# two iPhones, two people, one computer



## alra111 (Nov 21, 2009)

Greetings to all,

If there are two of us, each owning his own iPhone, and we want to synchronize them phones to the same iMac, but not have contacts intermingled, plus we may want to synchronize different music artists, is the only way to do this by setting up two different accounts on the iMac, or will the iMac recognize each iPhone as separate and synchronize contacts accordingly?

Thanks,

Rafael


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## ElDiabloConCaca (Nov 21, 2009)

You'd have to set up two accounts.


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## fryke (Nov 22, 2009)

If one of you has a MobileMe account, one can use AddressBook (without MobileMe synching!) to sync addresses to the iPhone, while the other only synchs contacts via MobileMe. So you can still use the same iTunes library (but different playlists or artist selections).


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## cleo (Jun 29, 2010)

I have a simular problem....i have a iphone now and am getting a iphone4...my husband
has a cellphone...now he will put his sim card in his new iphone4..and i will put mine in my new iphone..my question is this....what ever is on my iphone now..will it automatically
go into my husbands iphone?...or will he have to download what ever he wants and it will just go on to his iphone?..the computor is registered to me in my name...and any advice
would be very helpful.... thank you

my husband and i bought the new Iphone4.....i already have the 16gb iphone
so with my new Iphone4 i will just put the sim card in my new Iphone...now
my husband has a cell phone so he will put his sim card in his new Iphone4
now when i sync my Iphone.. will what i have on my Iphone just go on my Iphone or will what i have also go onto my husbands Iphone4?....
i have a Mac OS X G5...Version 10.4.11........ i really want us to have seperate
information for the 2 Iphone4....


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## Giaguara (Jun 30, 2010)

Hi cleo,

If your husband's current phone provider is AT&T (or if you are outside US, whatever provider that has iPhone covered in your country... unless you are in Switzerland where they should be unlocked), it _may_ work if you place his SIM in the other iPhone. 

iPhones are bound to the provider so for sure they don't work with other provider's SIM cards, unless you unlock the phone first (of which the details we can't discuss here for legal reasons). It may not even work with AT&T prepay without unlocking (which was the case for some iPhones I've seen...).
If his current phone is of a totally different kind, say CDMA instead of GSM, the card will not work even unlocked. 

The sync options are covered above as in how they could be done. 
I'd recommend setting either a different user for him and using that with iTunes, or to set the contacts not sync with that phone.

iPhone 4 has minimum system requirements for Mac OS X 10.5.8. So you would need to update your operating system. However, 10.6 is newer and costs only $ 29.


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## ElDiabloConCaca (Jun 30, 2010)

No data is stored on the SIM card when used with the iPhone.

Switching SIM cards will not transfer any data from phone to phone, unless the SIM was used in a phone that does store data on the SIM prior to being installed in the iPhone.


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## cleo (Jun 30, 2010)

so the information from my SIM card that i will be putting on my new iphone4...wont go
onto my husbands iphone when he uses his SIM card from hie cell phone hes using now ?
we just want to keep it separate if thats possible ?


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## ElDiabloConCaca (Jun 30, 2010)

The iPhone doesn't store information on the SIM card -- contacts, calendars, etc. are all stored on the phone itself.

The iPhone can, however, *import* information from a SIM card provided that SIM card was used in a phone that DOES store information (contacts, etc.) on the SIM.

Historically, phones from the late 1990s and early 2000s stored contact information on the SIM card -- this made moving information (which consisted mostly of contacts and not much else) from one phone to another relatively easy.  Now that the "smartphone revolution" is in full swing, much more information needs to be stored on the phone itself, simply because SIM cards don't have the memory capacity to store that kind of information.

It would be best to check and see if your phone you'll be upgrading from stores information on the SIM card -- you can find out by contacting the vendor of the phone (Motorola, Samsung, Nokia, etc.) or possibly by contacting the network agent you had the phone through (AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint, Verizon, etc.).


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## cleo (Jun 30, 2010)

i guess what im asking is...will the information on My new Iphone4 sync to my husbands
new Iphone4..the cell phone he has is only 2 years old and we have AT&T.... i was hoping what i have on my phone doesnt go onto his iphone...so he can get his own stuff other then the music..lol we both like the same music....i know im confusing everyone...its just hard to explain what i mean...sorry....


