Today I bought an htc evo 4g from someone on an online ad. The guy said it was his girlfriends phone and that she had switched to another carrier. He said that her mom paid off whatever was left, that he called sprint and that everything was good as far as the phone working. I got a hold of the phone, played with it, looked at it for a while... phone works great!

I get home make a phone call to activate it. Sprint says that the phone is still activated on an account that is currently suspended with a remaining unpaid balance. There's absolutely no way that I can activate it while its still under this account that has yet to be paid for. So yes, I realize I am sorry out of luck, got screwed over, made a mistake... But my real question is:

Before I figure out a way to get rid of this phone, is there any way that I can jailbreak/root/gingerbread this phone in a certain way, or ANYTHING I can do to make it to where I can have this phone activated on my account? (without continuously harassing the vendor )

It is the same protection that would stop the activation of a stolen phone. I don't think there is a way around it. I am sorry to hear that you got scammed.

wowsers. my buddy opend and paid monthly for not only his but his sisters service. some drama rama happend n he cut her off. well his sister bought his phone. she demanded it back cus she is a baby back #&!%. he said come take it. blah blah blah she reported her phone lost or stollen so they did some... just... rude computer voodoo that F*$@ed the whole thing up to where he cant activate it w new account or provider. he said he paid 100$ at the local swap meat and dude unlocked it or somethin so he can get service... maybe u should hit up your local flea market or other black market phone dealer n see whats up... other then that. im stuck tryin to root my evo 4g 2. says failed to get root. is your firmware to new? like im supposed to know if my F*#@in firmware is from the future n #&@! anyway good luck bro.

p.s. it took me 10 mins to research, dl, and jailbreak my freakin ipad... y i spent like 12 or more hours tryin to root my evo 4g n htc incredible AND STILL cant dl all the apps for free... WERES ANDROID INSTALLOUS!

Originally Posted by pawel

It is the same protection that would stop the activation of a stolen phone. I don't think there is a way around it. I am sorry to hear that you got scammed.

To activate a lost or stolen phone call Sprint and ask for data services, NOT tech. support. They do all data issues for Sprint Verizon ATT pretty much all cell company's. Either with the owners permision or police they can rememove it from the list and clear the esn.

I did this with a phone I bought off eBay. It was stolen, and the seller wouldn't give me a refund. Paypal refunded my money after I filed a claim and after finding the owner and talking to them and the police that filed the report, I got there permission to activate the phone. It took some work calling everyone but data services are the ones that can clear an esn.

Don't know if it will work for nonpayment but its worth a try.