Dunno about hardware, but I still get the occasional DOS game from eBay. Recently picked up one I've been really wanting to do a review of because very few people know of its existence and I wouldn't've either if not for a VERY tiny black and white ad at the back of one of those old, several-hundred-page PC Gamer Christmas issues! ;)

I reckon there's been MORE retro pc stuff on ebay recently/ I figured it was people doing a post christmas cleanout or something.

But then I've little interest in socket 7 type stuff or later, and I keep finding them on the side of the road/at the dump so I wouldn't be aware of any ebay trends regarding them...

I just bought a socket 7 Pentium MMX on ebay last month. Maybe its merely bad timing? One thing I never see on ebay is an LAPC-1 card.

I bought my LAPC-I from ebay and there was one for auction just last month. It's probably just down to timing, as you say.

jmrydholm wrote:

I just bought a socket 7 Pentium MMX on ebay last month. Maybe its merely bad timing? One thing I never see on ebay is an LAPC-1 card.

And if you find one LAPC they where sold for ` crazy` prices..
But actually these are normal ` street prices`
Its is up to you if you willing to pay these higher prices.
But for myself, i think its just worth it!

Same for other old stuff.. I know that there are people that earn enough / ask to much for that ` old junk` But i think its just normal, when you are 25 years later. And a lot of that old stuff is already processed to iron scrap.
Then there is not much left after some years later.. And knowing there are other vintage builders, they also look for parts too..

So then its up to you if you willing pay those high prices..

For myself i always try to look for the cheapest as possible..
Some stuff that are that RARE and need them (otherwise i could just wait 4 of maybe 10 year and still have nothing) or willing to pay the higher priced part (you defently could use it) then wait till you are dead..

Stuff older than 1996 or so seems pretty scarce to me, I find more of this era stuff in the 'to be scraped' pile at the tip. People just aren't aware that there's a market for stuff that old I guess, or they just can't be arsed listing it.

I have heaps of 'saved searches' setup but they miss a lot of stuff, particular things from OS; most things fall into that category when you live in Australia.

I know one thing though- Voodoo 5s seem to be getting rarer by the day. And the prices now are like wooo...

Yeah ebay has been pretty disappointing for me for about the past year or so. Hardware from the 90's is pretty much unusable unless your a hobbyist, and unless you have the right piece and know it, it's not going to worth the time to put up.

Unfortunately I live in the middle of nowhere so ebay is almost my only source of retro stuff. Fortunately I bought hordes of games and hardware in the mid 2000's when it was flowing freely. 😁

sgt76 wrote:

I know one thing though- Voodoo 5s seem to be getting rarer by the day. And the prices now are like wooo...

Makes me feel I did the right thing buying one after 3dfx went under.

The 486 stuff is just ridiculously expensive - and IMHO the ones coming up for sale are not what I would consider the better boards.

I am afraid the socket 7/370 stuff will eventually go that route....

The ebay saved search feature with email notifications is your friend.

I guess I was lucky, my Voodoo 5 was around $45 bucks or so. I guess nobody else saw it when I bid on it! 😀 The only problem is I need a compatible motherboard for it...processor...memory, etc. It won't fit in my XP machine or the Dell. 1.5v AGP only, I'm afraid.

Picked up a pair of Paradise VGA cards yesterday as well as some small hard drives so it can't have dried up all that much.

Building a retro-PC from e-Bay will cause you to go broke quickly. I had to do a lot of that with my GLide PC and it's still painful to me (mostly because I had the exact same stuff at one time, and discarded it).

Unless it's REALLY odd or EXACTLY what I want, I usually avoid e-Bay for retro-hardware. It's just too pricey. I've been having some good luck at the local thrift stores. Although they don't usually have what I want, I can get a mouse and KB for $1/ea, and older computers for the $5-$10 range. Have you seen what some ask on e-Bay for an older AT-style keyboard lately? It's a seller's market, though, and if you want they'll surely have it.

However, locally the 386/486/Pentium pool has also been drying up a little. They just aren't around that much anymore. 🙁

Actually, if you look enough, you can find great deals on ebay for retro hardware. These recent purchases of mine are great examples:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/200716606615
http://www.ebay.com/itm/290675323366
http://www.ebay.com/itm/370589308657
http://www.ebay.com/itm/370584599666
http://www.ebay.com/itm/220961388729

As for an AT keyboard... just get a ps2 keyboard and an AT adapter. like $3 shipped.

Except for your SB card, all that PCI stuff is plentiful. I could walk from one end of my house to the other on carpet of P2/PCI boards. Shopping for XT/286/386/486/P1 stuff is a different story, to which I think was being referred to in this thread. As for keyboard adapters, I guess I'm just one of those anti-anachronistic anal-retentive types, but that's OK, I'm the same way with my old cars.

So buy a DIN5 extension cable, cut off one end, and mod a ps2 keyboard to true AT...

P1 stuff is still out there, and so is some VLB and ISA stuff, but I know whatcha mean about 486 and older, it's getting rare. Of course, not nearly as many people had those computers, P1 and P2 is where computers started getting really popular.

Yeah, unfortunately for me too on the older stuff. I "wanted" to build a socket 7 for a little bit of time and it just so happened that I ran across one at the thrift store, which helped me out immensely. Of course, I wound up "upgrading" (if you can call it that) it with a bunch of late-90's hardware. Look for the build description coming soon.

Also....you're better than me if you can mod the itty-bitty keyboard cable/wires as I tend to grossly munch it whenever I try... 😀 Whenever I had to futz with serial cabling on the dumb terminals at work I always dreaded it, so, eventually all those serial terminals got replaced with IP terminals or thin clients.

This is the best finework I was able to do in the last year or two:
http://foxtecha.com/pics/comps/minipc-project … om/100_0720.JPG

more recently I tried to hardwire a 10 port usb2 hub and that went very badly, ruined the hub. 🙁 Thankfully I had a backup and it works fine.
http://foxtecha.com/pics/projects/usbkeyboard/100_1007.JPG