Has anyone been ripped off? Please tell you bad experiences. The deals look good but I its it worth the risk? What if they take your money and don't send the product or send you something that doesn't work? What do you do?

I think ebay has some type of insurance you can get, also you can always use an escrow service...takes longer, but will more or less guarantee you that its a fair deal

and always bid on stuff from people with at least 50+ reviews

I just bought a $660 Sony Camcorder on ebay (finally got one chicken :D ) and he shipped it out and i should get it Monday :)

With servers, i seen a few that were "AS IS" and would never bid on such items...who knows, they can send you a dead computer and if it showed up dead, it wouldnt be their fault...just like buying a car..just do your homework as with anything else you buy

Generally I think ebay is pretty safe, I have bought 80+ items on there, with no fraud as of yet (knock on wood)

Originally posted by AlaskanWolf
I think ebay has some type of insurance you can get, also you can always use an escrow service...takes longer, but will more or less guarantee you that its a fair deal

and always bid on stuff from people with at least 50+ reviews

I just bought a $660 Sony Camcorder on ebay (finally got one chicken :D ) and he shipped it out and i should get it Monday :)

With servers, i seen a few that were "AS IS" and would never bid on such items...who knows, they can send you a dead computer and if it showed up dead, it wouldnt be their fault...just like buying a car..just do your homework as with anything else you buy

When you buy a car you get to test driving it and look under the hood. With ebay you only get a cut and paste description and picture from the products website.

this is the internet...whada expect? :(

I would not suggest eBay as a means of obtaining equipment. I used to buy/sell things from eBay a lot last summer and 1 out of 3 dealings I got ripped off. Lucky for me, though, is that I never lost any money. That's why I stopped using eBay. Don't trust feedback, it's been known for people to decide not to use eBay anymore and go on a negative streak. (I saw one guy with over 1000 positive feedback marks, but his 20 most recent ones were ALL negatives. :rolleyes: )

And never trust equipment that you buy from complete strangers. I would just shell out a few more bucks for brand new equipment from a trusted source.

Originally posted by AlaskanWolf
I just bought a $660 Sony Camcorder on ebay (finally got one chicken :D ) and he shipped it out and i should get it Monday :)
Yeaaa! Congrats mate!

I have bought over 1000 items on ebay and have been ripped off once. For two video tapes. I have been on their system since 96.

I have bought everything from computers to videos to books to tickets to vcrs to well, just about everything.

Some tips to follow:

1) Buy from sellers who have high feedback ratings. That is the number between the () after their name.

2) If it is a big ticket purchase look at their feedback and send an email to someone who bought something like it.

3) Send an email to the seller before you buy and detail all the terms and condititions.

4) Use a credit card when you can. It's easy to reverse the charges then.

Good luck.

Wrong forum, right? Where are the mods? Chicken? Chicken, are you there? :D

Buying web hosting equipement from eBay... I don't know. Seems fine, but if you have a suggestion of where you would have expected to see this, please PM/Email the mods.

Originally posted by dialuphost
Generally I think ebay is pretty safe, I have bought 80+ items on there, with no fraud as of yet (knock on wood)

I've had similar experiences. But, I wouldn't say it is because eBay is necessarily safe. It has much more to do with keeping an eye on who you are dealing with.

Feedback is key. It is no guarantee to see someone with a high score. If you are buying something expensive enough to be upset about being ripped off, take the 2 minutes and actually READ their feedback. Someone with a +20 feedback might have 30 good and 10 bad feedback marks.

The amount of time you spend researching the seller should be commensurate with the $ amount you are spending. If your buying a 4-way server you better make "darn" sure that your going to get what you pay for.

Take care,

Brian