Please note, the iPhone is expensive and although its always worked for me some people say they have corrupted their iPhone’s like this. Do it at your own risk!

To Jailbreak iPhone on Windows and install custom ringtones, I recommend Nate True’s thorough Windows Jailbreak guide.

For a Mac how-to (Intel Mac only right now), you might want to try this Intel Mac Jailbreak guide from Hack the iPhone.

Jailbreaking your iPhone is a moderately time-consuming process, but worth the thrill of having an “open iPhone,” in my opinion.

iPhone Jailbreak at work

I Jailbroke my iPhone on Windows, but instead of using the iPhoneInterface program to load custom ringtones on the iPhone as Nate True describes, I used the iRingtoner application, which lets you simply drag & drop songs into a list of custom iPhone ringtones (as shown below).

Custom iPhone ringtones

I had no trouble syncing my iPhone’s custom ringtones using iRingtoner. Update: iRingtoner does not work for me anymore after installing the latest iPhone software update. After each ringtone synced, it appeared immediately in Settings >> Sounds >> Ringtone, but did not appear at first when assigning individual ringtones for contacts. This problem was solved each time by powering off and powering back on my iPhone.

For Intel Mac users, a good alternative to iRingtoner might be bitSplit’s user-friendly iFuntastic software (screenshot below).

I’m glad to finally be rid of those annoying preloaded Apple ringtones — though unfortunately you can’t remove them from the iPhone (yet?). But now I get to listen to my own choice of music when people call me, as I believe I should have always been allowed to do with my iPhone.