It can be a crapshoot. Once I bought a Number Nine 325 that was "tested working" complete with photo of a healthy-looking card. I got a card with missing SMD components that looked like it'd been sitting in a box in someone's humid garage for years. Then I bought a video card from Alan Computech, with no photo (I don't think they have photos of ANY of their stuff!), for dirt cheap (it was a CL-GD5446 for $10, which is about $15 less than the going rate), and when it arrived it looked brand new and worked awesomely. The only thing I didn't like was there were no memory upgrade sockets, which I would've known if there was a photo. But maybe that's why they sell their stuff for a little less money.

"In good condition", "working order", etc. usually means "I was able to cram a CD into it so it must work"

My advice is to go with those, were the sales add states that the photo is of the actual item for sale.
You can allways ask how long ago, the picture was taken.

I'm just glad there's buyer protection. I've been having to use it so much lately they've been more annoying each time. Another item I bought was this laptop. The one I got had a bright spot on the LCD. Very common for these C-Series latitudes from the trackpoint rubbing on the screen.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Dell-Precision-M50-La … z-/361524044410