Vintage Increases Value?

[Muirium]

I think you're right on the money here. Nostalgia is on a timer. Even beige tower PCs with abysmal specs and dubious functionality are going for $100+ on ebay. I guess I should diversify and take advantage of how cheap a lot of stuff from the 50's and 60's in now and expand my search to include crap from the 2000's (that isn't video game related. At this rate I have a gamecube game I kinda hated as a kid that is now worth more than the console was new)

Honestly old furniture is a great buy too, you can get incredibly well made solid wood furniture for depressingly little. I guess all the furniture collectors either got all the pieces they could fit in their home or even started downsizing or dying. "Modern" furniture was the beginning of the end quality wise and now commands a healthy premium.

You're saying I should sell my old iMac? Got it free in 2010. Worth something again in 2021!?



As for quality solid wooden furniture going for a song: where are you seeing that? I wouldn't even know where to look online for such bulky stuff.

[Rayndalf]

I think you're right on the money here. Nostalgia is on a timer. Even beige tower PCs with abysmal specs and dubious functionality are going for $100+ on ebay. I guess I should diversify and take advantage of how cheap a lot of stuff from the 50's and 60's in now and expand my search to include crap from the 2000's (that isn't video game related. At this rate I have a gamecube game I kinda hated as a kid that is now worth more than the console was new)

Honestly old furniture is a great buy too, you can get incredibly well made solid wood furniture for depressingly little. I guess all the furniture collectors either got all the pieces they could fit in their home or even started downsizing or dying. "Modern" furniture was the beginning of the end quality wise and now commands a healthy premium.

You're saying I should sell my old iMac? Got it free in 2010. Worth something again in 2021!?



As for quality solid wooden furniture going for a song: where are you seeing that? I wouldn't even know where to look online for such bulky stuff.

I wouldn't sell just yet. It's probably past the cheapest time to buy one, but I honestly think they're appreciate in the future.

As for the furniture there are some resale/ salvation army stores near me with some great pieces. The Goodwills nearby stopped taking most furniture (or maybe they toss it out after a while), but the salvation army I visited had some nice pieces. I went to an antique shop a few months ago that had some great wardrobes and a bedframe. I guess it's all still "in the real world" and probably requires a pickup truck, but damn... if you want some massive and classy furniture most small town antique stores probably have that covered.

[Muirium]

Well, when ours are allowed to open again, and we can see which ones survived the lockdown…

[Go-Kart]

It is a similar situation with vintage drum kits. Anything '70s or earlier is pretty cool right now and thus has reached a price apex. The stuff made in the '80s and '90s couldn't be any less cool. However, in terms of build quality and sound (for modern/rock music at least), this could arguably be the peak of drum kit manufacturing. The best stuff made from Taiwan, Japan, The States, etc. at that time is worth a faction of what it should command, if such drum kits sell at all; niche desirability. I suspect the window will shift or grow to encompass these drums in a few years time. Great time to buy such things, much like collectors in the '90s that saw the value of buying every '60s kit they spotted dusty in the corner of a thrift store.

[Muirium]

…or those of us lucky enough to be buying vintage boards in the 2000s-2010s.

Here's the thing with keyboards, though: will they ever drop off a cliff again? You can see the current bear market as a cohort effect where lots of first hand nostalgia is fuelling an ever bigger pool of demand for gear that's just not being made any more. But how long until the 1980s computing experience is beyond living memory? Are people really going to be into this in 50+ years from now?

An academic question, right enough. Yet I am honestly interested. Because when looking back at other kinds of "antiques", going back into the Victorian era, only some of them are worth anything today, and indeed only some of them survived. There's a hell of a lot of subjectivity involved in the peculiar history of all these objects!

[Thorogrimm]

…or those of us lucky enough to be buying vintage boards in the 2000s-2010s.

Here's the thing with keyboards, though: will they ever drop off a cliff again? You can see the current bear market as a cohort effect where lots of first hand nostalgia is fuelling an ever bigger pool of demand for gear that's just not being made any more. But how long until the 1980s computing experience is beyond living memory? Are people really going to be into this in 50+ years from now?

An academic question, right enough. Yet I am honestly interested. Because when looking back at other kinds of "antiques", going back into the Victorian era, only some of them are worth anything today, and indeed only some of them survived. There's a hell of a lot of subjectivity involved in the peculiar history of all these objects!

