have you ever bought refurbished electronics?

a reply to: Nyiah

I would agree that with desktop PC's the odds are definitely in your favor for getting decent refurb unit.

I'm not sure I'd agree (at all) on any kind of a portable device though like laptop or tablet.

originally posted by: Flyingclaydisk
a reply to: Nyiah

I would agree that with desktop PC's the odds are definitely in your favor for getting decent refurb unit.

I'm not sure I'd agree (at all) on any kind of a portable device though like laptop or tablet.

I can't speak for tablets, since I don't own any, but I've never had any problem with refurbished laptops. Maybe I've just had good luck with mine, but they've been well worth it and I don't see any reason to not consider them.

a reply to: Nyiah

I guess it depends on what you're using them for. If it's just personal use, or school or something, they'd probably be worth a look for some.

All my portable devices get used for work, they store and process mountains of data daily. I can't risk having some thing go ka-blooey on me when I'm out of the office, traveling or in the field. It's just too risky.

a reply to: TinySickTears

I bought a refurb lenovo yoga 900 with 256gb m2 8gb ram and i7 for $400. Never had a problem that wasnt microsofts fault.

Depends on whether or not one feels lucky
I always buy refurb hard drives
Depending on who does the refurb , the only thing that is used is the case...

I bought a 'refurbished' desktop for a 3rd of its new price, it was still covered in the peel off cellophane, so it was brand new, as far as I can tell there was a problem the packaging or documentation so it couldn't be sold as new.

i remember doing a little homework before i bought it, and generally the feedback for refurbed stuff is good.

a reply to: TinySickTears


My monitor is refurbished. It has like 5 years or more and no problem.

originally posted by: Gothmog
Depends on whether or not one feels lucky
I always buy refurb hard drives
Depending on who does the refurb , the only thing that is used is the case...

This is a wierd concept to me. I actually pay $10 per drive to have them shredded at a computer recycler when i pull them out of service. And i get to watch, so i know the drives are never put back to market.

a reply to: Tekner

Would that be UPS?? They handled most of Toshiba's refurbs a d returns for man years

originally posted by: Serdgiam
a reply to: TinySickTears

Generally legit, in my opinion.

I'd say failure rates are roughly the same as "new." I've had a lot of luck with refurbished tools.

That said, I feel like the more complicated the device, the less likely I am to buy refurb.

This is many hoa hoa great advice! The more complex, you'd likely be better buying new with a manuf guarantee.

originally posted by: drewlander

originally posted by: Gothmog
Depends on whether or not one feels lucky
I always buy refurb hard drives
Depending on who does the refurb , the only thing that is used is the case...

This is a wierd concept to me. I actually pay $10 per drive to have them shredded at a computer recycler when i pull them out of service. And i get to watch, so i know the drives are never put back to market.

Those drives have a low-level format (mostly a modified DoD wipe) performed on them
Refurbs are just about a total rebuild (including the platters)
SSDs have the electronics replaced
Dont know about NVME M.2s , and I am not about to try with mine

a reply to: TinySickTears

I've bought refurbished computers for use and for parts to repair or enhance other computers. I've bought some electronics, new, returned and refurbished from Walmart sometimes for the same reason. Many moons ago I would buy two of what I thought were important things just to have a spare but that got to be too much clutter but it was handy when something quit just to unbox another one rather than having to go out to get a new one.

Buying refurbished is somewhat of a gamble. Refurbished basically means something that was returned and either worked fine as it was or had repairs to get it back into working condition. Consider a laptop, for example. Someone could have bought it, used it for 5 minutes and decided they hated it, and then returned it with nothing more than a few fingerprints. On the other hand, that refurbished laptop could have been thrown into a wall and broken in two... You never know. For an item to be sold as refurbished, though, it's going to be in working condition. Whether or not you can trust it to keep working depends somewhat on the seller. If Dell for example were selling refurbished laptops directly from their online store, you can probably trust that it'll be fine. I wouldn't recommend buying refurbished items from some shady EBAY seller with a bunch of 1-star reviews, though. It basically just comes down to common sense. Check out the seller's history, reviews, ratings, etc.

Did you decide to take the plunge and get one?

ETA: if you are planning on upgrading any parts, do research to make sure it's upgradeable. I recently got one that had amazing stats, but the power supply was not upgradeable so I couldn't add a video card or really anything.