How to Check if Your Android Phone is Refurbished or Factory-New

How to Check if Your Android Phone is Refurbished or Factory-New

Whether you are buying a new phone or getting an existing one swapped out / repaired, you might want to keep an eye out for the casually slipped in refurbished models.

There are two methods for checking whether you Android smartphone is new or Refurbished !

 

Method 1 ~:

Step 1

Tap your Phone app and open up the dealer.

Step 2

Using the touchscreen keypad, Dial ##786# (aka ##RTN#).

No need to press dial, the phone should automatically open up to the RTN screen.  From here Tap View

Note: If this code does not work, try *#*#786#*#* instead. Stars and numbers must be entered in the correct order.

Step 3

Scroll down the RTN screen to Refurbished status. Here there are only two possible status entries:

• Yes – Your phone is a refurbished model.
• No – Congratulations, your phone is not a Refurbished model.  Instead, it is factory new.
  

  Method 2 ~:

  Before we get started, you’ll need to make sure you have an app installed that will add the “activities” option to your shortcut creator.
  Requirements:
  
• An Android phone.  ( only tested this on version 2.1 and higher)
• A custom home screen launcher, suggestion Launcher Pro. (it’s free!)
  ADW Launcher and others also work, but the steps below are shown using Launcher Pro.

All set?  Let’s get started.

Step 1

Go to your homescreen (using a custom launcher) and Long-Press on an empty spot.
The “Add to Home screen” menu should appear; Tap Shortcuts.
This also works with ADW launcher, but the process is changed to Custom Shortcut > Pick your activity > Activities

Step 2

From the next menu, Select Activities.*  Now you should be at a black screen with a list of phone activities.  Slide-down to whatever activity you can find with “hiddenmenu” in the name.
Tap the hiddenmenu entry and then below you’ll see a list of all hidden menus on your phone.  From here you can access any one of them.
*Note this may be called something else if you are using a launcher other than Launcher Pro.

 

Now you have a shortcut to one of your hidden menus on your home screen, and you can keep adding them to your hearts content.  I first chose the RTN hidden menu because several people were wondering how to access it on phones that don’t support the # codes after reading our previous article.  I hope this helps you with your Android phone, and feel free to post a comment below with your results!

It's Done...