I think at that point vintage keyboards will either become exponentially niche and may even turn into family heirlooms from prior collectors, or be overshadowed by the ever growing custom keyboard market.

[micmil]

Folks, stop whining about keys being too small and simply learn typing correctly

For your information, on old typewriters all keys were 1u and pressing them down required a lot of force.
But well, as by that time practically all typists were women, one has to assume… oh, that would go to far

I used to type on those all the time. As a child. A tiny, tiny, frail, child. At like twelve words per minute. If that.

Typewriters sucked and I'm glad they're an amusement.

[micmil]

It is a similar situation with vintage drum kits. Anything '70s or earlier is pretty cool right now and thus has reached a price apex. The stuff made in the '80s and '90s couldn't be any less cool. However, in terms of build quality and sound (for modern/rock music at least), this could arguably be the peak of drum kit manufacturing. The best stuff made from Taiwan, Japan, The States, etc. at that time is worth a faction of what it should command, if such drum kits sell at all; niche desirability. I suspect the window will shift or grow to encompass these drums in a few years time. Great time to buy such things, much like collectors in the '90s that saw the value of buying every '60s kit they spotted dusty in the corner of a thrift store.

So drums are lagging about ten years behind guitars then. I watched in horror as the price of 80's "shredder" guitars went through the frickin' roof in the early to mid 2000's. If you had a San Dimas era Charvel in decent condition you could trade up to a low-priced car in some instances.

I don't get it. Right here, right now, the best guitars ever made are being produced and people want to pretend like the past was better. I'd argue that even keyboards are superior now to what they ever have been. More reliable switches, smaller form factors, massive range of choice, infinite customization.

VS the beige. All the beige. Maybe some browns too.

[lhutton]

…or those of us lucky enough to be buying vintage boards in the 2000s-2010s.

Here's the thing with keyboards, though: will they ever drop off a cliff again? You can see the current bear market as a cohort effect where lots of first hand nostalgia is fuelling an ever bigger pool of demand for gear that's just not being made any more. But how long until the 1980s computing experience is beyond living memory? Are people really going to be into this in 50+ years from now?

I think there will be a time when the value drops off again save for a few very timeless models. Same thing has happened to classic cars in some regard due to ageing populations. 50s/60s/70s cars kind of peaked about 10-15 years ago when boomers and early gen X hit nostalgia stage. They have been trailing downward since. Save for a very very specific models that defined certain eras. Mid-50s Chevys, mid 70s to early 80s square body pickups and a few others. But the days of a well used GTO, C3 Corvette or Barracuda going to a bidding war are over. They still have some value as an antique but it's declining.

Now 80s/90s cars are getting expensive. Japanese models specifically but there are oddball folks that collect K-cars and early-90s/late-80s GMs with bench seats. I suspect they'll peak in the next decade or two as millennials age and gen Z becomes the dominant adult demo. Sorry for my US-centric view but I'm sure there is a Europe or Asia version of the same phenomena.

Same thing will happen to my closet full of vintage keyboards. I'm not sure which vintage keyboard or PC will end up being "the one" that endures but the rest will just be oddities for most people. If I had to guess I'd think Apple and IBM stuff would be the things that even people in 50 years recognize as era defining and valuable. The Focus or Northgate keyboards and parts? Not so much.

YouTubers like LGR and 8 Bit Guy are fuelling it to a degree too.

[Jan Pospisil]

I'd say Youtuber(s) like Chyros. Every single time he's positive about a board, its price skyrockets. For an example, see his review of the Laser SMK. (seriously, even the slider over dome versions of "Montereys" go for absurd prices now, because they're very similar to SMK monterey boards)
His videos are among the first results when you google vintage boards, so naturally sellers will run into them.

[Go-Kart]

Spoiler:

It is a similar situation with vintage drum kits. Anything '70s or earlier is pretty cool right now and thus has reached a price apex. The stuff made in the '80s and '90s couldn't be any less cool. However, in terms of build quality and sound (for modern/rock music at least), this could arguably be the peak of drum kit manufacturing. The best stuff made from Taiwan, Japan, The States, etc. at that time is worth a faction of what it should command, if such drum kits sell at all; niche desirability. I suspect the window will shift or grow to encompass these drums in a few years time. Great time to buy such things, much like collectors in the '90s that saw the value of buying every '60s kit they spotted dusty in the corner of a thrift store.

