Absinthe 2.0 iOS 5.1.1 jailbreak released for iPad, iPhone and iPod

By Chris Davies/May 25, 2012 7:37 am EST

A new jailbreak hack for iOS 5.1.1 on most iPad models plus the iPhone and iPod touch has been released, Absinthe 2.0, allowing for unofficial third-party apps to be installed on Apple's usually locked-down hardware. The handiwork of the Chronic-Dev Team and iPhone Dev Teams, Absinthe 2.0 promises one of the quickest jailbreaks to-date, simply a matter of plugging in a USB cable and clicking a button.

The coders behind the hack do recommend performing a full backup before hand, and then erasing everything from your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch before jailbreaking. That makes the whole thing run quicker, they claim, plus it's good advice just in case something goes wrong.

Currently, the iPad (1,1 – 2,1 – 2,2 – 2,3 – 3,1 – 3,2 – 3,3), iPhone (2,1 – 3,1 – 3,3 – 4,1) and iPod (3,1 – 4,1) are supported. If you have an iPad2,4 – i.e. the iPad 2 model using 32nm chips released earlier this year – you'll have to wait a while, as that's coming later on.

Once you've backed-up, wiped and then plugged in via USB, you can run Absinthe 2.0 and simply wait for it to do its magic. A restore-from-backup brings all your content and apps back home. It's available for OS X 10.5/10.6/10.7 and Windows XP/Vista/7, as well as Linux x86/x86_64 from here.