TheAbandonwareGuy: The exact numbers I gave are soft 🙁 But they aren't off by an extreme amount. If I had to give a accurate numbers then the original price was between $20 & $40 and the new price between $200 & $400, probably between a 5x to 10x markup. It's been a while, and my memory isn't what it used to be. This happened back in the early 2000's (2001-2003.) It was a couple of years after my income had taken a dramatic drop (1999.) I was a little more sensitive to prices at the time. I've always looked for good deals, but was comforted in the knowledge that if a reasonable price didn't come along, I could pay a higher price if I decided to. That didn't hold true any more, and when I saw cases with strong indications of someone buying up all the reasonably priced items to force a price inflation, I tended to be a little more observant towards them.

So, I can't tell you exactly what it was. During that period, I was mostly concentrating on vintage games (board, card, & computer,) and Amiga hardware. So if fell into one of those categories. You can find cases now, though the collectable hoarders are more common forms. Look for an item that usually sells for lower prices appearing suddenly for much higher prices, usually more than one at a time. Then pull up the history. I tend to set up saved searches, so when I'm in the mood to observe one of the cases, I just add it to my saved searches & check it on a daily basis. I see what's being offered, then click a couple of buttons to check the recent sales. Usually, for a short period, more reasonably priced items will appear, only to sell quickly. Once this pattern is spotted, you know you've found one. Though, recently, I haven't seen anything with more than a 2-3x markup ($50 to $100 or $150.) It's usually a low priced item that "could" actually be more. A card or MB that's been selling for $25, but there usually isn't more that 5-10 available at any given time, but they do sell fairly regularly. Those seem to be the types of items targeted.

Others: I very rarely take advantage of "second chance" offers. There were a couple of times, though, when I did go ahead and get it. I don't think I'll ever sell on eBay again 🙁 Been burned twice by what appears to be a "the customer never lies," policy they've taken recently. Well, technically, my sister was burned the second time, but it was through my account. Since then, I've only sold on forums that allow it.

Also much of the price increase recently is due to the roaring economy. People have way more disposable income, and they find ways to use it. During a recession, expect prices of non-essential items to crater. Seeing as how we have a fiscal idiot at the helm of the US (and the fact that the last 8 year bull run is unprecedented), I would expect a recession within the next 1-2 years.

About the LGR thing, I saw his Unisys video and checked the eBay page where someone was selling them. At that time it was 85 dollars. Checked a day later, seller hiked it up to 95. Checked it the next week and I think it's now around 145 dollars, officially putting it out of my price range for the time being. And the seller still charges shipping.

Welp.

cj_reha wrote:

About the LGR thing, I saw his Unisys video and checked the eBay page where someone was selling them. At that time it was 85 dollars. Checked a day later, seller hiked it up to 95. Checked it the next week and I think it's now around 145 dollars, officially putting it out of my price range for the time being. And the seller still charges shipping.

Welp.

Basically a smaller scale version of what happened to the value of Pokemon games after PokeMon Go came out. One day they were $20, the next they were $50+

snorg wrote:

Price inflation frustrates me too. I used to see listings on E-bay for Amiga 2000 and 3000 desktops for $200-$300 all the time, now they're going for $600 or more.
I have no doubt overpaid for some of my items (286, 386 and 486 specifically) although nothing like $200 for a single motherboard or $500 for a system. Compared to the days of being able to get a curbside 486 or pick up in a thrift shop for peanuts, $50 for a system board is pretty pricey. Am I also guilty of using my systems not nearly as much as I should? Yes, most of the time they are sitting in the closet. I think I'm going to try and narrow my collection down to 2 or 3 "must have" systems and put the others up for sale for something reasonable, so someone else can enjoy them.

Regarding my own personal Amiga quest, I realize I'm probably just going to have to settle for Amiga Forever running on a raspberry pi, along with the Amiga 500 I managed to get my hands on. And sure enough, no sooner did I manage to get one did I start to see listings for $400 and $500 for Amiga 500 as well. Some of that could be being driven by the coming Vampire add-on, which is suddenly making these older systems attractive once again.

Interesting... I did notice older hardware costing more recently. I assumed it was originally due to the USPS postage increase costs. But also time has a way of increasing value. When Jobs died all the Apple stuff jacked up right away. I'm glad I grabbed some of this stuff a decade ago when shipping costs were affordable and these stuff even at that time $200 or more was still costly to purchase. I can't imagine someone paying $600 plus for an Amiga computer? Amiga 2000+ I tend to see these listed at higher prices but because their gaming compatibility is worse I wonder why pay more for these.

Jorpho wrote:

xplus93 wrote:

Is anybody worried that the hobby is focusing too much on prestige and exclusivity?