So drums are lagging about ten years behind guitars then. I watched in horror as the price of 80's "shredder" guitars went through the frickin' roof in the early to mid 2000's. If you had a San Dimas era Charvel in decent condition you could trade up to a low-priced car in some instances.

I don't get it. Right here, right now, the best guitars ever made are being produced and people want to pretend like the past was better. I'd argue that even keyboards are superior now to what they ever have been. More reliable switches, smaller form factors, massive range of choice, infinite customization.

VS the beige. All the beige. Maybe some browns too.

Indeed. The brilliant-sounding American drum kits of the '60s are arguably the most desirable right now. Part of their magic sound, for two of the companies at least, was that they were buying the cheapest wood they could at the time - old African Mahogany. We now know that such aged, dark, tight-grain woods produce very warm, deep, rich tones. When Ringo happened, The Ludwig Drum company couldn't make drums quick enough. They doubled the work force, opened the factory 24/7 and were knocking our drums that were barely round. However, that again, accidentally added to the complex sound of the drums by drying them out and making them a little more "tubby" and "boxy" sounding. These things were accidental. Sure, you can buy old Mahogany these days but who'd be willing to pay for what such materials now command? Could they still make the drums ever so slightly egg-shaped to get that vintage tone back? I'd like to see a marketing department spin that!

Some old things do command high price tags as they are artefacts of their day and can't easily be replicated. Trade embargos, material costs, technology advancements (or lack there of), the stories of the people that worked at the companies that produced these products, it all adds up. I'm heartened to see when someone dedicates themselves to reproducing something like the New Model Fs or the Lisp boards, and really does it properly. For some, there's always that je ne sais quoi missing, not being a genuine product of the time.

[micmil]

These things were accidental.

Just look at the prices if you want an original Danelectro. A guitar literally made out of countertop plywood with pickups crammed into cosmetics containers. They were absolute cheap crap then and are expensive crap now.

But they sure as hell have their own sound and feel that are a byproduct of the cheapassness.

The real killer with the "vintage" crap is survivorship bias. All of the garbage guitars were disassembled, the good parts used for better instruments, and the rest thrown in the trash where it belonged. It's not like instrument manufacturing got worse over the years. The only place you could conceivably say things were better was in wood selection but even then... well... if you'd played my former coworker's 15 pound ash Tele you wouldn't make that argument try to stick. Different? Yes. Better? Nah.

[lhutton]

I'd say Youtuber(s) like Chyros. Every single time he's positive about a board, its price skyrockets. For an example, see his review of the Laser SMK. (seriously, even the slider over dome versions of "Montereys" go for absurd prices now, because they're very similar to SMK monterey boards)
His videos are among the first results when you google vintage boards, so naturally sellers will run into them.

I like his videos but he's a tiny fish compared to a lot of the vintage PC channels. Keyboard enthusiast is a niche hobby and vintage keyboard enthusiast is a niche in a niche so it probably doesn't take much nudging to get prices going.

To be clear I'm not faulting any of these guys for doing their job and paying their bills. But they are media figure heads of vintage PC hardware and have had some effect on the market for sure. Would a beige box 486 system still be pulling in north of $400+ on eBay in 2020 without them? Who knows but IMO they've certainly helped get the craze going. It's not all bad either. Those channels and the rise in polarity of this stuff means a lot of these systems or keyboards that would have been bound for eWaste "recycling" (aka put on a boat, landed in SE Asia or Africa and burned in an open pit most likely) get a second or third life in a collection or by an enthusiast enjoying their old hobbies or games. I think that's an OK trade off for higher prices. I've got enough keyboards anyway.

[lhutton]

You're saying I should sell my old iMac? Got it free in 2010. Worth something again in 2021!?



As for quality solid wooden furniture going for a song: where are you seeing that? I wouldn't even know where to look online for such bulky stuff.

I raise you my 2018 recycling center save of this blue and white PowerMac G3. I always loved the way these looked. Can't believe I got it for free still. Had a Sonnet 500Mhz G3 upgrade card in it too.

_LGH3908.jpg (69.6 KiB) Viewed 7587 times

[Go-Kart]

Spoiler:

I'd say Youtuber(s) like Chyros. Every single time he's positive about a board, its price skyrockets. For an example, see his review of the Laser SMK. (seriously, even the slider over dome versions of "Montereys" go for absurd prices now, because they're very similar to SMK monterey boards)
His videos are among the first results when you google vintage boards, so naturally sellers will run into them.

