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MBP on eBay?

C

chesterville

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Sep 26, 2006
9
0
being new to both macs and eBay I have a question about purchasing the former from the latter. I have my eye on a "brand-new" "unopened" MBP at a very steep discount. The seller has more than 1000 feedback/ratings with 90+% positive.

First of all, I would appreciate advice on what to look for, or any positive/negative mac on eBay experiences.

Secondly, does anyone know if a mac in this situation will still be eligible for applecare?

thanks,

dru

EDIT: I am more interested in info on buying macbooks/MBPs on eBay in general, rather than one specific laptop
 
OMFG, another OOOOOH look a really cheap Apple product, let me see if its legit by asking MR...

unless I am not understanding this correctly.

Are you saying this is a MBP for $660

or

a MBP for $660 OFF the retail price?

$660 is not "steep" for a discount as it is probably the same as the ADC or education discount.
 
MBP on eBay?

I originally posted the following in the MB/MBP forum, not realizing there is a buying forum - anyone with advice/input?:

being new to both macs and eBay I have a question about purchasing the former from the latter. I have my eye on a "brand-new" "unopened" MBP at a very steep (too steep perhaps - $660 USD for a 2Ghz?) discount. The seller has more than 1000 feedback/ratings with 90+% positive.

First of all, I would appreciate advice on whether or not to proceed with a bid, or what to look for, or any positive/negative mac on eBay experiences.

Secondly, does anyone know if a mac in this situation will still be eligible for applecare?

thanks,

dru

[Moderator note: threads merged]
 
perhaps a link to the auction?
so people can check it out first hand, see if it looks fishy
 
and again ill post:

OMFG, another OOOOOH look a really cheap Apple product, let me see if its legit by asking MR...

unless I am not understanding this correctly.

Are you saying this is a MBP for $660

or

a MBP for $660 OFF the retail price?
 
it is FOR $660....which seems shady to me...however, I guess I was trying to ask my questions based on some more reasonably priced (ie. not stolen/broken, etc.) ones
 
Can you post a link to the auctioned item. Maybe we could see if anything looks fishy.

Don't worry, I'm not in the market for a new puter. ;)

edit: beaten to it ^_^
 
Keep in mind that most Apple EBay scammers use hijacked accounts.

Does the item listing say they have multiple units? Payment via Western Union?

Does the listing instruct you to email the seller directly at some email address, rather than use the EBay contact seller function?

If any of the above are true (and typically they all are), then it is a scam auction. It'll probably get pulled before the auction even ends.
 
Dood, give me a break, you honestly think you can get a friggen brand new laptop for under a grand.

I dont think I am even gonna waste my time writing about WHY you shouldnt even have to ask these kinds of questions.

sigh.
 
my apologies once again...I shouldn't have mentioned that specific laptop...I was merely pointing out some the concerns I have with eBay. My question is more on buying a mac on eBay in general...not that specific one
 
miles01110 said:
if the seller has that many positive feedback ratings I would say it is fairly trustworthy. I would buy from someone like that.
Click to expand...

if the seller has that many positive feedback ratings I would say it is fairly trustworthy. I would buy from someone like that.
Click to expand...

Not necessarily. I've seen quite a few sellers with a lot of positive feedback that were selling wholesale lists. i.e., "$50 flatscreen 17" LCD!!! Small text: you are bidding on a wholesale list only, not the actual product or that sort of thing. I never quite figured how they can get so many positive feedback.

http://scams.flipshark.com/wholesalescam.html
 
when is it ending? if it's ending 5 days later sure it's possible legit auction for that price.. but dont expect that to be the ending price... now if it's buy it now for that price, i would run away.. fast!
 
Honestly, on high ticket items such as a new laptop, I usually avoid ebay. It is worth it for me to pay a little extra and use amazon.com instead. They usually have rebates as well which is nice. Too many bad things can happen on ebay and with paypal (aka Satan) if you use that.

For used computers like iBooks or PowerBooks, ebay is more acceptable in my book. Good luck with your purchase.
 
check the history of what they sell also. if they sell a bunch of recipies for 1 cent each to get feedback, its a scam. if they sold teddy bears and balloons for the last 500 sales, and then suddenly have 20 laptops available, its a scam.
 
matttrick said:
check the history of what they sell also. if they sell a bunch of recipies for 1 cent each to get feedback, its a scam. if they sold teddy bears and balloons for the last 500 sales, and then suddenly have 20 laptops available, its a scam.
Click to expand...
sold bears? like bearbo?:D
 
I understand the gist of your concerns - and feel like Chrispy stated - for the big ticket items (of anything) perhaps avoid eBay - no matter how good the feedback is. Can you afford to lose the dollars if something goes awry? (is my rule of thumb).

My personal limit on any one eBay item is 200.00 Max - then if I lose it - it still hurts, but won't hurt that much.

Recently, I was browsing eBay for a G4 Powerbook - and 5 different sellers (over a period of 6 weeks) had various machines I liked - they had all 100% feedback btw. I didn't bid, but I sent an email to them requesting further information in the first instance.

As it happens - some of the sellers responded and others didn't - but the items were all later pulled by eBay. I'd also (much later) get a security warning email from eBay saying that the auctions had all been removed (so I'm guessing they were all suspect). Those sellers however, still have 100% feedback and are trading still to this day.
 
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