High Priced Old Architecture PC Items on Ebay, What Gives?

[SteveJ34]

I'm sure there is an answer, so thought I would ask here....

From time to time when searching items, etc one runs across sellers with similar items being listed in standard auctions as Store Inventory with outrageous prices.

I researched a few of these and see actual purchases made for said items at prices that make no sense whatsoever.

Anyone have input as to "what is really going on" here?

Is it as simple as listing any and everything in the hopes that someone will be in a critical situation as to pay the outrageous price in order to restore some piece of equipment to recover data in time of need?

I just don't get it....

[MikeQ]

Very likely.  I'm involved in embedded systems development and for reference platforms on WinCE, there are only a few graphics cards that are supported.  Unfortunately, the platforms these cards are usuable on are ancient.  It is impossible to buy many of these components new.  ATI Rage graphics cards are a good example.  Then you need to find an AGP 1x or 2x motherboard, etc...

[Samstag]

That's pretty much it.  People looking for the really old stuff on Ebay are there because they need it and can't easily find it anywhere else.

My company has to support a lot of seriously outdated systems (25 years old in some cases) and we buy from these guys all the time.

[Jdurg]

It's probably not a huge contributor, but a lot of the old PC parts used precious metals in fairly high quanitity for the ICs and PCBs, and there are people out there who take those old parts and try and reclaim the one or two grams of gold/silver/palladium that may be in there.  I laugh at many of those people because the money they spend trying to extract it is far, far more than the value of the metal they pull out.