How to put a new cell service & phone number on a Motorola Razr

August 21, 2009 8:59 AM

How do I delete old data on a MotoRazr Maxx cell phone which was formerly on Verizon, and set it up as an extra for someone who uses Alltel?

My mother uses Alltel as her cellphone service & she's new to having a mobile phone. Mom thinks she's accident-prone, so she has asked if she can have one of our old phones as a backup in case something happens to hers. We have several outdated phones around the house and I'd like to give her my husband's old MotoRazr Maxx. Problem is, we use Verizon, and his old address book and photos & such are still on the phone even though he doesn't use it and it has no active service (we have Blackberries now). My questions are:
- How can I delete all my husband's data from the phone? The manual from Verizon doesn't explain this.
- How to set it up so Mom can use it with Alltel? Can I "install" her phone number on it myself? Or is it easiest just for her to bring it to her Alltel store & have the magical cellphone elves do it there? (is that even possible?)

I've already searched AskMefi & google but didn't really find what I was looking for. Thanks!

posted by cuddles.mcsnuggy to technology (5 comments total)

Alltel was recently acquired by Verizon. She should be able to call customer service and tell them she would like to move her number to another physical phone. They'll ask her to read some numbers from it and switch it over.
posted by odinsdream at 9:19 AM on August 21

Try these steps for a hard reset:

1. Open your phone up and go to “Settings”
2. Next go to the selection for “Initial Setup”
3. Next go to the selection for “Master Clear”
4. Then select to confirm the option.
5. Now enter the security code which should be “000000”
6. Finally press select or ok and the phone will reset itself to the factory condition
posted by Burhanistan at 9:39 AM on August 21 [1 favorite]

Most phones have a "reset" setting. It's burried somewhere in the system/tools menu. If it asks for a security code, try the last four digits of the previous phone #.

Swapping a phone is really really easy. You call Verizon customer service, and you go through a few prompts, and I think you choose "activate equpiment." After verifying some billing/security information, they will ask for the IMEI #, which you can find by taking the battery out of the phone. They will switch it in their system and then ask you to press a few buttons on the phone which will activate it.

Verizon has a cool feature called "Backup assistant." I think there may be a small monthly fee, but if you have a lot of contacts it might be worth it. It remotely backs up your address book every day. If you switch to a new phone, you then put backup assistant on that phone and it downloads your contacts for you.

(I don't work for Verizon, but I handle cell phones at work and we have Verizon so I'm sadly very familiar with all this.)
posted by radioamy at 9:44 AM on August 21 [1 favorite]

I actually did something like this for my dad today. He went swimming with his phone, so I gave him an old phone of mine. I logged into his Verizon account online (which I'm assuming she'll have soon if Alltel was acquired by Verizon?) selected activate new phone, entered the serial number, and that was it. The link was right on the main page.
posted by Ruki at 10:52 AM on August 21

Don't forget *228 on the new phone once you follow Ruki's advice
posted by ijoyner at 7:42 AM on August 23