrier, you’ll definitely want to stop by an Apple retail store instead of an AT&T store. Apple will sell a unit to anyone that comes in the door while AT&T will only sell a contract-free iPhone to an existing AT&T customer. Once you have your unit you can unlock it and take it to whoever you want. The price for the contract-free iPhone is significantly higher than with a contract which is to be expected. The 8GB model comes in at $599 while the 16B models come in at $699.

[BGR]

Today I had a need for something to hold my iPhone to play a video. I didn’t really feel like going anywhere and figured maybe I could rig something up. Putting that aside for a second, I hopped on Google Reader and there just happened to be a video in one of my feeds about how to make an iPhone stand out of a paperclip. Check out the video below to make your own.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Here’s the template to make your own.

[Dean and Ying's Blog]

A few weeks we wrote about the mysterious website Konami had up that had a symbol vaguely resembling the Xbox 360 power button as well as the color scheme. We hoped it meant Metal Gear Solid was coming to the Xbox 360 but it looks like we were completely off base. It appears that “A Next Metal Gear Is…” Touch. Looking at the site, there was evidence then that it would be touch. In fact, the url even had “mgst” in it. After digging a little deeper on Konami’s website, we found things about the new Konami Touch games. I may have to give this one a shot on my girlfriend’s iPod Touch whenever it comes around.

Official Konami Touch Website
Original “A Next Metal Gear Is…” Website
Metal Gear Solid Touch Website

Scans from Famitsu

[Photo via Kotaku]

Have you ever wished you could create a random scene of yours and a bunch of your friend’s avatars? Well now you can! With the new Free Your Avatar utility from Microsoft, you can choose a custom background, drag in the avatars of your choice, position, size, add text, etc. then export the image as a .jpg. The tool has built in presets for sizes such as sizes for Facebook, MySpace, Live, iPhone, etc. or you can choose your own custom size.