Poor THINKPAD resale value??

[Blake]

well im currently in the process of selling off all of my computer belongings and it could possibly include my beloved x31. I want to get another powerbook and i just dont need all of the other computer related stuff that i accumulated. basically i want to down size and keep whats important and thats it.

im currently trying to trade my x31 for a powerbook on another forum with no luck, so naturally i went to ebay to see how thinkpads are selling. I was shocked when i had to come to the reality of what i should expect to get for my thinkpad. And to me its worth much more, but 2 computers is no longer necessary let alone 2 laptops

I know an x31 cant compete with some of the new super duper laptops with 128mb of vid and bla bla bla , but there is no way id ever own anything but a thinkpad. I just laugh at the crap i see people buy and i believe my X is far superior to nething you can buy thats windows based and nothing quite feels the way my X does.

what do you think?

[firestarter]

Your laptop is only worth what people are willing to pay for it. As far as resale value is concerned, Apple laptops hold their value longer than any PC company. Im not too surprised as their laptop quality is just as good as the thinkpads and they have a much nicer design.

[christopher_wolf]

Well, the design point is very debatable as I consider both of them to have the same quality and good looks, the meaning of design is vague to an engineer, over the rest of the PC market. Apple is Apple and they have a strong and dedicated user base that doesn't mind paying more for Apple products. IBM/Lenovo has a dedicated user base as well, perhaps not as large or infamous as Apple, but it is mainly a simple supply/demand situation.
Say you have a group of people that will pay alot for a given Thinkpad, and the rest are just th "Average" laptop users; in that sense, the former group of people will get really good deals on the re-sale of any Thinkpad as opposed to the average users. Much the same can be said for Apple, with a few minor changes (nobody else makes Powerbooks but Apple, contention, etc) and so the economics of it can turn out a benefit if you are looking for a Thinkpad on re-sale.

[Blake]

im not comparing it to apple, just resale in general but i do understand the difference between a thinkpad and apple user vs. you best buy staples laptop buyer.

[wolfman]

So what are you wanting for the X31? Is there any warranty left on it?

[Navck]

Well its better than those kids who bought a overpriced 7000 dollar laptop (Same spec one can be bought for under 4000 dollars), then it resells for 700 dollars 1 year later (OUCH!!!)

[Blake]

So what are you wanting for the X31? Is there any warranty left on it?

i bought it lightly used, it was a month old but flawless. i do not think it has a warranty, but i did call ibm a while ago, and they helped me out.

i dont know what to ask for it, but if i could boot osx i would keep it

[pianowizard]

I used to think that computers depreciate by about 1/3 each year, but I just found this study which shows that it's actually 50% per year:

http://www.nber.org/papers/w10521

I bought my Dell Inspiron 8200 for $1,746 in Aug 2002 but could sell it for only $350 last week!

[Blake]

I used to think that computers depreciate by about 1/3 each year, but I just found this study which shows that it's actually 50% per year:

http://www.nber.org/papers/w10521

I bought my Dell Inspiron 8200 for $1,746 in Aug 2002 but could sell it for only $350 last week!

ibm has a much slower depreciation value than dell. IBM's are more specific where dell has many more models in their lineup and often run huge specials where new comptuers are cheap.

personally i would never buy a dell

[tfflivemb2]

I bought my Dell Inspiron 8200 for $1,746 in Aug 2002 but could sell it for only $350 last week!

This is why a lot of us tend to buy used, whether it be laptops or vehicles. The minute it has been "driven" the price drops.

Now that technology might be picking up again, prices will begin to drop even more on the "used" laptops. It seems that many people are ready to jump on the Dual Processor train...which is fine with me, as I'd still love to jump on the T40 train.

[Aroc]

Your X31 is worth, what $700-900 used now? Try pricing a used Dell Latitude D400 (very similar vintage, DDR, Pentium M, centrino, 3.8lb ultralight, etc) and it's about half of that. $400-$500. And that's a latitiude folks, not an inspiron! So your IBM actually has pretty good resale value.

[Blake]

Your X31 is worth, what $700-900 used now? Try pricing a used Dell Latitude D400 (very similar vintage, DDR, Pentium M, centrino, 3.8lb ultralight, etc) and it's about half of that. $400-$500. And that's a latitiude folks, not an inspiron! So your IBM actually has pretty good resale value.

its its hitting home on how much i can actually get for it. I guess its the love for the machine that makes me think its worth more

[turbolium]

same happend to me

couple of years ago i was thinking of changing my dell inspiron p3m 900
for something newer
i originally bought it for almost $4000cad. when it first came out with top hardware on it in 2002
so the idea came and i figured i could get $2000 for it but in the reallity people used to sell it for less then a 1000$
What a rip off
so in the end i desided to keep it since i could not let it go for soo cheap since it worth so much more to me then a 1000$

the funny part i still have it, just cant through it away even though i fried motherbord wile trying to fix it))))

Cheers for the love of our old lappys !!!!!

[AlphaKilo470]

Computers are sorta like cars as in you'll almost never get back out as much cash as you put in so you'd better buy a nice one and get as much use as you possibly can out of it.

The main profit situations I see are where you buy a total piece of crap and put time and effort into making it look and run nice and then sell for slightly more than you paid so you can get profit.