Various boxed computers - how much?

[olly]

c64 old style in with psu, manual, polys, sleeve, 9/10
Sinclair zx spectrum, mint + boxed, everything there
Atari 800XE, complete and boxed w. polys.

i also have a zx 81 with a strange synthesiser board that fits into the expansion bay. this has a DIN audio output.

Anyone know how much any of this would be worth, or is interested?
thanks

[Sharkonwheels]

I'm going to assume by the fact that you list a spectrum, and use the word "polys" that you're in the UK?

letting people know where you are helps, so they can account for p&p in their thoughts on the items.


Tony

[carlsson]

C64: Price level varies by the season of the year; i.e. in spring you might get twice as much as you'll get at the beginning of fall. Or vice versa. There are reasonably many complete, boxed C64 in good condition, both the breadbox and newer models. Assuing you want values in GBP, I would say it can be worth anything from £20-40. Any peripherals like disk drives, freeze cartridges, software etc?

ZX Spectrum: Much like the C64, but here you have to account for local availibility. While boxed C64s might appear anywhere around the world, boxed Spectrums are likely in the UK or some other part of Europe. Look on eBay for price indication, but I'd say £20-40 here as well, maybe up to £50 if it really is in mint condition. If it is in pristine mint condition, some collector might be interested in paying more, but then they would have to make a house call to investigate the item in person...

Atari 800XE: As far as I know, this is the European version of 65XE, which itself was the replacement for 800XL. I don't know how common it is compared to the other Atari models - it was released relatively late in parallel to the 130XE - but in boxed condition, this one might be able to fetch £75-110 if you find the right buyer.

ZX-81: Not boxed? It is strangely often sought for, but without box and polys, perhaps £20-30. The synthesizer board however might be of more interest; hard for me to give a fair evaluation without looking it up.

In any case, I think the boxed Atari might be the most valuable item of those. All those evalutations are prior to shipping costs. Since I know the UK Royal Mail is (one of) the most expensive in the world, people abroad might hesistate to buy anything if the postage costs overshadow the price of the items.

[olly]

hi, thanks for all the help - yes i am in the uk. The speccy is mint apart from the manuals, which are very slightly dog-eared. The commodore has a tape drive and about 10 tapes, all of which are boxed and mint and bear the "by appointment to her majesty the queen manufacturers of business machines" , most of these are games.

I made a mistake - the atari is an 800 XL not XE, its black and beige. The box is somewhat tatty.

I also have an amiga 600, unboxed, a black commodore 16 plus 4 with various cartridges (unboxed) and an interesting spectrum controller assignment board, with a kind of old telephone-exchange style plugboard allowing the gamepad controls to be mapped to keys on the spectrum.
Also an unboxed spectrum plus 3 witha floppy disk drive - ive not seen one of these before i thought they all had tapes.

Does anyone know anything about the aquarius?

[carlsson]

The 1530/C2N tape recorder itself doesn't add so much value, but it depends a little which 10 tapes (originals I presume) you have. Most are insignifcant or common, but once in a while you might own a semi-rare or better game.

I don't know if an XL counts higher or lower than an XE - you should look around for recent quotes. The "somewhat tatty" box will not score as high as if it had been mint, of course. While all the other, unboxed computers tend to be uncommon, they're not worth telling your insurance company about.

Aquarius? I googled Mattel Aquarius just the other day, inspired by the thread about a previous TI employee who has an eBay store selling Barbie dolls and handheld (?) TI computers. I was about to write something what if that person had been employed by Mattel and could've picked up left-over Aquarius and perhaps even more rare Aquarius II systems. I think on various webpages you will see quotes between 5,000 and 18,000 computers sold world-wide, and that it was internally nicknamed "computer of the 70'ties" despite being manufactured in 1983. If you own one of those, in particular in nice condition with some accessories, it might be the crown of the collection, boxed or not.

[olly]

Yes, the aquarius is pretty much mint, with all the original bits and bobs that came with it, including the keyboard overlay for basic programming that doesnt look as if its even been used.

[retro69]

Mattel Aquarius very common...and really cheap computer I think.. I have seen several in ebay.. I want to buy one, but nobody want to send it to Turkey :( I have bought several computer from UK and US. But some seller don't send computers overseas..

http://oldcomputers.net/aquarius.html