The PowerMax Experiment

I did get the quotes from PowerMax, and I was pretty happy with them. So, I’ve bought a black MacBook for my wife from them and will be shipping the systems out as soon as I receive all their instructions. I’ve reviewed the policies on their website in the past, so I feel like I already know what they’re going to say.

I’m trading in two systems on the MacBook. The first is my wife’s 17 inch 1.8GHz G5 iMac with 512MB of RAM, an 80GB hard drive, an Airport Card, and the standard USB 2.0, FW 400, and Ethernet ports as well as the 56K internal modem Apple chopped out of their products prematurely. They offered me $625 for it; and from what I could see, that’s the average money being given for one on eBay. The second is my wife’s 12 inch 1 GHz G4 PowerBook, with 512 MB RAM, a 40GB hard drive, a combo drive, two USB 2.0 ports, a Firewire 400 port, a 56 k internal modem, and a DVI out port. They offered me $550 for it. That also seemed like a good price. Of course, those values are written in jello; the real values will be sent to me once they receive the machines. They’re in good shape and we have all the accessories (unless my wife lost some, which is possible if not likely), so I’m expecting the value to come in within $100 of the quotes, or it will be the last time I try this approach. Obviously, I’ll blog about how it goes.

There is no tax ordering from them, so the difference between the quoted values and the system price is only $225 plus shipping costs. Not bad for a day’s work if it holds up.

I’m going to order her a 1GB stick of RAM from Other World Computing tonight. That’ll put 1.25GB of RAM in the machine. I’d get her more but I’ve got my own Mac Book Pro to worry about.