I like his videos but he's a tiny fish compared to a lot of the vintage PC channels. Keyboard enthusiast is a niche hobby and vintage keyboard enthusiast is a niche in a niche so it probably doesn't take much nudging to get prices going.

To be clear I'm not faulting any of these guys for doing their job and paying their bills. But they are media figure heads of vintage PC hardware and have had some effect on the market for sure. Would a beige box 486 system still be pulling in north of $400+ on eBay in 2020 without them? Who knows but IMO they've certainly helped get the craze going. It's not all bad either. Those channels and the rise in polarity of this stuff means a lot of these systems or keyboards that would have been bound for eWaste "recycling" (aka put on a boat, landed in SE Asia or Africa and burned in an open pit most likely) get a second or third life in a collection or by an enthusiast enjoying their old hobbies or games. I think that's an OK trade off for higher prices. I've got enough keyboards anyway.

Everyone's collections are worth a hell of a lot more now too so it's a double edged sword. I saw this happen with drums. Some collectors document and publish their library, some cash in.

[vometia]

What sucks is I see this going the way of guitars. A bunch of jackwagons looking to sell old crap started labeling everything old as "vintage" and a bunch of absolute schmucks that know nothing about instruments just eat it up. It's somehow been getting WORSE over the years to the point where absolute dumpster fire instruments (Norlin Gibsons, CBS Fenders) are commanding high prices solely because of age and not through any actual positive aspect.

Ugh, when I started playing bass in the mid 1980s, Fender had such a bad reputation thanks to the CBS years that I instinctively avoided them for decades. I eventually bought a new one (well, "1958 Vintage" model, but new) about five years ago and it's wonderful so I bought a second and it's also awesome. Definitely a case of vintage=old not necessarily being better.

Ebay's awful for finding practically anything these days though. It used to be a good place to find stuff like new-old-stock shoes as I was always too late getting to the high-street stores (yeah, clear out your summer stock to make way for the winter stuff just after Easter... ) but for years now it's just been flooded with absolute garbage which is all sized wrong anyway and it's increasingly difficult to filter out the junk with keywords, location etc.

Anyway, "get your vintage rubber-dome crap here!" for probably 10x the price it was originally.

[karlmartin95]

But think this way, why a collectible card (it's just a piece of paper) can cost, say 100.000 USD? Like a Pokemon one. So, why not an old rare Keyboard that could be used as a daily board cannot cost more than that? Like a classic car for example.

[lhutton]

Speaking of inflation here's someone selling a rubber dome Lexmark Model M that's got a broken cable and missing six keycaps asking for $49 USD. If it sells for that I've lost faith in humanity.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Lexmark-IBM-Mo ... SwaT5gdwuc

Screenshot from 2021-04-20 19-51-02.png (321.84 KiB) Viewed 7310 times

edit: and for $10 more at least this one is buckling spring I guess and what a deal for only $22 additional shipping. Just buy a Unicomp man.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Vintage-IBM-Mo ... SwIJZdkUCe

Screenshot from 2021-04-20 19-56-47.png (362.76 KiB) Viewed 7302 times

[raoulduke-esq]

I saw someone this week list a bog standard gray badge Model M for $9999.99. Absurdity is the norm but I still cringe when I see crap like that or people listing Model M as “rare” even though there are millions in existence.

[lhutton]

I saw someone this week list a bog standard gray badge Model M for $9999.99. Absurdity is the norm but I still cringe when I see crap like that or people listing Model M as “rare” even though there are millions in existence.

I have a friend who worked at at college in Mississippi in the early to mid-2000s. He has photos with their surplus room just full of M's, even had a hand full of SSKs too. He said he reckoned there were around 1500-2000 boards in there total in various states of working but at the time they weren't fashionable and people just threw them out. They stock piled what they could but a lot went to the the shredder. I imagine what that would be worth these days.

[raoulduke-esq]

I'm sure there will come a time when I regret offloading that aluminum white crap that came with my Mac Pro for like $20...

[Rayndalf]

But think this way, why a collectible card (it's just a piece of paper) can cost, say 100.000 USD? Like a Pokemon one. So, why not an old rare Keyboard that could be used as a daily board cannot cost more than that? Like a classic car for example.

