30 Sep
2008
30 Sep
'08
8:17 p.m.
In article <Pine.GSO.4.55.0809301046390.26480 at helios.cs.csubak.edu>,
David Griffith <dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu> writes:
I stumbled on a disturbing thing on Ebay. There's
a guy who seems to
specialize in taking apart perfectly good classic computer stuff to sell
the pieces. I found him when looking for a VT100. He's selling a naked
CRT that he says was taken from a working VT180. I asked him why. No
answer.
You're talking about seller "md9ent", aka "Drake's Retro Video
Game
Shop".
I saw that when he first listed it some time ago. I have no idea why
he would break a VT180 down into parts, but this behavior of breaking
down machines into parts and selling the parts has been going on for
as long as there have been computers. Its easier to ship parts then
entire units and some people think they'll make more from the sum of
the sold parts than they would make from selling the entire unit.
For instance, when was the last time you saw a SGI Challenge, Crimson
or Onyx deskside sold on ebay? Instead you see lots of people
offering individual boards, memory sticks, drive sleds, and power
supplies. Its easier and cheaper to ship out parts than it is to
arrange freight shipping for one of these large beer keg sized
computers (keg laying down, of course).
At any rate, what you observe may be "disturbing" to you, but it has
been going on for what I would guess is many years.
--
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