Old motherboards

Why do old motherboards sell for so much? I made a new computer yesterday and put my old motherboard on eBay, and it's selling for $400! I only paid $120 for it back in 2009. I checked some more, and this motherboard is going for like $1500 in a new, unopened box.

Makes me wish I bought like 100 of them back in 2009.

Why on earth would people pay so much for an old motherboard?

Maybe you could give more details of what the MB is? Maybe it's the architecture of the MB?

a reply to: WP4YT
Supply and demand.

I just bought a printer that sold for $29 10 years ago. I paid $90 for it, and that was "cheap". The guy I purchased it for is using it on a Windows 98 machine, and wanted an identical to the one that died. Go figure.

Once parts are no longer made, they become valuable to those with a need for that particular part.

Perhaps they have a system keyed to an architecture that can't be changed.

I have one piece of software that runs one of my CNC setups & it is coded to the original system.(Security/Anti Piracy)
Last time it crashed (motherboard) I was lucky to find a replacement as it is so old it was brand new when I built & installed ME on it.

K~

That's crazy, especially when I just got a top tier brand new Z97-Pro with wifi and usb 3.1 for about that same price. Must be something uniquely baddass about the one you had, all I can figure.

I have some older CAD software and hardware.

Needs the motherboards that were around in the days of 486 DX2-66 and Pentium 1s.

It has a huge board that slots into the Motherboard. Therefore, motherboard must have the right type of slot. I can't even remember what the slots were called. Edit : ISA Slots.

I can still buy a new board that will take this card ... at around $1500.00

It is what it is. Replacement cost for the modern version of the CAD stuff is around $4000.00 and I don't want to spend my hard earned cash when the current one is still working.

P

I've built lots of nice systems over the years but I have never had to pay anything remotely near that price.

I would love to know what the model # on that thing is.

There are all sorts of defense contractor suppliers who keep warehouse full of auctioned off bits and pieces of old military projects. Everything from spare control modules to wing pods. I'd imagine the odd motherboard would be easy to stock. Some people even turn them into clipboards.

originally posted by: pheonix358
I have some older CAD software and hardware.

Needs the motherboards that were around in the days of 486 DX2-66 and Pentium 1s.

It has a huge board that slots into the Motherboard. Therefore, motherboard must have the right type of slot. I can't even remember what the slots were called.

I can still buy a new board that will take this card ... at around $1500.00

It is what it is. Replacement cost for the modern version of the CAD stuff is around $4000.00 and I don't want to spend my hard earned cash when the current one is still working.

P

The daughtercard sockets were Vesa Express (to kill off early graphics accelerator boards), PCI, then AGP, and currently PCIexpress 1.0/2.0/3.0

a reply to: stormcell

Try ISA Slots, I think.

The ones you mentioned are the Graphic card (Such as they were.) Slots.

P

Just as an aside to anyone who looks at motherboards for their scrap value:

Most people who do this know where the gold can be found; processors, edge connectors, etc. But don't overlook surface mount capacitors. They are the small grey blocks identified on the board with numbers starting with C, as opposed to surface mount resistors which are black and identified by R numbers. The resistors are mostly carbon, but the capacitors have silver and palladium.

You need about a cup full to get about an ounce of palladium. But if you're scrapping the board for gold, no sense in throwing away the palladium.

There is quite a lucrative market in buying old computer parts to sell back to desperate businesses, very old ISA boards quite often were locked to the cpu itselfs frequency so you couldn't use them on newer kit and its one of the reason genuine ibm xt's are still found in some places controlling some antique cad/cam system etc.

a reply to: WP4YT

is no one else thinking of a Titor stlye time traveler sent back to buy a certain motherboard that will reboot the future's hardware and end a war?

originally posted by: nonspecific
a reply to: WP4YT

is no one else thinking of a Titor stlye time traveler sent back to buy a certain motherboard that will reboot the future's hardware and end a war?

Anyone think the OP WP4YT is full of it and was just trolling? Abandoned thread to boot?