Trying To Rename or Change .DMG to .IPSW File on Windows? Don’t Do It!
Imagine this situation: You are about to download iOS 9 on your computer running Windows 8 operating system. You realize the file is in DMG format, which cannot be opened on your computer or transferred via iTunes. In other words, you cannot install the new iOS software on your iPhones, iPads, and iPad touches. Here’s why…
DMG is Apple Disk Image that works only on Macs! This confusion is common and it happens to the most of us. In fact, many of them were confused when Apple released iOS 9 Beta 1 — this was a DMG file, instead of IPSW!
Remember: File ending with the .DMG extension does not work on Windows PCs.
iOS Files Should End With .IPSW Extension
I received this question the other day: “I was wondering, though, if it is possible to simply rename the DMG file into IPSW and then restore this IPSW through iTunes player? I am on Windows 7 laptop and I want to download and install iOS file on my iPod Touch.”
I never thought we could convert a file so easily — simply by changing the 3-letter file extension at the end. A 10-minute Googling revealed nothing! So, as I had the iOS 9 beta 1 files on my computer, I decided to see if files can be converted from DMG to IPSW by renaming.
Answer:
I didn’t notice a change in the file size after changing the .DMG extension to .IPSW. What I did notice, when trying to transfer the new IPSW file to my iPhone through iTunes, is that I wasted another another 5 minutes of my life. I couldn’t install the newly created IPSW file.
In simple words, renaming didn’t help. I invested a total of 25 minutes on this — extra 10 minutes to write this article. That said, changing the file back to DMG didn’t damage the iOS firmware file.
Using iOS DMG File on Windows Computer
If you are looking for a solution, I have one! You must visit this article (Convert DMG File into IPSW), where I have shared some of the best tools (free & paid) that will help you to convert and extract DMG file into IPSW file format in less than a minute. Save your time, read that article, as renaming simply doesn’t work!