[raises hand]

Yup. I've done that but it wasn't much less expensive than what I paid. A Eumig 
Projector with an incredible 3fps and the will to hack it into a telecine 
machine. It's still sitting in its box. $90. I saw them go for as little as $60 
and as much as $150. So I guess I fell among the middle ground so it wasn't all 
bad.

I did get a faulty Classic [checkerboard screen] and SW2 for $60 and the guy 
wanted $75 minimum. Both PSUs fully recapped and they are a dream to use! I 
need to retrobrite the cases at some point and add a few o-rings.

But sometimes I just feel that I have to have that thing and I need to count to 
ten and chill out.

I also need to start selling some of my stuff to make a bit of cash!

Some guys my age want a small sports car, I want a low-tech computer that I 
couldn't afford when I was a teenager! Each to his own.

Good night folks,

Keith





On Thursday, 13 March 2014, 3:16, James Fraser 
<[email protected]> wrote:
 

Hello,

>True /market/ worth is only what someone else is willing to pay you for it. 

Agreed.  A seller telling a potential buyer what they *think* an item is worth 
may or may not mean anything to the buyer, who might already have a price in 
mind that they are willing to pay (and/or a husband/wife who has threatened to 
kick them out should they let their enthusiasm run away with them).  Of course, 
"Blue Books" and other price guides are useful because both buyer and seller 
can take a look at them and get some idea of what price point (or price range) 
a (presumably) disinterested third party has assigned to a particular good.

Unfortunately for the sake of uniformity (if not sanity), there aren't many 
hard-and-fast rules when it comes to selling old computer hardware and the 
price paid for a given "old computer" at any given time can fluctuate wildly. 

In short, I think it's safe to say that selling old computer hardware can be a 
bit of crap shoot. :/

(*Buying* old computer hardware, on the other hand, is a *complete* crap shoot, 
IMO.) :D

>Ebay's recent sold items list gives you a good idea of current market worth.

Speaking for myself, I've always viewed eBay as an excellent example of the 
aforementioned phenomenon of prices fluctuating wildly. :)

What I mean is: it's not uncommon for a given item to sell for a relatively 
high price on eBay one week, only to have the price fall drastically (or, yes, 
rise even higher) the following week.  I've always found eBay to be a bit 
tricky to use as an objective price guide simply because conditions there can 
vary so greatly from week to week.  Unless the prices paid are averaged out 
over time (with the proper amount of time being another subjective measure, of 
course), personally, I'd be extremely wary of using recent eBay auctions as 
some sort of yardstick of what an item *ought to* go for and look at them as 
more of an indication of what an item can *possibly* go for, depending. 

I say this because I've seen computer-related items go for both Silly Money and 
for near-giveaway prices on eBay.  That's because the final price of a given 
auction can be affected by such things as: 

The number of people bidding (e.g. one, two, twenty).

The capacity of their wallets.

The exact condition of the item being auctioned (Are all the necessary 
components there?  Are there bonus accessories being offered as well?).

The rarity of the item (Real or imagined; take a drink every time you see the 
word "rare" in an item description and you'll be legless in no time flat). 

How many days the auction is running for (Three days? A week? Perhaps the item 
is being offered at a Buy-It-Now price and will stay up until it sells?)

The reserve price the seller has set, etc.

The point being that using eBay for anything more than getting a ballpark idea 
of what something *might* be worth may result in a seller either under- or 
over-pricing the item they're offering simply because there are so many 
different variables at play there.

Unless someone is in a particular hurry to sell something, the best advice for 
the seller of an old computer or computer-related item might be: price the item 
at a price point that makes you, the seller, happy (after all, it's your item, 
right?).  If you happen to be wrong about the price you set being the current 
"going rate" (i.e. what someone is willing to pay *right now,* this second, as 
opposed to what someone was willing to pay for it last week), well, it won't 
take all that long for that to become apparent because your item will simply 
sit there, unsold. :)

If you're a buyer, on the other hand, you can take comfort in the fact that, 
other than prototypes, there are very few true "one of a kind" items in the 
world of mass-produced computers and peripherals.  Raise your hand if you've 
ever bought something you were convinced you'd never see again, only for 
another example of the same item you just bought to surface a short time later 
for a fraction of the price you paid for yours (not that I'd know anything 
about that myself, of course!). ;)


Best,

James Fraser






-- 
-- 
-----
You received this message because you are a member of the Vintage Macs group.
The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/vintagemacs.shtml and our 
netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml
To post to this group, send email to [email protected]
To leave this group, send email to [email protected]
For more options, visit this group at 
http://groups.google.com/group/vintage-macs

Support for older Macs: http://lowendmac.com/services/
--- 
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups 
"Vintage Macs" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email 
to [email protected].
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

-- 
-- 
-----
You received this message because you are a member of the Vintage Macs group.
The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/vintagemacs.shtml and our 
netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml
To post to this group, send email to [email protected]
To leave this group, send email to [email protected]
For more options, visit this group at 
http://groups.google.com/group/vintage-macs

Support for older Macs: http://lowendmac.com/services/
--- 
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups 
"Vintage Macs" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email 
to [email protected].
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

Reply via email to