Experience buying “junk” or “untested” consoles?

[Plazorn]

I’ve seen countless consoles for sale on EBay, appearing in decent condition, selling for pretty cheap, but usually with the “junk” or “untested” tags. For example, a DSi for $19, listed as “junk” but it doesn’t say what’s wrong with it. I was wondering if anyone has had experience buying such consoles, do they work? Or are they really junk? What do you think?

 

[tech3475]

I'd say stuff like this is always the luck of the draw.

In one instance I bought an old iPod thinking the HDD just needed replacing, but that wasn't the fault.

Recently I saw someone repair a PS5 where it just needed some cleaning up to fix.

 

[Mayo1990]

Depends. If It's coming from a collector, and they're """untested""", they're 99% broken and require a lot of money to get them fixed.

Rest is mostly about luck. And your skill at fixing stuff.

 

[The Real Jdbye]

I'd say stuff like this is always the luck of the draw.

In one instance I bought an old iPod thinking the HDD just needed replacing, but that wasn't the fault.

Recently I saw someone repair a PS5 where it just needed some cleaning up to fix.

It can be... Sometimes it's just a scam. Repair people or people with zero repair knowledge (which is even worse) selling consoles they already tried to fix as "untested". Which 99% are going to be unfixable, or not worth the money/effort to fix. Or the worst ones, when you get a console made up of all faulty parts they had left over after fixing other consoles that they just threw together...
It's hard to tell the difference between genuine listings, and business sellers pretending they don't know what's wrong. Until you buy it and open it up anyways.

 

[spinal_cord]

Untested = Tested but Broken.

 

[tech3475]

It can be... Sometimes it's just a scam. Repair people or people with zero repair knowledge (which is even worse) selling consoles they already tried to fix as "untested". Which 99% are going to be unfixable, or not worth the money/effort to fix. Or the worst ones, when you get a console made up of all faulty parts they had left over after fixing other consoles that they just threw together...
It's hard to tell the difference between genuine listings, and business sellers pretending they don't know what's wrong. Until you buy it and open it up anyways.

Sometimes even 'legitimate' stuff can be understated.

I once drunk bought a region modded SFC being sold as 'broken shell'.....when I got it I couldn't so much as look at it without bits of it falling off and to add to it games wouldn't boot.

However, I had had a couple of drinks by this point so I decided to open it up and gut swap it with my faulty PAL SNES's case. Had to dremmel a bit of the case but in the end I got it working (I suspect the SPC subsystem had become disconnected).

 

[master801]

It's hit and miss. Most of the time it's miss.

But I've bought a few things listed as "broken" or "for parts / repair" in the past, yet arrived with absolutely no issues, or very minor ones.

For example, I bought 3 USA Dreamcasts for $90 listed as "broken", but they all worked fine, other than all of them being yellow and one not reading discs (common issue - no biggie).

In a different case, I bought a "NEW 3DS XL" listed as broken, and the seller knew damn well what was wrong with it but yet feigned the typical ignorance saying things like "untested" or "I don't know what's wrong with it". Yet when I opened it, the liquid damage sticker was completely bled out, battery was completely swollen, and corrosion on some chips. It was cheap, but mentioning something like "hey, liquid was spilled on this" would've been at least informative.

I guess they didn't want to explain what happened to it and have the price be lowered.

If you like gambling and don't mind getting potentially scammed (item never being shipped and messages ignored, item being improperly described), go for it.

Buying and repairing is very risky, especially with disingenuous sellers.

Side note: Most Japanese sellers on Ebay have figured out that their items will still sell even if actually broken, so their prices will not be much fairer than ones from the US (assuming you're also in the US.)

Personally, I think having a Japanese console instead of the local region (assuming it isn't exclusive to Japan) devalues the price quite a bit.

 

[SylverReZ]

Untested = Tested but Broken.

Sometimes if you're lucky with an untested item, it might power on and/or work without any problems, but only requires a few easy fixes.

 

[The Catboy]

It really depends on your skills and willingness to work on a project.
In high school, I used to buy bulk broken DS Lites to repair them. Most of the systems were almost completely dead, but I was able to use their parts to make all kinds of custom systems. Parts I couldn't use, I would either recycle them or break them down further to find what I could use.