Seems to me that point was passed quite some time ago. Are there not many people out there building 386 or 486 systems because they neeeed to have this vital piece of PC History for the sake of preservation because even though there are alternatives which look and sound the same for all practical purposes, they just don't feel right? And do these systems that are constructed after much time, effort, and expense not tend to sit around collecting dust afterwards? Prestige and exclusivity would appear to be where it's at.

The greatest need I would see in owning something in the 386 and 486 era computer is for using copy protection hardware. Most people today would probably stumble up on a cracked version of some abandonware software online and use DOSBOX which would nullify the need to own or build such a system. But for the hardcore that need to duplicate Non-DOS bootable games or copy protected disks anything faster than this era of computer the copying software may not function properly or at all. Not all Non-DOS bootable or copy protected games have been cracked at least if they all have then these systems would definitely decrease in value tremendously or be donated or recycled.

xplus93 wrote:

Is anybody worried that the hobby is focusing too much on prestige and exclusivity?

Worried? Not really. But that doesn't mean that I prefer it to be this way. If it were my choice, I would've preferred for things to stay the way they were 10 years ago, but that's not realistic.

Jorpho wrote:

Seems to me that point was passed quite some time ago. Are there not many people out there building 386 or 486 systems because they neeeed to have this vital piece of PC History for the sake of preservation because even though there are alternatives which look and sound the same for all practical purposes, they just don't feel right? And do these systems that are constructed after much time, effort, and expense not tend to sit around collecting dust afterwards? Prestige and exclusivity would appear to be where it's at.

I've build rigs that basically ended up catching dust, but were basically build from freebies. Sometimes things just end up that way, though I can imagine that your example is actually a realistic one.
I think bought prestige is just stupid and boring, but so are the people who gravitate towards such people. I just tend to kinda ignore such people.

TheAbandonwareGuy wrote:

I sway extremely towards either bottom end parts or high end parts. Like for example I own 2 GeForce 256s... But I also bought a SiS 6326 which is the slowest AGP video card on the planet. I have to admit I do (especially on the software side of things) have a tendency to hoard trophy pieces like the floppy library of a former high rank IBM engineer with lots of rare source code and stuff (which Is all going to the internet archive as soon as I find a box for it). Around here I feel a need to compete in terms of collection size and value with members like hard1k and artex or I feel like my status in the community is lesser.

Hopefully, in about 20 years or after upcoming quantum leap we will be able to 3D print all the vintage PC parts we desire. At least until someone ***** it up with DRM and brands that "physical piracy" or some shit.

You shouldn't need to feel lesser only because someone else has more stuff than you. It may be true that some people simply get what you can't due to throwing tons of money into it, but most people who have more stuff then you will either have better ways or find more luck, or they simply have been busy for a longer amount of time.
And you have the "bad luck" of having been too young to have actively hoarded tons of parts 10 years ago or longer ago, why would anyone here look down onto you for just that? Noone will (or lets hope so 😜).
To me it doesn't matter if someone has 2 cheaper retro rigs or 200 extremely exclusive and rare ones. To me it's more about what these people have to say about their hobby and what information they share about it and how they experience it 😀
I'm not envious towards anyone here, no matter how shitty my life may become.

Tetrium wrote:

xplus93 wrote:

Is anybody worried that the hobby is focusing too much on prestige and exclusivity?

Worried? Not really. But that doesn't mean that I prefer it to be this way. If it were my choice, I would've preferred for things to stay the way they were 10 years ago, but that's not realistic.

I'm in the same boat. 10 years ago vintage stuff was still quite affordable. Shipping costs even domestically were not insane. International shipping costs were pretty high when shipping outbound but receiving it was a blessing in disguise.

You shouldn't need to feel lesser only because someone else has more stuff than you. It may be true that some people simply get […]
Show full quote

Hopefully, in about 20 years or after upcoming quantum leap we will be able to 3D print all the vintage PC parts we desire. At least until someone ***** it up with DRM and brands that "physical piracy" or some shit.

You shouldn't need to feel lesser only because someone else has more stuff than you. It may be true that some people simply get what you can't due to throwing tons of money into it, but most people who have more stuff then you will either have better ways or find more luck, or they simply have been busy for a longer amount of time.
And you have the "bad luck" of having been too young to have actively hoarded tons of parts 10 years ago or longer ago, why would anyone here look down onto you for just that? Noone will (or lets hope so 😜).
To me it doesn't matter if someone has 2 cheaper retro rigs or 200 extremely exclusive and rare ones. To me it's more about what these people have to say about their hobby and what information they share about it and how they experience it 😀
I'm not envious towards anyone here, no matter how shitty my life may become.

Hmm. I don't see any reason to be envious of someone with an old system. You pay for what's it's worth to you buy within reason. A few times you might overpay if you just want one and don't have the time and focus to keep hunting for the right price. There are some pretty rich or insane people out there. I recall seeing an Ultima 1 cassette version sold for several thousands a decade ago and the box wasn't in the best condition. I wonder what the going rate is today. A recent Apple III computer sold for a couple thousand but I wouldn't pay more than $300 for it and most likely due to its rarity you might not ever turn it on often or use it as a common system.

