Trashbytes wrote on 2024-04-10, 01:47:I did the same with a NIB sealed Sound Blaster Audigy 2 ZX Platinum Pro, nothing I love more than opening such things and smelli […]
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midicollector wrote on 2024-04-10, 00:46:
Occasionally, rarely, I bought something sealed mostly on accident. I immediately opened it. No regrets.
I did the same with a NIB sealed Sound Blaster Audigy 2 ZX Platinum Pro, nothing I love more than opening such things and smelling that new old electronics smell, the feel of real paper manuals and just the general feeling of knowing none else but me has touched this hardware.
Was it worth more still sealed in box? .. maybe to the right collector and I guess thats the same for every other bit of NIB sealed hardware, its only ever worth as much as someone is willing to pay for it, the trick is finding that one person who is willing to buy it at a price you think its worth. (This rarely happens even on ebay)
That card above still in its box, yup its rare, yes it may be the only one left still in its box .. but trying to place a value on that, you cant because what you think its worth matters little, what the market thinks is more important.
Personally, I've had very good results trying to find the people who want the rarest items and are willing to pay the prices I've valued them at. Those sales fund a pretty large chunk of my retro collecting budget and I'm very grateful for the people who are willing to trade their dollars for the time I spend scouring the internet for this stuff.
This particular item I don't see being hugely valuable because it's pretty obscure. Retro video-processing, mpeg and TV tuner cards have not had much of boost in popularity as far as I can tell. I have found myself getting more interested in tinkering with them myself over time since I'm starting to find fewer VGA cards and sound cards that I don't already have in my collection, but that doesn't impact their value really. The fact that this card has one of the best VLB video chips you can buy is just a bullet point feature, but if someone is a big Tseng or VLB fan, this could be a really interesting find.
Otherwise, if someone with huge collecting budget has a very large collection of complete boxes and absolutely must buy sealed boxes which they've never seen before, then yeah, items like this could be worth basically whatever they are listed for, within reason.
Of course, like you said, the value is what someone is willing to spend, which is why it is a careful balancing act to find the best prices for selling collectible oddities. I have been doing it for many years, and lots of people on my family do it in other fields. Yes it's a weird thing to have run in the family... 🤣 . That said, the fastest way to guarantee that you won't sell an item for a given price to a "sealed box collector" is to break the seal on the box.
Anyway, if I decide to bust into the thing I will definitely make a post about it. 😁
Now for some blitting from the back buffer.