Woah... why are these old hard drives worth so much?

[poiihy]

I took a peak on ebay and discovered that my 80 MB Quantum ProDrive LPS, in my beige g3, is worth $30-$80!!
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_fro...rodrive+lp&_nkw=quantum+prodrive+lps&_sacat=0
That's almost more than than value of the whole machine!

Not only that, the Quantum Fireball is also worth about $30!
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_odk...reball+4gb&_nkw=quantum+fireball+4gb&_sacat=0

Last... but NOT least... hell no not least at all...
THE WD CAVIAR 34000 SELLS FOR $80-$190! HOLY CRAP
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_odk...wd+caviar+34000&_nkw=wd+caviar+34000&_sacat=0

WHY ARE THESE DRIVES SO VALUABLE?!?! The drives themselves are worth the same, or more, than the entire machine!

 

[eyoungren]

I took a peak on ebay and discovered that my 80 MB Quantum ProDrive LPS, in my beige g3, is worth $30-$80!!
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_fro...rodrive+lp&_nkw=quantum+prodrive+lps&_sacat=0
That's almost more than than value of the whole machine!

Not only that, the Quantum Fireball is also worth about $30!
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_odk...reball+4gb&_nkw=quantum+fireball+4gb&_sacat=0

Last... but NOT least... hell no not least at all...
THE WD CAVIAR 34000 SELLS FOR $80-$190! HOLY CRAP
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_odk...wd+caviar+34000&_nkw=wd+caviar+34000&_sacat=0

WHY ARE THESE DRIVES SO VALUABLE?!?! The drives themselves are worth the same, or more, than the entire machine!

Because they aren't made any more and therefore are scarce to find in the systems they were commonly used in.

 

[catzilla]

Search the sold listings...

 

[bunnspecial]

1. Check the items that actually sold and I think that you'll find that most of those drives aren't actually selling for that.

2. AFAIK, 50-pin SCSI drives haven't been made in several years so supplies are dwindling for applications where they are really needed(like 68K and early PPC Macs). I've been experimenting-mostly unsucessfully-with using newer(and larger) 80 pin SCSI drives via adapters although I think a lot of my issue is in using newer adapters.

All that said, I spent $20 including shipping for a 500mb 50 pin SCSI drive last week. Earlier this year, I bought a big box of hard drives, including several 4gb OEM Apple IDE WD Caviars, a couple of big IDE drives(200gb or so) and a pair of OEM Apple 50-pin SCSI drives(1gb and 2gb) for about $40 including shipping. The deals are out there if you are patient.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/231393300268?_trksid=p2059210.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK:MEBIDX:IT

 

[poiihy]

Because they aren't made any more and therefore are scarce to find in the systems they were commonly used in.

You can still find IDE and SCSI drives that are much newer and better in all ways, and cheaper. It's not like they use a rare proprietary connection bus.
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_fro....Xide+hard+drive&_nkw=ide+hard+drive&_sacat=0
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_odk...scsi+hard+drive&_nkw=scsi+hard+drive&_sacat=0

----------

1. Check the items that actually sold and I think that you'll find that most of those drives aren't actually selling for that.

2. AFAIK, 50-pin SCSI drives haven't been made in several years so supplies are dwindling for applications where they are really needed(like 68K and early PPC Macs). I've been experimenting-mostly unsucessfully-with using newer(and larger) 80 pin SCSI drives via adapters although I think a lot of my issue is in using newer adapters.

All that said, I spent $20 including shipping for a 500mb 50 pin SCSI drive last week. Earlier this year, I bought a big box of hard drives, including several 4gb OEM Apple IDE WD Caviars, a couple of big IDE drives(200gb or so) and a pair of OEM Apple 50-pin SCSI drives(1gb and 2gb) for about $40 including shipping. The deals are out there if you are patient.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/231393300268?_trksid=p2059210.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK:MEBIDX:IT

Oh... I see...
I searched the Caviar 34000s and found none sold, but the Quantum Fireballs were sold for about 10-20. Some were sold for much more but most are 10-20.
But WOW, the Quantum ProDrives were sold for 20-150! Why do people pay so much for a crappy old drive with so little capacity when they can get a better one that is so much bigger for about the same price?
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_odk...odrive+lps&_nkw=quantum+prodrive+lps&_sacat=0