If anything I would prefer to parsing out some of my computer memorabilia to get some space back and money. Not everyone prefers to have 200 retro rigs. Even myself I think I might have close to that amount but they aren't all individual and rare ones. Some are new old parts that could be assembled into new rigs which some today may find valuable whereas 20 years it was about to be metal recycled. But I think most people would prefer to have more space and money and that's where I'm at these days.

Looks like it all boils down to whether you just want 1-2 systems to play those 300 of hours of gold box RPGs and Doom in a nostalgic setting or you collect. You have issue with rising prices only in the second case (when you collect) it seems, no?

alexsydneynsw wrote:

Looks like it all boils down to whether you just want 1-2 systems to play those 300 of hours of gold box RPGs and Doom in a nostalgic setting or you collect. You have issue with rising prices only in the second case (when you collect) it seems, no?

I would seek out the hardware over the software. Software will eventually be imaged and that can be converted back to a genuine floppy or used in an emulator. But these days with so many emulators you could still experience the golden era of computing without emptying out your wallet.

It's kind of the same issue retro console gaming is having, people become aware of the "value" of something according to some people, so they sell it at that higher price. People start talking about it, they think everything they own is rare, and suddenly prices go up, people buy more, and people unwittingly buy the overpriced crap. At least that's what I noticed. The thing is, this only seems to affect the super popular, high end, """iconic""", and rare parts of retro computing. The Voodoos, the Pentium 3 Slot 1 1Ghz (at least for a short time), the AWE64s, those were all expensive last time I checked.

And then you have the ridiculous amount of cheap and just as effective TNT2s, Pentium 3 Slot 1 600/733Mhz, and SB16s with YMF262s/CT1747s. I honestly doubt there's going to be any exclusivity or prestige issues because I think the people who are genuinely interested in retro computing, not because it's popular, but because they want to experience that era, won't have any issues getting into it because there's a lot of options that are affordable and will likely stay affordable.

SpeedySPCFan wrote:

It's kind of the same issue retro console gaming is having, people become aware of the "value" of something according to some people, so they sell it at that higher price. People start talking about it, they think everything they own is rare, and suddenly prices go up, people buy more, and people unwittingly buy the overpriced crap. At least that's what I noticed. The thing is, this only seems to affect the super popular, high end, """iconic""", and rare parts of retro computing. The Voodoos, the Pentium 3 Slot 1 1Ghz (at least for a short time), the AWE64s, those were all expensive last time I checked.

And then you have the ridiculous amount of cheap and just as effective TNT2s, Pentium 3 Slot 1 600/733Mhz, and SB16s with YMF262s/CT1747s. I honestly doubt there's going to be any exclusivity or prestige issues because I think the people who are genuinely interested in retro computing, not because it's popular, but because they want to experience that era, won't have any issues getting into it because there's a lot of options that are affordable and will likely stay affordable.

True I remember AWE64s selling for $20 or less 10 years ago with free shipping. But with DOSBOX the only OS not truly emulated fully for gaming is Windows 95/98. If a proper Voodoo5 emulation can be done in DOSBOX for XP then I would think most people would go that route. It's a big headache dealing with Windows 98. Eventually the prices for these hardware components will fall down.

I've been in the "scene" for awhile now but my collection has been pretty narrow and focused on things I personally enjoy and care about more so than just having anything and everything that's cool and popular - or just having everything in general.

I've downsized quite a bit lately. Things I never use went up for sale. I didn't need four of the same motherboard, or a lot of GeForce2 GTS cards, or a stack of 1GHz Pentium IIIs. I had them because they were good prices or free, but what good were they sitting on a shelf? I sold the GF2 cards for $10 AUD each plus postage which I think is a fair price. I'd seen them sell on eBay for anywhere from $15 to $30 plus postage for the standard OEM models. In the process I had some people tell me I was undercharging. I disagreed and thought other people were overcharging. The cards are everywhere. They aren't worth $25.

At the same time, I still made a profit off those cards. I sold below market price and still made a profit. Everyone was happy. There's nothing wrong with making a profit. It's trying to rip people off by making them think things are worth more than they should be that is the problem.

Electromyne's GeForce2 Ultra for 300 EUR was stupid. I don't know if they sold it or what happened to it, but if someone bought that they either got ripped off or have a lot of disposable income. I felt some regret after buying my GF2 Ultra that was a Canopus Spectra 8800 for close to $110 AUD from Japan. It was in the original box, with all the original manuals and other inclusions in perfect working order. It cost me a lot of money, and I believe the most expensive retro part I'd ever bought. $90 for an old video card? What was I thinking? I had wanted it for a long time, and when I finally had the chance to own one I had to. In the end, I'm glad I did. I'll probably never see another one in my life.

