At 03:41 PM 5/28/2004, you wrote:
>I think I purchased the last batch of Qbus boards before Ed raised his
>prices.
>Ed is an honest broker and I've had good experience with him over some time.
>
>Lyle
>
>
>On Friday 28 May 2004 12:28, Jay West wrote:
> > I've known about macro-inc site for years now, but haven't looked for a
> > while. I just checked, and his prices have definitely increased since the
> > last time I looked.
> >
Thank you, Lyle.
<Where should I send the check? :-) >
Bill Bailey copied me on his post starting this thread.
I wasn't aware of the list, so I signed on to see what was happening.
Yes, I bumped most of the prices up when I saw the stuff actually moving.
Sorry, no excuse but crass commercialism on my part. :-)
I don't think I'm really a broker in the sense I buy stuff to resell.
What I'm selling is what I've accumulated over the last 25+ years of
working with DEC PDP11 systems.
I still have a customer with 4 PDP11 systems that I have 24/7 service
contracts on.
This DEC stuff (and some old PC stuff) just sat on the shelf because I was
too lazy, and too much the packrat, to toss it.
In the old days to sell this stuff you'd have to take an ad in The
Processor or some other print magazine.
Way too expensive for a part-timer with a small inventory.
Now with the Internet, Google, and my own server, my cost of sales is
practically nil.
Pricing depends on a lot of things, one of which is the number and type of
buyers your product is exposed to.
With the Internet, it's huge, both in numbers and diversity.
How huge, I didn't really consider when I first set prices on my stuff.
I just wanted someone to come buy it all so I could buy some other toys.
But with a huge market, one in which you can reach *all* potential buyers,
I realized that I didn't need to price something so low someone would buy
it even if they didn't really want it.
And, if they wanted it, and availability was scarce, price didn't matter
much either.
Now I know this may strike some on this list as a little crass, and not in
the spirit of classic, or vintage computing.
I agree. It would be much nicer to give things away in a public spirited
way to promote the hobby.
And I do some of that too. I'm scanning some Emulex manuals I have, to
send, along with Emulex tape and disk formatting software, to a guy who as
a public service has posted old manuals on his site.
http://www.miim.com/documents/dilog/
But this isn't really my hobby or avocation, something else is.
The little I make selling old DEC stuff supports my other interests.
My "market" isn't really people on this list either.
My thinking, and I may be all wet, is that folks on this list like to
tinker and cobble stuff together as much as they like to use what they've
put together. I'm like that myself.
But I figured there are people who don't really want, or have the time, to
tinker.
They'd just like to play Plane or Advent or Dungeo (6.3 names) on a PDP11.
Some folks camp with tents, others with RV's.
So I took a bunch of the parts and put together some complete PDP11 systems.
Since I have other hobbies to fund, I decided to put a good price on them
and wait for a buyer.
And Lo!, they're out there. :-)
I had some QBus disk controllers listed on the website at give away prices.
No one bought them, so I put them together with cables, drives and
enclosures, all tested, formatted and ready to go.
Again, nothing magic to folks on this list, but just the thing someone else
might be looking for.
Plus I liked tinkering them together. :-)
I make my living developing systems for gamma ray inspection of nuclear fuel.
My avocation and hobby, where I'll put the little extra I make selling old
DEC stuff, is firearms related.
I like to shoot and I'm a licensed firearms dealer but that just helps with
my real hobby which is
promoting the rights of citizens to have and use firearms as they wish.
I do that as president of GrassRoots GunRights South Carolina.
www.scfirearms.org
And now that I'm *completely* out of hand, I'll sign off. :-)
Ed Kelleher
Received on Fri May 28 2004 - 16:37:06 BST