FAQ: How to Reset a BlackBerry or Remove an IT Policy Using a Mac or PC

Desktop Manager Mac

I was stuck in an interesting situation yesterday and thought I would share what I learned. My friend decided to dump his hosted BES service for BlackBerry Protect now that it is out but he had to get rid of the BES IT Policy on his BlackBerry Tour 9630. Usually that is no problem since there are many tools that will let you do it from your PC like BBMCP, Vnbbutils, BBSAK, etc. The issue was the lack of a Windows PC anywhere in sight.

I decided to do some digging and found out that at least with the latest BlackBerry Desktop Software 2.0 for Mac you can reset a BlackBerry to factory settings from the command line. Reminds me of how we used to have to do it on a PC. I found the answer in some documentation I had lying around but a friend pointed out to me that RIM has the instructions in their knowledge base. Supposedly it can only be done on devices with OS 4.3 through 5.0 but I didn’t have an OS 6.0 device to test it on.

Here is how you do it according to RIM’s official guide. Keep in mind you MUST perform a backup since you will be resetting your BlackBerry to factory defaults:

  1. Close the BlackBerry Desktop Manager, if it is open.
  2. On the Mac computer, open Terminal.
  3. Type cd /Applications/BlackBerry\ Desktop\ Software.app/Contents/MacOS/ and press ENTER.
  4. Type ./bbdm resettofactory

    Note: If the smartphone has a password, type the following command replacing <password> with the password for the smartphone.

    ./bbdm -password <password> resettofactory

That should be it for a Mac. If you are on a PC I highly recommend checking out the easy to use BBMCP, Vnbbutils, or BBSAK but if you must here are the command line instructions from RIM if you have Desktop Manager installed:

Remove the IT policy using the loader.exe application included with BlackBerry® Desktop Manager 4.7 to 6.0 on a Windows® based computer.

Important: This method can only be used on BlackBerry smartphones that are running BlackBerry Device Software 4.3 to 6.0.

Note: When using BlackBerry Desktop Manager 4.6 or earlier, the loader.exe application can be updated by going to www.blackberry.com/update and installing the software when prompted.

Warning: This procedure deletes all data on the BlackBerry smartphone. Back up the data before performing this procedure. For more information on how to back up data, see KB12487.

  1. Connect the smartphone to the computer.
  2. From the Start menu, click Programs > Accessories > Command Prompt.

    Note: When a computer running Windows Vista™ or Windows 7 is used, the user might need to right-click the Command Prompt application and choose Run as administrator.

  3. Find the Apploader folder by typing cd C:\Program Files\Common Files\Research In Motion\Apploader and then pressing ENTER.

    Note: For computers using a 64-bit version of Windows, navigate to C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\Research In Motion\Apploader

  4. Type loader.exe /resettofactory
  5. Type the BlackBerry smartphone password if prompted.
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