With that said, if someone posted that exact thing on eBay today they'd be getting 3-4x as much as I paid for mine.

I think there just cults that develop around certain products or brands - and not just in retro PCs. Any brand. But here we've got the 3dfx/Quantum3D cards, the GUS cards, and an emerging trend for the greatest in high end late 90s hardware. People who liked computers back then are getting to an age where they are getting anywhere from their first real jobs (early-mid 20s) to proper disposable income. I don't think it is any coincidence that the "new" generation of retro enthusiasts/collectors/hoarders grew up with the modern PC and are likely getting into well paid IT jobs. Retro gaming is cool now. The 90s are cool now. Nostalgia makes people do crazy things.

I think the face of the hobby is changing for sure. Supply is drying up at computer markets and flea markets. People don't throw out 486/P5//P6/P III anymore. You sometimes find an old C2D if it isn't recycled. The same can be said for garage sales. Family owned computer stores with old hardware hoarded out the back are going the way of the dodo with price pressure from ecommerce giants. eBay is full of resellers and overchargers because of reasons mentioned in this thread already. More people are holding onto their collection because things are getting so hard to find in working order, or because they think they can sell it for more profit as the retro trend continues. People's only good chance at a bargain these days is winning an auction, finding one locally or making friends with fellow collectors.

I all but gave up on eBay for buying outside the most common of things like RAM and cables. I still check closing down businesses for old hardware with less success as the years have gone on. More than once I've resorted to getting things I really want from Asia (Japan/Korea and sometimes China). The shipping is expensive so I have to group buy things with friends, family and acquaintances who want clothing or other pop culture stuff to make it economical for all of us. The retro craze is a lot less pronounced there if it even exists.

It's great that new people are joining the hobby. Whether its for playing games, for the hardware, the software, the nostalgia or just for fun - the more the merrier. The only real downside is with more people comes rising prices. Supply is limited and demand is growing. Perhaps one day the trend will die, people who only collected because it is beginning to become "cool" will sell off their collections when the 2000's become cool and 80/90's are out. 🤣

x0zm_ wrote:

I've been in the "scene" for awhile now but my collection has been pretty narrow and focused on things I personally enjoy and ca […]
Show full quote

I've been in the "scene" for awhile now but my collection has been pretty narrow and focused on things I personally enjoy and care about more so than just having anything and everything that's cool and popular - or just having everything in general.

I've downsized quite a bit lately. Things I never use went up for sale. I didn't need four of the same motherboard, or a lot of GeForce2 GTS cards, or a stack of 1GHz Pentium IIIs. I had them because they were good prices or free, but what good were they sitting on a shelf? I sold the GF2 cards for $10 AUD each plus postage which I think is a fair price. I'd seen them sell on eBay for anywhere from $15 to $30 plus postage for the standard OEM models. In the process I had some people tell me I was undercharging. I disagreed and thought other people were overcharging. The cards are everywhere. They aren't worth $25.

At the same time, I still made a profit off those cards. I sold below market price and still made a profit. Everyone was happy. There's nothing wrong with making a profit. It's trying to rip people off by making them think things are worth more than they should be that is the problem.

Electromyne's GeForce2 Ultra for 300 EUR was stupid. I don't know if they sold it or what happened to it, but if someone bought that they either got ripped off or have a lot of disposable income. I felt some regret after buying my GF2 Ultra that was a Canopus Spectra 8800 for close to $110 AUD from Japan. It was in the original box, with all the original manuals and other inclusions in perfect working order. It cost me a lot of money, and I believe the most expensive retro part I'd ever bought. $90 for an old video card? What was I thinking? I had wanted it for a long time, and when I finally had the chance to own one I had to. In the end, I'm glad I did. I'll probably never see another one in my life.

With that said, if someone posted that exact thing on eBay today they'd be getting 3-4x as much as I paid for mine.

I think there just cults that develop around certain products or brands - and not just in retro PCs. Any brand. But here we've got the 3dfx/Quantum3D cards, the GUS cards, and an emerging trend for the greatest in high end late 90s hardware. People who liked computers back then are getting to an age where they are getting anywhere from their first real jobs (early-mid 20s) to proper disposable income. I don't think it is any coincidence that the "new" generation of retro enthusiasts/collectors/hoarders grew up with the modern PC and are likely getting into well paid IT jobs. Retro gaming is cool now. The 90s are cool now. Nostalgia makes people do crazy things.

