there is a way to identifiy OLD "newbiefied" items. Try and lock the item down in your house. If it locks, it's not newby. If it says you cannot lock this down, then it IS newby. Just one thing, you gotta be quick in doing this, as a newby item left on the ground will poof in less than a minute. I recently bought a bag of old stuff from a vendor and tested the items this way, it works [got a scissors and a dagger out of the lot:]