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iPhone new vs refurb vs ?

O

osxabsd

macrumors member
Original poster
Sep 28, 2009
41
0
My wife bought an iPhone 4s. it turned out to be a dud (it would not charge). She went back to the Apple store 48 hours after purchase. They gave her a "new" one, but it was not in the original box, and came in a re-usable plastic box that the Apple store kept it in. They said it was not refurbished, "new" and never used by anyone as a phone, and it went through more testing than an out-of-box iphone. Sure sounds like a refurbished iPhone to me. Was this really a refurbished iPhone?
 
Nope. The phones for swaps used to be refurbished, that is why if you look at the paperwork they gave you it mentions refurbished parts, but they stopped doing that a few months ago. Your phone that you got is absolutely brand new. There are several reasons that they use that black plastic box instead of the normal box:
- To keep separate from "sellable" stock
- You already have a box and the cables it came with, you don't get a second set because you are not buying a new phone
- Most importantly, Apple sends the iPhone back to be recycled and they use that box to send it back in. They may also test it to see what caused the problem. That is why you probably noticed they put your old phone in it, they attached an ID tag to it.
 
We bought two refurbished 3gs phones from at&t and they have been working perfectly for 2 years. I have no issue with refurbished.
 
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