I think the face of the hobby is changing for sure. Supply is drying up at computer markets and flea markets. People don't throw out 486/P5//P6/P III anymore. You sometimes find an old C2D if it isn't recycled. The same can be said for garage sales. Family owned computer stores with old hardware hoarded out the back are going the way of the dodo with price pressure from ecommerce giants. eBay is full of resellers and overchargers because of reasons mentioned in this thread already. More people are holding onto their collection because things are getting so hard to find in working order, or because they think they can sell it for more profit as the retro trend continues. People's only good chance at a bargain these days is winning an auction, finding one locally or making friends with fellow collectors.

I all but gave up on eBay for buying outside the most common of things like RAM and cables. I still check closing down businesses for old hardware with less success as the years have gone on. More than once I've resorted to getting things I really want from Asia (Japan/Korea and sometimes China). The shipping is expensive so I have to group buy things with friends, family and acquaintances who want clothing or other pop culture stuff to make it economical for all of us. The retro craze is a lot less pronounced there if it even exists.

It's great that new people are joining the hobby. Whether its for playing games, for the hardware, the software, the nostalgia or just for fun - the more the merrier. The only real downside is with more people comes rising prices. Supply is limited and demand is growing. Perhaps one day the trend will die, people who only collected because it is beginning to become "cool" will sell off their collections when the 2000's become cool and 80/90's are out. 🤣

Nice interesting spiel. These days I usually buy SATA extension cables very cheap from Asia where I am not worried about things failing. They either work or they don't. Molex and SATA power adapters. Other items I enjoy getting from time to time are the SSDs where people are obsessed with 2TB I'm going for the smaller ones which fit my needs.

As for the other sounds cards. It might be interesting to hear how a different sound card brand sound / music was interpreted but overall once you enjoy the best version of it you can't really go back to an inferior one.

I did like the Warcraft 2 intro version brought by the Ensoniq PCI over the SB ISA version. That's the only exception where I preferred it when used to the SB ISA version.

snorg wrote:

Price inflation frustrates me too. I used to see listings on E-bay for Amiga 2000 and 3000 desktops for $200-$300 all the time, now they're going for $600 or more.
I have no doubt overpaid for some of my items (286, 386 and 486 specifically) although nothing like $200 for a single motherboard or $500 for a system. Compared to the days of being able to get a curbside 486 or pick up in a thrift shop for peanuts, $50 for a system board is pretty pricey. Am I also guilty of using my systems not nearly as much as I should? Yes, most of the time they are sitting in the closet. I think I'm going to try and narrow my collection down to 2 or 3 "must have" systems and put the others up for sale for something reasonable, so someone else can enjoy them.

Regarding my own personal Amiga quest, I realize I'm probably just going to have to settle for Amiga Forever running on a raspberry pi, along with the Amiga 500 I managed to get my hands on. And sure enough, no sooner did I manage to get one did I start to see listings for $400 and $500 for Amiga 500 as well. Some of that could be being driven by the coming Vampire add-on, which is suddenly making these older systems attractive once again.

I used to see Amiga 2000's for $50-100 plus shipping all the time, but that was ages ago when I actively collected Amiga machines. These days I have all the Amigas I need (A1200, A2000, A3000, A4000, A500, A1000) and I got them cheap. Don't feel the need to sell them even if I don't use them that often because replacing them would be too expensive.

This is a hobby to me and I don't pay "going ebay rates" for anything outside of commodity Chinese parts. I collected old 8bit/Amiga/Mac/PC gear when nobody else wanted any of it. You could find whole C64 systems on freecycle back then. I purchased 75+ mint boxed Amiga games for a few bucks a piece because literally nobody wanted them. Sure I have too many extra 386 and 486 motherboards but if I didn't snag them they would have been recycled a long time ago.

Prices are going up because new people are entering the hobby and outside of a bunch of old time hoarders there isn't that much of a supply anymore. People mention recyclers but they pretty much snagged all the 486 boards and CPUs that exist in their stream a long time ago. Things are over priced when they don't sell. If I can sell a Picasso any day of the week for $20M then it is not over priced. I do think some sellers are only selling to the extreme high end of the market and it takes a while to sell but they eventually do sell their stuff. The cheap gear that probably needs some work throws people off, but I go after them because they can usually be fixed cheap enough. Recapping or fixing blown tracks is a needed skill these days unless you want to pay somebody else to do it for you (which reflects ebay working condition pricing).

I don't think the upward pricing trend is going to keep people out of the hobby, but it will influence how big and expansive their collection will be. Some people will have to resort to bartering and trading instead of flat out buying which isn't a problem. Of course if some outfit starts slabbing 3dfx cards (for example) in tamper proof plastic with "ratings" on them and selling them as retirement funds then you know the hobby is screwed and you need to sell out and get out fast.

