A Question About Macbooks.

Hi all,

I'm just looking for a little advice here. I've acquired a 2009 Macbook 13" model, which is not in good health! I was considering trying to source parts (it has no hard drive and no RAM) with the intention of selling it. The guy I got it from said it was water damaged, and I'd taken it to an Apple store to see what they could do for me. The girl in the store had plugged in an external drive from which she said the machine would boot if it was still 'alive'... she told me that as lights were coming on at the side of the machine, this did indicate that it was receiving power - but that because it was not booting, the power was not getting to 'the right places'. I was quoted £71 for them to tell me how much it would be to fix it. How very kind, I thought.

Having had a look on ebay and the likes, I see that a lot of these machines are sold as 'spares & repairs'. So there's obviously a market for those who can source parts and are knowledgeable enough to repair them, to buy 'dud' machines, and sell them on or use them. So... as a Windows user who knows nothing about Macs (sorry guys!) I'm basically wondering what sort of price I could realistically expect for the Macbook I have, if I were to sell it in its current condition.

Any advice would be much appreciated!

Like you mentioned...check e-Bay for "dud" Macbooks similar to your's. I would say that the most valuable part is the logic board...and if your Macbook was water damaged...then the logic board is probably no good.

Thus your Macbook:

- has a bad logic board
- no hard drive
- no ram

All of this greatly reduces it's value to "parts computer buyers". Just put it on e-Bay clearly identifying it as a parts computer...and that it was water damaged...and see how much you get. There really is no set price for selling a damaged computer.

I'm assuming you didn't pay much if anything for it...so whatever you make on e-Bay will be profit (minus e-Bay & Paypal fees)!

Good luck,

- Nick

Thanks for your reply Nick.

As you've suggested, I'd had a look on ebay. In most cases, the users selling Macbooks as 'spares & repair' didn't often specify exactly what the problem with the machine was, i.e. what it would need or what would need doing to make it operational. This is why I didn't really have a clue what sort of price to ask! I saw prices ranging from £100 to around £300. Good thing is, I got it for nothing so as you say, anything is profit!

thebazman said:

As you've suggested, I'd had a look on ebay. In most cases, the users selling Macbooks as 'spares & repair' didn't often specify exactly what the problem with the machine was, i.e. what it would need or what would need doing to make it operational.

Click to expand...

I can almost guarantee you that many of the e-Bay sellers selling broken laptops for parts know almost exactly what is wrong with them. They're just "playing dumb" hoping that by playing dumb that will fetch more money!

The £100 to around £300 you mentioned I'm guessing covers a lot of different models & ages (newer models & older models). What many buyers do with broken laptops they buy is not to get them working again (unless it's a very inexpensive part). What they usually do is to just strip the computer for all of it's good parts...and then list like 10-20 separate auctions for each individual part.

I like to be as open & honest as possible when selling on e-Bay. If I knew that a broken laptop I was selling was water damaged...I would mention that in the e-Bay description. That's just me.

Since you got this Macbook for nothing...everything (minus selling fees) would be profit.

Good luck,

- Nick