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Not for a CPU but earlier this year I bought a Thinkpad workstation off eBay for $500. It's a machine from 2020 and when it was new cost $5,700. I see this for

Not for a CPU but earlier this year I bought a Thinkpad workstation off eBay for $500. It's a machine from 2020 and when it was new cost $5,700. I see this for pretty much all hardware out on eBay, just go back 5 years and watch the price fall 10x.

saalweachter 1y ago
Has eBay fixed their "and then they ship you a box of rocks" problem? I feel like there was a five year span where everyone I talked to said buying or selling electronics on eBay was a nightmare, so I'm a little curious if I need to re-evaluate my priors.
- apetresc 1y ago
  My understanding is that eBay sides with the buyer on all disputes, to the point of ridiculousness. So you should be fine. The real issue is being a seller and solving the "and then the customer claims I shipped them a box of rocks" problem.
  - buildbot 1y ago
    Yep selling is way more risky. Ebay might be the most safe (refund wise) marketplace for buyers… I have more trouble with amazon.
- buildbot 1y ago
  Yes, it’s extremely rare to be stuck with a broken/wrong/missing item as a buyer on eBay. Selling is quite risky in some ways because eBay will nearly always side with a buyer. Every missing or broken thing I have purchased has been refunded or replaced. On the other hand, 3 things I have sold were claimed to not arrive. The only case where eBay decided in my favor was when the buyer had signed for the package in a literal USPS office :)
- accrual 1y ago
  > Has eBay fixed their "and then they ship you a box of rocks" problem? I've personally never had that problem after over a decade and hundreds of purchases on eBay. I've had some defective parts, but never outright fraud. IME eBay favors buyers.
- throwawayffffas 1y ago
  You don't get that with used old stuff, you get it with unrealistic low prices for new stuff. A 7532 CPU is now ewaste for all the datacenters out there 1/10 of original price is reasonable, but the latest Nvidia GPU for 200 bucks is obviously a scam.
- mjh2539 1y ago
  Every single laptop I've bought off of ebay (all of which were used) over the past ten years has functioned perfectly and flawlessly. You just pay attention to the number of recent sales the account has had and their overall rating.

saalweachter 1y ago

Has eBay fixed their "and then they ship you a box of rocks" problem? I feel like there was a five year span where everyone I talked to said buying or selling electronics on eBay was a nightmare, so I'm a little curious if I need to re-evaluate my priors.

apetresc 1y ago
My understanding is that eBay sides with the buyer on all disputes, to the point of ridiculousness. So you should be fine. The real issue is being a seller and solving the "and then the customer claims I shipped them a box of rocks" problem.
- buildbot 1y ago
  Yep selling is way more risky. Ebay might be the most safe (refund wise) marketplace for buyers… I have more trouble with amazon.
buildbot 1y ago
Yes, it’s extremely rare to be stuck with a broken/wrong/missing item as a buyer on eBay. Selling is quite risky in some ways because eBay will nearly always side with a buyer. Every missing or broken thing I have purchased has been refunded or replaced. On the other hand, 3 things I have sold were claimed to not arrive. The only case where eBay decided in my favor was when the buyer had signed for the package in a literal USPS office :)
accrual 1y ago
> Has eBay fixed their "and then they ship you a box of rocks" problem? I've personally never had that problem after over a decade and hundreds of purchases on eBay. I've had some defective parts, but never outright fraud. IME eBay favors buyers.
throwawayffffas 1y ago
You don't get that with used old stuff, you get it with unrealistic low prices for new stuff. A 7532 CPU is now ewaste for all the datacenters out there 1/10 of original price is reasonable, but the latest Nvidia GPU for 200 bucks is obviously a scam.
mjh2539 1y ago
Every single laptop I've bought off of ebay (all of which were used) over the past ten years has functioned perfectly and flawlessly. You just pay attention to the number of recent sales the account has had and their overall rating.