Unknown_K wrote:

I used to see Amiga 2000's for $50-100 plus shipping all the time, but that was ages ago when I actively collected Amiga machine […]
Show full quote

snorg wrote:

Price inflation frustrates me too. I used to see listings on E-bay for Amiga 2000 and 3000 desktops for $200-$300 all the time, now they're going for $600 or more.
I have no doubt overpaid for some of my items (286, 386 and 486 specifically) although nothing like $200 for a single motherboard or $500 for a system. Compared to the days of being able to get a curbside 486 or pick up in a thrift shop for peanuts, $50 for a system board is pretty pricey. Am I also guilty of using my systems not nearly as much as I should? Yes, most of the time they are sitting in the closet. I think I'm going to try and narrow my collection down to 2 or 3 "must have" systems and put the others up for sale for something reasonable, so someone else can enjoy them.

Regarding my own personal Amiga quest, I realize I'm probably just going to have to settle for Amiga Forever running on a raspberry pi, along with the Amiga 500 I managed to get my hands on. And sure enough, no sooner did I manage to get one did I start to see listings for $400 and $500 for Amiga 500 as well. Some of that could be being driven by the coming Vampire add-on, which is suddenly making these older systems attractive once again.

I used to see Amiga 2000's for $50-100 plus shipping all the time, but that was ages ago when I actively collected Amiga machines. These days I have all the Amigas I need (A1200, A2000, A3000, A4000, A500, A1000) and I got them cheap. Don't feel the need to sell them even if I don't use them that often because replacing them would be too expensive.

This is a hobby to me and I don't pay "going ebay rates" for anything outside of commodity Chinese parts. I collected old 8bit/Amiga/Mac/PC gear when nobody else wanted any of it. You could find whole C64 systems on freecycle back then. I purchased 75+ mint boxed Amiga games for a few bucks a piece because literally nobody wanted them. Sure I have too many extra 386 and 486 motherboards but if I didn't snag them they would have been recycled a long time ago.

Prices are going up because new people are entering the hobby and outside of a bunch of old time hoarders there isn't that much of a supply anymore. People mention recyclers but they pretty much snagged all the 486 boards and CPUs that exist in their stream a long time ago. Things are over priced when they don't sell. If I can sell a Picasso any day of the week for $20M then it is not over priced. I do think some sellers are only selling to the extreme high end of the market and it takes a while to sell but they eventually do sell their stuff. The cheap gear that probably needs some work throws people off, but I go after them because they can usually be fixed cheap enough. Recapping or fixing blown tracks is a needed skill these days unless you want to pay somebody else to do it for you (which reflects ebay working condition pricing).

I don't think the upward pricing trend is going to keep people out of the hobby, but it will influence how big and expansive their collection will be. Some people will have to resort to bartering and trading instead of flat out buying which isn't a problem. Of course if some outfit starts slabbing 3dfx cards (for example) in tamper proof plastic with "ratings" on them and selling them as retirement funds then you know the hobby is screwed and you need to sell out and get out fast.

I dont know. The thought that always cross's my mind is: How many people out there exist with the high level of profecciency needed to keep these Vintage machines running for any duration of time.

TheAbandonwareGuy wrote:

Unknown_K wrote:

I used to see Amiga 2000's for $50-100 plus shipping all the time, but that was ages ago when I actively collected Amiga machine […]
Show full quote

snorg wrote:

Price inflation frustrates me too. I used to see listings on E-bay for Amiga 2000 and 3000 desktops for $200-$300 all the time, now they're going for $600 or more.
I have no doubt overpaid for some of my items (286, 386 and 486 specifically) although nothing like $200 for a single motherboard or $500 for a system. Compared to the days of being able to get a curbside 486 or pick up in a thrift shop for peanuts, $50 for a system board is pretty pricey. Am I also guilty of using my systems not nearly as much as I should? Yes, most of the time they are sitting in the closet. I think I'm going to try and narrow my collection down to 2 or 3 "must have" systems and put the others up for sale for something reasonable, so someone else can enjoy them.

Regarding my own personal Amiga quest, I realize I'm probably just going to have to settle for Amiga Forever running on a raspberry pi, along with the Amiga 500 I managed to get my hands on. And sure enough, no sooner did I manage to get one did I start to see listings for $400 and $500 for Amiga 500 as well. Some of that could be being driven by the coming Vampire add-on, which is suddenly making these older systems attractive once again.

I used to see Amiga 2000's for $50-100 plus shipping all the time, but that was ages ago when I actively collected Amiga machines. These days I have all the Amigas I need (A1200, A2000, A3000, A4000, A500, A1000) and I got them cheap. Don't feel the need to sell them even if I don't use them that often because replacing them would be too expensive.

This is a hobby to me and I don't pay "going ebay rates" for anything outside of commodity Chinese parts. I collected old 8bit/Amiga/Mac/PC gear when nobody else wanted any of it. You could find whole C64 systems on freecycle back then. I purchased 75+ mint boxed Amiga games for a few bucks a piece because literally nobody wanted them. Sure I have too many extra 386 and 486 motherboards but if I didn't snag them they would have been recycled a long time ago.

