Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

OWC ripoff

D

ddavid

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Jan 4, 2008
267
53
Just a heads up guys... Don't count on selling your memory back to OWC if you buy from them. I bought some memory from them and they sent me an RMA to buy back my Apple memory. Three weeks later I got a check for almost 40% less than the memory was when I sent it in. No email, no confirmation, no heads-up, nothing.

When I called them and asked them to send me my memory back they said it had already been assimilated and I was out of luck. WTF OWC?? I expected more from them...

So, anyway buy from them if the price is right, just don't count on selling them your stuff. I would have been happier if I had just kept my old memory in a dusty drawer for a year or given them away.
 
Oh that's terrible! I like OWC they have such great products and some are well priced (Their own SSD collection).

I hope everything sorts out at the last minute :/
 
Read the terms. That's all stated in the agreement. Memory is subject to commodity prices; they give you the price when they receive it, not when you get the RMA.
 
I know next to nothing about US law, but wouldn't the seller have to agree to sell at that price?
 
Why would they buy it back at the price you paid for it? Not saying you aren't justified in your frustration, the communication may not have been good on their end.

It just wouldn't make any sense to buy back used memory at the price it was sold as new, they'd never make any money.
 
You should have just bought your ram from newegg. Half the price of owc and you could have sold your old ram on ebay.

OWC seemed to lower the price they gave you for the ram you sent in due to market price. Since the market price has gone down they dont seem to want to lower the price of the ram they sell on there website but are quick to act on giving you less for your ram. Typical business.
 
Last edited:
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_3 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8F190 Safari/6533.18.5)

I read the terms. Their communication stinks. I wish I hadn't bothered sending them my RAM because the way they handled it makes it hard for me to recommend them to anyone. I've spent a ton of money at OWC over the last 10 years and for them to respond so badly over a few dollars is pretty icky.
 
lindstedt56 said:
You should have just bought your ram from newegg. Half the price of owc and you could have sold your old ram on ebay.
Click to expand...
You know this simply is not true, half the price....come on now.

However, OWC makes their own brand of memory while Newegg doesn't have their own memory, they just sell other manufactures RAM. So they can sell low quality RAM at a lower price.
 
Resist said:
You know this simply is not true, half the price....come on now.

However, OWC makes their own brand of memory while Newegg doesn't have their own memory, they just sell other manufactures RAM. So they can sell low quality RAM at a lower price.
Click to expand...

Actually you are wrong. It is half the price on newegg. The gskill sale went off which they were selling for 40 but here is a similar kit.

OWC 8gig 79.99 - http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Other World Computing/1333DDR3S08S/

Newegg 8gig 43.99 - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820145281

79.99-43.99= 36$ cheaper

Nothing is better between the two only owc costs twice as much.
 
Resist said:
You know this simply is not true, half the price....come on now.

However, OWC makes their own brand of memory while Newegg doesn't have their own memory, they just sell other manufactures RAM. So they can sell low quality RAM at a lower price.
Click to expand...

The kits of 8gb ddr 3 ram newegg sells for 40-50$ are all namebrand kits. Crosair, kingston, gskill, crucial, ect. Nothing about those kits are "low quality" or lower quality then the owc kits.

Some people buy into the whole "mac certified" thing even though its the same ram tested in macs. Plenty of people use the non certified ram and it works fine. Even so, newegg sells the "mac certified" kits quite a bit cheaper also.
 
Resist said:
You know this simply is not true, half the price....come on now.

However, OWC makes their own brand of memory while Newegg doesn't have their own memory, they just sell other manufactures RAM. So they can sell low quality RAM at a lower price.
Click to expand...

Nice try, OWC rep :p
 
lindstedt56 said:
Actually you are wrong. It is half the price on newegg. The gskill sale went off which they were selling for 40 but here is a similar kit.

OWC 8gig 79.99 - http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Other World Computing/1333DDR3S08S/

Newegg 8gig 43.99 - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820145281

79.99-43.99= 36$ cheaper

Nothing is better between the two only owc costs twice as much.
Click to expand...
That's a great deal (and I have had great success with Corsair)...thanks for the heads up! :)
 
ddavid said:
Just a heads up guys... Don't count on selling your memory back to OWC if you buy from them. I bought some memory from them and they sent me an RMA to buy back my Apple memory. Three weeks later I got a check for almost 40% less than the memory was when I sent it in. No email, no confirmation, no heads-up, nothing.
Click to expand...

