Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Cashing In On Antique Computers

Posted by timothy on from the break-out-the-duster dept.

mwillems writes: "The Economist posts this story this week about how old computer hardware can be worth money. At the Vintage Computer Festival East, a lot of old hardware was seen, swapped and admired. An industry is emerging, it seems: an Apple One apparently fetched $25,000 at auction. Time to dust off my Ohio Scientific OSI Challenger 4-p!" These festivals sounds like a lot of fun -- can anyone offer some first-hand reports from the Boston one? Hmm. The local thriftstore has a working Mac IIci for $1.98 -- maybe I should put it on eBay as a collectable.

6 of 182 comments (clear)

  1. OBSCENE CONTENT WARNING!!!!!!!! by BassGuy23 · · Score: 1, Informative

    The above post is a link to some nasty pictures! DON'T FOLLOW IT!!!!!

    --

    ~Mike

    A big enough hammer fixes *anything*
  2. Re:Show me the money! by hqm · · Score: 2, Informative

    The CRT usually stopped working because a big capacitor in the drive circuit on the board blew out, you can often just replace this.

  3. Re:VIntage Computer Festival East by Tackhead · · Score: 3, Informative
    > At the VCF east, I picked up a Radio Shack Model 100 for $40, including case and manual, a bunch of old Creative Computing Issues for $1, and an obscure Psygnosis game for the Amiga called "ORK", shrinkwrapped, for $10.

    Yeah, in addition to drooling over the exhibits and expensive/rare stuff, I picked up some pretty cool stuff at VCF 4.0 last year. Lots of old software, hardware, and parts.

    (Yes, this is another shameless plug for VCF 5.0, September 15-16th, in San Jose. Why wait until after it's over to read about it on Slashdot? ;) VCF East was the first time the VCF crew put on a show for the East Coast crowd, and it should grow over the next few years.

    Meanwhile, for the Silicon Valley crowd, VCF 5.0 is also under the same roof as CA Extreme, a weekend of all the 80s arcade machines and prototypes you could imagine. Serious dr00l.

  4. Erasing HD? Re:The more modern ones, though... by joneshenry · · Score: 3, Informative

    The only thing keeping me from donating an old HP 6170S is that I don't know what to do about erasing the HD. I'm using Sami Tolvanen's Eraser, a GPLed utility, but I'm still a little nervous. Of course there is the option of simply destroying the HD, but this particular monstrosity has a very flaky BIOS that somehow makes it extremely difficult to install new HDs.

  5. Some dude on eBay by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    is selling a supposedly rare NeXT cube.

    Man, I wish I could afford one of those!

  6. Re:Old keyboards by mjflory · · Score: 2, Informative

    Look around for a Northgate keyboard... I think they were made by the same folks who made the IBMs, and they have the same feel, plus extensive programmability in some models. They had a female PS/2 port on the keyboard and a cable that went to an AT connector. Just substitute a male-male PS/2 cable (the kind used with multiple-PC KVM switch boxes) and hook it up to your new PC. I forget just where all the keys are, but they did have models with the F-keys on the left. They are invaluable for anyone still using WordPerfect for DOS. (YES, it's still in use.) Our lab heads, a husband-and-wife team, still use their twin Northgates with XyWrite II!