Prices are going up because new people are entering the hobby and outside of a bunch of old time hoarders there isn't that much of a supply anymore. People mention recyclers but they pretty much snagged all the 486 boards and CPUs that exist in their stream a long time ago. Things are over priced when they don't sell. If I can sell a Picasso any day of the week for $20M then it is not over priced. I do think some sellers are only selling to the extreme high end of the market and it takes a while to sell but they eventually do sell their stuff. The cheap gear that probably needs some work throws people off, but I go after them because they can usually be fixed cheap enough. Recapping or fixing blown tracks is a needed skill these days unless you want to pay somebody else to do it for you (which reflects ebay working condition pricing).

I don't think the upward pricing trend is going to keep people out of the hobby, but it will influence how big and expansive their collection will be. Some people will have to resort to bartering and trading instead of flat out buying which isn't a problem. Of course if some outfit starts slabbing 3dfx cards (for example) in tamper proof plastic with "ratings" on them and selling them as retirement funds then you know the hobby is screwed and you need to sell out and get out fast.

I dont know. The thought that always cross's my mind is: How many people out there exist with the high level of profecciency needed to keep these Vintage machines running for any duration of time.

If you for example have a look on the VCF, I don't think the supply of knowledge to keep these systems running will be dead soon and skills like soldering are probably not going to disappear so I think we're good hehe 😁
And the "rated" 3DFX tamper proof plastics thingy sounds a bit unsettling 😵

And I can relate to "If I hadn't snagged it up, it would've not existed anymore" bit, especially and for instance the old AT cases and many of the AT motherboards.

edit:
Otoh, I suspect one will have to be even more creative as time goes by, in order to keep things running. And I noticed that (obviously) the last 5 years, the old age of all this equipment is becoming more of a central thingy to keep in mind. This wasn't much of a problem 10 years ago.
And because stuff has gotten more expensive (which is to be expected when looking at it from a supply/demand perspective), it's more "rewarding" to sell off stuff you know is actually broken (just sell it "as is"), people tend to throw out broken stuff more if it is worthless. But all these elements (higher prices, increased rarity, older age of the parts, "old" collectors who gotten in when stuff was everywhere, that retro hype, some parts I forgotten) do make it harder and perhaps also more frustrating.
The upside to starting now, however, is the increased knowledge there is. Back then there was basically noone who could tell you what to keep and what to throw out (except people who told you to throw everything out or just to throw out the 486 stuff, but those were idiots) and how stuff worked. I had actually thought all this stuff would end up disappearing in the mists of time and forgotfullness, but instead it mutated into a hype 🤣!
But anyway, it's those early people who helped lay the foundation of the retrogame community there is today. Without them, chances are it would've never become a hype or at least a less steep hype.

Tetrium wrote:

If you for example have a look on the VCF, I don't think the supply of knowledge to keep these systems running will be dead soon […]
Show full quote

If you for example have a look on the VCF, I don't think the supply of knowledge to keep these systems running will be dead soon and skills like soldering are probably not going to disappear so I think we're good hehe 😁
And the "rated" 3DFX tamper proof plastics thingy sounds a bit unsettling 😵

And I can relate to "If I hadn't snagged it up, it would've not existed anymore" bit, especially and for instance the old AT cases and many of the AT motherboards.

edit:
Otoh, I suspect one will have to be even more creative as time goes by, in order to keep things running. And I noticed that (obviously) the last 5 years, the old age of all this equipment is becoming more of a central thingy to keep in mind. This wasn't much of a problem 10 years ago.
And because stuff has gotten more expensive (which is to be expected when looking at it from a supply/demand perspective), it's more "rewarding" to sell off stuff you know is actually broken (just sell it "as is"), people tend to throw out broken stuff more if it is worthless. But all these elements (higher prices, increased rarity, older age of the parts, "old" collectors who gotten in when stuff was everywhere, that retro hype, some parts I forgotten) do make it harder and perhaps also more frustrating.
The upside to starting now, however, is the increased knowledge there is. Back then there was basically noone who could tell you what to keep and what to throw out (except people who told you to throw everything out or just to throw out the 486 stuff, but those were idiots) and how stuff worked. I had actually thought all this stuff would end up disappearing in the mists of time and forgotfullness, but instead it mutated into a hype 🤣!
But anyway, it's those early people who helped lay the foundation of the retrogame community there is today. Without them, chances are it would've never become a hype or at least a less steep hype.

That reminds me when clearing out a warehouse there was maybe 80 of those Atari / C64 Compatible joysticks brand new in the box. They were originally meant to be converted to IBM PC compatible via soldering by an employee and got shelved. I now regret not taking a bunch of all those as I thought I wouldn't ever be able to use them since I only had IBM PCs at the time. I didn't think 20 years later they would come in handy and figured I wouldn't be able to adapt them myself. Now having these systems I could easily use them.