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## cleo (Jul 1, 2010)

how do you set it so my contacts dont sync with my husbands iphone.... and is there a way to sync just itunes to both iphones and not have to go thru ...contacts...photos and what ever else is on my computer?.....what were trying to do is keep the 2 iphones seperate


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## ElDiabloConCaca (Jul 1, 2010)

To truly keep the two iPhones separate, you should set up two different user accounts in Mac OS X: one for you, one for your husband.  This is the truest and most ideal way to keep the two devices separate -- any other method, and you're looking at workarounds, limitations, and possible overlap in information.

If you truly want to keep them separate and simply refuse to take advantage of Mac OS X's multi-user capabilities the way they're supposed to be taken advantage of (i.e., two, separate user accounts), then you can probably set both iPhones to "manually manage" everything -- photos, music, contacts, etc.

You can then separate your contacts in Address Book into two groups -- one for you, one for the husband.  You can then instruct iTunes to only sync one group with your phone, and the other with your husband's phone.

Since you're manually managing music and photos, you can now simply drag-and-drop only your photos and music onto your iPhone, and your husband can simply drag-and-drop only his photos and music onto his iPhone.

I think you will find it more frustrating and difficult to do it this way, rather than to do it the way it was intended: one human being can access one user account on the machine, and anything that you want to share with another user can be placed in the "Public" folder.

If two users use the same user account, then you will run into limitations and frustrations that may not have any kind of easy workaround.  It's best to do the work now and separate your stuff rather than have it grow larger and larger and present a much more difficult situation to untangle in the future.


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## cleo (Jul 2, 2010)

were going with separate accounts.... we will be sharing some contacts...emails..and music...so how does it work?.....when you sync one of the 2 iphones.. it knows what info
goes on which iphone...sorry to sound confusing but i just want it easy and uncomplicated
for my husband.....thanks for any help....


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## ElDiabloConCaca (Jul 3, 2010)

If you're going to use separate accounts, then only the data under each account will sync with the respective iPhones. You should only connect and sync your iPhone with your user account, and likewise for your husband.

I'm not sure what you mean by "share some contacts" -- each account will have it's own set of Address Book contacts, which are mutually exclusive from each other. Similarly, the same goes for emails as well -- your account will have your emails, and his his... Unless you're somehow setting up the same email address under both accounts...?


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## cleo (Jul 3, 2010)

thanks for all your help......and yes were going to have the same email address under both accounts if thats even possible to do ?...


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## ericmurphy (Jul 13, 2010)

Speaking of SIM cards: I'm upgrading my iPhone 3G to a new iPhone 4 in a couple of weeks, and am having the new phone shipped to me. My understanding is that all I have to do is connect the new iPhone to iTunes, and do a restore from the backup of my 3G iPhone. But do I have to swap in the SIM card from my old phone in order to get AT&T's network to recognize it as my phone?

Mac Pro  dual-quad Nehalem Xeon  2.26 GHz 20.6.4 16 Gig  2 X 1TB HD  30" CD HD
MacBook Pro  2.33 GHz Core2 Duo  3 Gig  100 Gig HD
Mac Mini  2.53 GHz Core2 Duo  4 Gig  320 Gig HD
Mac Mini  1.6 GHz Core Duo  1 GB  60 GB HD


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## ElDiabloConCaca (Jul 13, 2010)

Nope, they're not compatible anyway.  Your old iPhone uses a standard size SIM card.  The iPhone 4 uses a microSIM card.  You can cut a standard SIM down to microSIM size and they'll work, but Apple doesn't expect you to have to do that.

Connect the iPhone 4 to your computer, as you speculated, and iTunes should take care of it for you.


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## dixonbm (Jul 23, 2010)

My wife and I both have iPhones and sync to the same user account on our iMac. 

Address Book & Calendar
We sync our phones' address books and calendars to our individual MobileMe accounts (We have a family pack). 

Music & Videos & Photos
We manage which playlists, photo albums, and videos are synced manually in iTunes.


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