Refurbished devices

[gray2018]

So, who uses refurbished devices at all? I've been using my S21 Ultra for going on almost a year and a half now that I got in 2022 from Ebay certified refurbished.
It honestly looked brand new and worked great. You wouldn't have known it was refurbished or wasn't new. It came with a year warranty and also 30 day return
policy. I have also had pretty good luck with getting refurbished devices from Samsung directly. That said, you can get refurbished devices from Amazon which
I think is normally what most would gravitate to. Sadly, not all sellers are equal in this regard. I've seen some devices that look brand new, and then I've seen some
that looked like complete garbage and made me question how they got past inspection. Namely one that I actually purchased that had a CRACK in the screen.

I would prefer brand new devices, but a lot of the time when I'm looking for a particular device, it's not sold new anymore so used or refurbished is the only option
a lot of the times. Anybody else use refurbished devices at all or have used one in the past?

 

[B. Diddy]

I've had good experiences with refurbished phones, although the last time was a while ago, with a Pixel 3a XL (which I got from either Woot or DailySteals, can't quite remember). The first iPhone I got for my daughter (an 8 Plus) was also a refurb -- no real problems to speak of.

But just recently, I got a refurb HP Elite C1030 Chromebook through Best Buy Outlet (which was a steal at $259, down from the original price of around $1000 back in 2020). It's really more of a scratch & dent, since there's a bit of both visible on the body. More importantly, the battery health was already down to 84% (and it lasted only about 3.5 hrs on one charge, compared to the 8-10 hrs mentioned in reviews). The happy ending to this story is that since I pay for My Best Buy Total, that covers battery replacement (for $49). They have to send it out for the replacement, but in 2-3 weeks, I should have it back and acting brand new. The total cost of a little over $300 for this super high-end Chromebook (designed for enterprise) still remains a huge bargain!

 

[BerryBubbles]

I've never purchased a refurbished device, but I did purchase a previously owned Galaxy Tab s6 & Tab s8 Ultra from Swappa.

They were both in mint condition with excellent batteries & came with some accessories: keyboards, screen protectors, cables & cases.

I still use the Tab s6 daily. The Tab s8 Ultra is a little heavy for me to use daily but if I need split screen, that's the one I grab.

I was pretty lucky!

 

[notforhire]

I've had good experiences with refurbished phones, although the last time was a while ago, with a Pixel 3a XL (which I got from either Woot or DailySteals, can't quite remember). The first iPhone I got for my daughter (an 8 Plus) was also a refurb -- no real problems to speak of.

But just recently, I got a refurb HP Elite C1030 Chromebook through Best Buy Outlet (which was a steal at $259, down from the original price of around $1000 back in 2020). It's really more of a scratch & dent, since there's a bit of both visible on the body. More importantly, the battery health was already down to 84% (and it lasted only about 3.5 hrs on one charge, compared to the 8-10 hrs mentioned in reviews). The happy ending to this story is that since I pay for My Best Buy Total, that covers battery replacement (for $49). They have to send it out for the replacement, but in 2-3 weeks, I should have it back and acting brand new. The total cost of a little over $300 for this super high-end Chromebook (designed for enterprise) still remains a huge bargain!

I just discovered My Best Buy Total. (no bios blue screen on a year old HP Envy 360) Big fan. And now I know about battery replacement, etc.

 

[B. Diddy]

One of the great things about My Best Buy Total is that it covers every single tech item bought using that account, so the more you get, the cheaper the insurance coverage per device turns out to be. This is in contrast to buying separate insurance (e.g., through SquareTrade) for each device.

 

[joeldf]

I've used reburbs in the past. But only back when AT&T was offering them.

In 2010, I got a refurbished BlackBerry Torch 9800 (the touch-screen/keyboard slider device). Used it for 3 years with no issues. It was replaced in 2013 with...

...a refurbished BlackBerry Z10. I used it for 4 years with no problems.

That was replaced in 2017 with a Galaxy S8, but by then AT&T quit offering refurbished phones. However, the S8 was already just more than half a year out and the world was gearing up for the next S9 series. So AT&T had lowered the price a little.

The refurbs were about half the usual cost even on 2-year contracts, but I certainly got my money's worth out of them.

I sold the 9800 for 50 bucks back in mid-2018. And I was surprised we got that much out of it. I still have the Z10 today. It's only connected to my Wi-Fi, but I keep it to see how long Microsoft will let it stay connected to my outlook email account. Plus, I still visit the CrackBerry forum, and I refer to it if a question comes up that I think I can answer.