Decoding SNs

[Orome]

Is there a serial number decoder for more recent models? The algorithms for decoding SNs here describes schemes that don't match any of my recent models: 32SII, 35s, 15C LE, 300s+, 10s+, Prime?

[striegel]

You may have some luck for the recent models if you use the HP site made for checking warranty status. It can tell you when a device was originally produced by the date of its warranty expiration. That worked for my 50G.

Below is the link for checking in the USA. There is a pull-down box to change the country of purchase.

https://support.hp.com/us-en/checkwarranty

It does not always work and might come back and ask for the product number too. In that case, it wants something like 2AP18AA for the Prime G2, not the model name.

Also, it sometimes says the service or the site is not available.

Alan

[rprosperi]

I've found that the warranty checker hardly ever provides useful results, even for quite new units. I bought a Prime G2 several months ago, it had no idea.

The 32SII should be clear; what is the SN?

Overall, they still generally follow the guidelines for later machines with some tweaks.

For later machines, they use factory codes instead of country codes, and these have never been revealed, though it is believed those beginning with "C" are in China, etc. Also, for the unit number produced that week, they switched to an alphanumeric scheme to hide the number of units produced during the particular week; several reasons for the switch to alphanumeric have been suggested (not enough units using only numbers, hiding produced qty, etc.) but none have ever been officially acknowledged. I chose a cynical choice above...

[Orome]

rprosperi Wrote:  I chose a cynical choice above... ;)

Probably a good bet. A lot of manufacturers like to keep their SNs from revealing any info publicly. It's interesting (and convenient for collectors) that the earlier ones were so easy to decode.