 

[bunnspecial]

You can still find IDE and SCSI drives that are much newer and better in all ways, and cheaper. It's not like they use a rare proprietary connection bus.
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_fro....Xide+hard+drive&_nkw=ide+hard+drive&_sacat=0
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_odk...scsi+hard+drive&_nkw=scsi+hard+drive&_sacat=0

Most of the "newer and better" SCSI drives you reference are 68 pin or 80 pin. They will work in older computers, but require an adapter(which can be a pain in and of itself, something I'm finding out).

 

[poiihy]

Most of the "newer and better" SCSI drives you reference are 68 pin or 80 pin. They will work in older computers, but require an adapter(which can be a pain in and of itself, something I'm finding out).

It would still be worth it to get an adapter.

 

[bunnspecial]

It would still be worth it to get an adapter.

Worth it in theory, but the adapters won't necessarily fit all installations. I've also learned the hard way that you have to be careful in selecting an adapter to make sure it can set up the IDs correctly and also needs to be able to terminate(or you need to have a supply of 50 pin external terminators and possibly spare 50 pin cables). I ordered 3, and my first batch were more-or-less a no go with getting them to work in older Macs.

I have some more adapters on the way, all of which are capable of terminating.

I'm also only messing around with these because I was able to rescue a dozen and a half 9gb Quantum Fireball 80-pin drives from a lab clean out a month or so back.

At the moment, I my Macintosh SE is in need of a hard drive. After messing around with the adapters for a while, I decided that the simplest and most expedient way to do fix it was to put the 500mb drive I linked to above in my Quadra 700, and then transfer the OEM 160mb drive from my Quadra to the SE.

 

[poiihy]

Wow... so people actually do pay great money for these!
I should sell all mine and replace them with better ones

 

[Slomo-vise]

I know it's a very old post but i still want to write my answer because no one wrote the right one....
all of this harddrives can be sold very expencive because of the data recovery labs, when they want to recover a haeddrive that's physical damaged they have to take parts from exactly the same drive and the less there is of this kind so its price will go up accordingly, that's all.

 

[ervus]

Many of these drives are simply pulled out and destroyed when computers are decommissioned. This also reduces the supply.

 

[dmr727]

The vintage computer market is hot as folks that are nostalgic for these machines are getting to the age where they have a lot of disposable income. A lot of them prefer to keep things as stock or period accurate as they can, so while a newer drive would be more reliable, it's not necessarily more desirable.

 

[eyoungren]

A lot of them prefer to keep things as stock or period accurate as they can, so while a newer drive would be more reliable, it's not necessarily more desirable.

I've never understood that. Every computer I've every built, bought or had given to me has always been customized to my tastes, desires and needs. Stock configurations have never interested me, I've always sought to maximize whatever I could. This has been the case even with work computers. Even during the period where PowerPC Macs were new and those were the Macs I used at work I always sought to customize and upgrade them.

I get nostalgia, but I never used any of this stuff stock so this is strange to me. But I'm not the one buying and everyone is different.

 

[dmr727]

I get nostalgia, but I never used any of this stuff stock so this is strange to me. But I'm not the one buying and everyone is different.

It's interesting seeing what's important to folks that are into vintage computers (or probably any other vintage hobby).

I have mine connected to an old 1024x768 LCD - blaspheme to many, but space is at a premium and I decided I'd rather not have bulky CRTs around. I also replaced all my old failing SCSI drives with SSDs. But on the other hand some folks are creating FPGAs to replicate old processors at higher clock rates, and that crosses a line for me. Everyone has their thing, that's for sure!

 

[Slix]

Personally, if I get a vintage computer and the internal drive is still working ok, I'll leave it in until it starts to fail. At this point, I would definitely use an SSD adapter since it's a lot cheaper and more reliable (not to mention faster) than the stock drives.

 

[random_dude]

So does it kind of get more expensive the less storage there is?
Sorry for opening a very old chat again.