I also could have grabbed a bunch of those older new AT style chassis but space was at a premium so I figured just keeping the ones with the installed motherboards was all I needed. 😢

95DosBox wrote:

Tetrium wrote:

If you for example have a look on the VCF, I don't think the supply of knowledge to keep these systems running will be dead soon […]
Show full quote

If you for example have a look on the VCF, I don't think the supply of knowledge to keep these systems running will be dead soon and skills like soldering are probably not going to disappear so I think we're good hehe 😁
And the "rated" 3DFX tamper proof plastics thingy sounds a bit unsettling 😵

And I can relate to "If I hadn't snagged it up, it would've not existed anymore" bit, especially and for instance the old AT cases and many of the AT motherboards.

edit:
Otoh, I suspect one will have to be even more creative as time goes by, in order to keep things running. And I noticed that (obviously) the last 5 years, the old age of all this equipment is becoming more of a central thingy to keep in mind. This wasn't much of a problem 10 years ago.
And because stuff has gotten more expensive (which is to be expected when looking at it from a supply/demand perspective), it's more "rewarding" to sell off stuff you know is actually broken (just sell it "as is"), people tend to throw out broken stuff more if it is worthless. But all these elements (higher prices, increased rarity, older age of the parts, "old" collectors who gotten in when stuff was everywhere, that retro hype, some parts I forgotten) do make it harder and perhaps also more frustrating.
The upside to starting now, however, is the increased knowledge there is. Back then there was basically noone who could tell you what to keep and what to throw out (except people who told you to throw everything out or just to throw out the 486 stuff, but those were idiots) and how stuff worked. I had actually thought all this stuff would end up disappearing in the mists of time and forgotfullness, but instead it mutated into a hype 🤣!
But anyway, it's those early people who helped lay the foundation of the retrogame community there is today. Without them, chances are it would've never become a hype or at least a less steep hype.

That reminds me when clearing out a warehouse there was maybe 80 of those Atari / C64 Compatible joysticks brand new in the box. They were originally meant to be converted to IBM PC compatible via soldering by an employee and got shelved. I now regret not taking a bunch of all those as I thought I wouldn't ever be able to use them since I only had IBM PCs at the time. I didn't think 20 years later they would come in handy and figured I wouldn't be able to adapt them myself. Now having these systems I could easily use them.

I also could have grabbed a bunch of those older new AT style chassis but space was at a premium so I figured just keeping the ones with the installed motherboards was all I needed. 😢

I insisted on keeping all the ones I wanted and how to store them was always an afterthought. I literally "converted" 8 AT cases to a table next to my bed for to putting my glasses and alarm onto 🤣
And I can tell you that my room used to be stuffed full, till I moved to my own place and then I could sort them all more properly. I literally stuffed AT cases full of expansion cards and stored stuff inside semi-complete cases, because I refused to toss out anything I wanted to keep. So basically I said "fuck it" and I somehow made due. I'm thankful I threw out so little I regretted later, but there's always stuff I regret not having taken when I had the chance. It was about recognizing the opportunity and the knowledge of what one had in hands (and this is where lack of knowledge in those old days come in).

Some things were obvious (like standard AT 486 PCI and VLB boards or ss7 and AT cases even) but lots of stuff wasn't.

Yeah, throwing out stuff and regretting it is one of the worst feelings. My entire collection from when I was a kid is gone. Only thing that's really left is an LS-120 drive. Later on I got rid of a quadro4 accidentally. That's not even considering the things I passed on buying. Sadly regret plays a bit of a role with collecting.

As for anybody who thinks 486 gear is drying up with the recyclers then you are mistaken. When I worked a job that took in recycled equipment we got couple of those systems every week in both stores. I had to sit there and watch them go right in front of me to otherwise I would have been charged with theft.

xplus93 wrote:

Yeah, throwing out stuff and regretting it is one of the worst feelings. My entire collection from when I was a kid is gone. Only thing that's really left is an LS-120 drive. Later on I got rid of a quadro4 accidentally. That's not even considering the things I passed on buying. Sadly regret plays a bit of a role with collecting.

Same. I only have my CT-479/Asus P4GPL-X Dothan setup and some random gear (like a Pentium-133 from my Dell XPS).

xplus93 wrote:

As for anybody who thinks 486 gear is drying up with the recyclers then you are mistaken. When I worked a job that took in recycled equipment we got couple of those systems every week in both stores. I had to sit there and watch them go right in front of me to otherwise I would have been charged with theft.

I see maybe one 486 system in workable condition every month here at the recycler. Vast majority of systems are OEM (Dell, HP, etc) and between late Pentium 4 to Core2 era. Even systems with ISA slots are getting rare.