Well, hold on. Your statement is confusing. You say you're selling the RAM back to them, but an RMA is used for something you are returning (defective, buyer's remorse), not something you are selling. Which was it?

If you're returning the RAM, I'd think you'd get back what you paid for it, less shipping. If you're selling it back, you don't have much to complain about; you get what they give you.
 
I guarantee you OWC does not have their own fabs making memory chips no matter how much they want you to believe that. Its laughable to think a company their size could afford that. Same with their SSD's btw which is why you can't even update firmware from a Mac. Someone else is making those for them too. I've had 3 or 4 customer service issues with OWC over the years that should not have happened and know several other people who also had issues. There are a lot of complaints about ram prices, defective ram, exchanges etc. I stopped doing business with them several years ago after spending a lot of money over the years.
 
DannySmurf said:
Well, hold on. Your statement is confusing. You say you're selling the RAM back to them, but an RMA is used for something you are returning (defective, buyer's remorse), not something you are selling. Which was it?

If you're returning the RAM, I'd think you'd get back what you paid for it, less shipping. If you're selling it back, you don't have much to complain about; you get what they give you.
Click to expand...

I'm sorry you are easily confused...

OWC sent me a RMA for my OEM ram that I was replacing with higher capacity RAM. What they choose to call the reference number they send me is their business.

"You get what they give you." WTF? Read it again, s l o w l y.
 
DannySmurf said:
Well, hold on. Your statement is confusing. You say you're selling the RAM back to them, but an RMA is used for something you are returning (defective, buyer's remorse), not something you are selling. Which was it?

If you're returning the RAM, I'd think you'd get back what you paid for it, less shipping. If you're selling it back, you don't have much to complain about; you get what they give you.
Click to expand...

I believe the OP is referring to OWC's "memory rebate" program where they buy back your old RAM. If you read the page, the catch is the pricing is only good for that day (for example right now it says prices good only for 07/31/2011). So if you send them your RAM they can just change the price to whatever they want.

In 2009 I bought a 4GB upgrade kit from them for a 2008 MBP and the price they offered for the 2GB I removed was not even worth me shipping it to them. It looks like are offering $7.00 for that same 2GB now. To be fair, I suppose used RAM in small sizes has little value.

As an aside, the 4GB I bought from them went bad last month and had to be replaced. I did not exchange with OWC as the machine was in the hands of a relative across the country.
 
Weaselboy said:
So if you send them your RAM they can just change the price to whatever they want.

In 2009 I bought a 4GB upgrade kit from them for a 2008 MBP and the price they offered for the 2GB I removed was not even worth me shipping it to them. It looks like are offering $7.00 for that same 2GB now. To be fair, I suppose used RAM in small sizes has little value.
Click to expand...

They change the price without any notification.

OWC's motto appears to be "Buy from us! We'll buy your old stuff for $$$!!! (butwemayonlygiveyouhalf)"

This is like taking an old ring to a cheezy jeweler and having them say they will give you X. After they take it in the back they say, "sorry we'll only give you half and you can't have it back because we melted it down already. Sorry."
 
ddavid said:
They change the price without any notification.
Click to expand...

Why did you accept the terms, then? It is spelled out pretty clearly. You happen to have sent in your memory at a time when memory prices had a huge drop.

No one forced you to resell your memory to OWC. You can have kept it, or sold it on craigslist or eBay. Instead, you accepted the rather clear terms and now you are upset. How does that work again?

Telling people to beware because they may not get what they are originally quoted is one thing, but calling it a rip-off is mischaracterizing the transaction and the terms.

Are you going to call me an OWC representative as well because I pointed out the terms?
 
I dont understand. What did you expect to get back? The full price of the Apple memory?

Most people would be happy to get anything back on their memory as the typical person just lets it sit around or throws the old stuff out.
 
The problem is that ram changes so fast that the capacites you get in a new machine are usually worthless since all the new machines that take that kind of ram already have that much. Just buy from Newegg, and plop the old stuff in a drawer.
 
For people looking to do something with the old ram (2 2gb sticks) you could sell it on ebay for around 20$.

You could buy an 8gb set on newegg for 40$ and sell the old ram for 20$. Much much better deal then owc.
 
ddavid said:
OWC's motto appears to be "Buy from us! We'll buy your old stuff for $$$!!! (butwemayonlygiveyouhalf)"
Click to expand...

Who wants to pay you what it cost you for something that's old, smaller than what you could get for the same cost, and is your junk?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back