SIM card error

[uscpsycho]

I just bought a used Note 3. Everything seems to work fine but I keep getting this error "SIM card removed. Unable to detect your SIM card. Your device will restart to check for your SIM card."

I don't get this error right away, it seems to happen within 30 minutes or so of turning the phone on with the SIM card.

This has happened with two SIM cards so I'm confident it's not the card.

The phone has the latest software updates but no software has been downloaded, the phone hasn't been activated and I haven't even associated it with my Google account. So it's as close to virgin as can be.

Sprint is telling me the phone is fine but the problem is that the phone hasn't been activated.

Can someone shed some light on this? Is this normal or is something wrong with the phone?

 

[Rukbat]

Ask Sprint to activate the phone, and get the name of the person who activated it. Then, when it happens again, you can tell them that X activated it at Y time on Z date and it's still happening.

The SIM card port could be damaged. I doubt it's a lack of activation. (You did notify Sprint to change the account to this phone, right? You have to do that with a CDMA carrier, you can't just swap cards from phone to phone. Part of the "code" in CDMA [Code Division Multiple Access] is the ESN of the particular phone.)

 

[uscpsycho]

Ask Sprint to activate the phone, and get the name of the person who activated it. Then, when it happens again, you can tell them that X activated it at Y time on Z date and it's still happening.

The SIM card port could be damaged. I doubt it's a lack of activation. (You did notify Sprint to change the account to this phone, right? You have to do that with a CDMA carrier, you can't just swap cards from phone to phone. Part of the "code" in CDMA [Code Division Multiple Access] is the ESN of the particular phone.)

No, I haven't activated the phone or anything. Trying to avoid activating the phone until I've fully checked it out and know it works OK. I bought it used from Amazon.

Your response was a little confusing. First you said you doubt the problem is lack of activation, then you suggested it could be because I didn't notify Sprint to switch this phone to my account.

If the problem is not lack of activation then it has to be a hardware problem, in which case I'll return the phone and save myself the hassle of switching phones back and forth.

 

[uscpsycho]

So just to update in case anyone in the future has this problem and finds this thread.

I activated my phone and I no longer receive this error message. There doesn't seem to be anything wrong with my phone, it was simply an activation issue. Strange, but that's what it is.