Collectables typically have value because of the communities surrounding them assign them value. The keyboard community is now large enough that having an IBM board is a status symbol or otherwise desirable and the supply of these boards is being outstripped by demand. Somehow.

When I was a kid no one actually knew how to play the Pokemon card game. At that point every Pokemon pack had a holographic card that looked pretty cool, but they were only slightly less "valuable" on the playground than Yugioh cards despite that fact that they were more common and no one knew how to play the game.

Vintage crap is no different, it "looks" like stuff that is known to be good or hyped up in some way, but is inferior to a new board you can buy for cheaper. With moderately popular GMK sets doubling in price in a year... you can get your Beamer half off if you wait 10 months to flip your GMK first

[Burton]

I think you're right on the money here. Nostalgia is on a timer. Even beige tower PCs with abysmal specs and dubious functionality are going for $100+ on ebay. I guess I should diversify and take advantage of how cheap a lot of stuff from the 50's and 60's in now and expand my search to include crap from the 2000's (that isn't video game related. At this rate I have a gamecube game I kinda hated as a kid that is now worth more than the console was new)

Honestly old furniture is a great buy too, you can get incredibly well made solid wood furniture for depressingly little. I guess all the furniture collectors either got all the pieces they could fit in their home or even started downsizing or dying. "Modern" furniture was the beginning of the end quality wise and now commands a healthy premium.

You're saying I should sell my old iMac? Got it free in 2010. Worth something again in 2021!?



As for quality solid wooden furniture going for a song: where are you seeing that? I wouldn't even know where to look online for such bulky stuff.

It looks just amazing! An old Mac is something! She could make visually cool devices. I would not mind buying a new powerful computer with such a design that will run modern games.

[hellothere]

I don't think the "lamp" iMac is considered a classic, yet. Give it some time. Are those Creature speakers?

Y'know, if we were able to go back into the past and tell folks to save and store their unused Model Ms, Model Fs, and earlier, then jump back to present day, those keyboards would only be worth around $20. While I'd like to live in that world, with the limited knowledge of mechanical keyboards I now have, I think that if a Model M was only worth $20, people would treat them like rubber dome keyboards.

[Muirium]

Original Apple Pro Speakers, as came bundled with the iMac. Bloody useless on any computer besides the G4 iMac and Power Mac. Sound decent enough for their size, and the acrylic Apple aesthetic of the time is strong in them. Maybe it'll get more retro as the days of iMac colours sink back in! My G4 is when they went away.

Given how much Apple Extended Keyboards (I and II) cost back in their day, and the, ahem, picky/hoardy Apple nerds who were buying them, we can almost run that experiment. There's actually a lot of AEK IIs still out there today, a good few of them new in box. I got a mint one pretty easily. Mind, I got an NIB SSK as well, but that was Cindy working wonders, not me!

Anyway, my point is these good keyboards were pricey back in the day, as well. $200 or so? ($163 according to Wikipedia.) Some people really would keep them new in box for the duration, as a spare or just a sense they'd be worth more in future. If anything, that may have reduced their value in our current future! But not by much. And it is nice to have that vintage experience, new in box and none the worse for it.

Kishsavers, meanwhile, were strictly corporate—banking terminals, right?—so all the OG hardware is used, and fairly rare. Owners chucked it all out, decades ago. Scarcity surely makes the prices rocket, but when I got mine for a hundred bucks or so, the demand wasn't there yet. The legend was busy being born.

[raoulduke-esq]

Looks like complaining about price has always been a part of this hobby. Reading that Kish chain now feels like looking back in time at folks like “a share of Apple for $1 hell no that’s too high!”

[Muirium]

Beautiful ain't it?

[raoulduke-esq]

Beautiful ain't it?

I'm just in awe of that, and in the fact that at one point in the current century there were actual F50!

[E3E]

F50 and F107 were not nearly as desirable as kishsavers or unobtainum-level F77 until Ellipse's repros made it easier to be more blase about them

I wonder what OG unmodified F62/77 would go for on eBay these days

[raoulduke-esq]

I wonder what OG unmodified F62/77 would go for on eBay these days

There's a broken and bootleg industrial painted one for $3k that started for several thousand higher that continues to not sell, so it would seem people wanting to empty their bank accounts on a keyboard would like it at least original and working.