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Deal on MBP 1.83 Core Duo: Please Advise...

InLikeALion

InLikeALion

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Jul 18, 2007
624
59
Greener places than I used to live
I have the opportunity to buy a gen 1 MBP 1.83 Core Duo, 2GB ram, 80gig HDD for the low price of $600 plus shipping from the UK to the States.

About Me/My Needs: I am a graphic designer who does flash, web, and lots of print design, as well as the occasional video/motion graphics project. I am also a musician and am expanding my studio to include Logic Express (eventually Studio). Currently I have a PowerMac G5 DP 2Ghz tower. I have felt for a while the need to have a portable, in order to have mobility with my projects, to have the ability to go to clients when I free-lance, and to be able to work while on the road.

I am ultimately saving for a mid-to-high-end MBP to become my main machine, but with a wife and having to keep a tight budget it will take me the greater part of another year or so before I have the money for that machine. This seems like it could be a good stop-gap till then.

Does anyone think this is a good deal, or that it is a poor decision? I really appreciate this community's input and respect many of your opinions.
 
IMcD23 said:
If you bought this, it would be longer still until you get the nicer one. Plus, for that price?? Watch out! It might be a fake!
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I'd want to see the machine in person and learn more about it.

Still, you need to take into account that the capital investment in hardware may yield a profit greater then what you invested.

My Macs have always earned part of their price back from projects I accomplish on them.
 
InLikeALion said:
I have the opportunity to buy a gen 1 MBP 1.83 Core Duo, 2GB ram, 80gig HDD for the low price of $600 plus shipping from the UK to the States.
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This is of course the earliest and lowest spec MBP out there. Its the base model when the MBP first replaced the PowerBook G4. Also, given it is in the UK it will likely have the UK keyboard which has a slightly different layout to the US keyboard - the '#' (hash) symbol is accessed via ALT-3 rather than SHIFT-3 which is the '£' (Pound) symbol and the return key sits vertically rather than horizontally which takes some getting used to.

Now, I am using a MBP of the same age which I bought in the UK when I lived there and it is fine. I paid £2000 for it at the time because I upgraded it to 2GB of RAM and mine was the top model apart from the BTO 2.16 version. If you do buy it you should install FanControl as these early machines run very hot without it. Also, there is a good chance the battery is a problem if it hasn't already been replaced, I'm on my third.

I would be very suspicious of a machine that is now considered to only be worth £300 given current exchange rates. That seems very very low indeed even for a machine that retailed at about £1500 when new. If it was a PC I would say the price is about right but for a Mac it looks at least half the price it should be so the seller is either ill informed of the actual value or a con artist.
 
Thanks for the replies. Let me give some more background:

This is a person from my city that a friend had been in contact with on Craigs List. They were trying to sell the computer before they moved to the UK, but were too busy with the move to settle anything. They have now settled in and are trying to sell again. Here is her message to my friend:

Hello

The laptop is still available and I hope you are still interested. My name is Name Removed and I am now in Manchester, U.K.
The laptop is in good condition, it is 11 Months old and still has 25 Months of Apple Care warranty from the manufacturer. The laptop was designed for North American use and it works on the US power and plug system and that's why I am looking to sell it over there.
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I'm not a noob - I won't be paying through Western Union. I've sent an initial contact to see if she would be willing to do a PayPal transaction, which would give me the double guard of my credit card company and PayPal's insurance.

Eidorian, I always appreciate your replies. I do realize the investment in hardware will pay for itself. The problem is at my full-time job I make about $20k a year and my wife had been without a job for the past few months. She has a new job now so our finances are improving, but being able to float that initial investment and waiting for the solid return is still taxing on the budget.

I work at a small design firm with about 5 employees and we occasionally need another machine at work. I will most likely be able to work out a lease with my boss where she will pay $200 to have an extra machine come in to work with me every day over the next 6 months. This makes it a much more enticing opportunity.
 
GreatDrok said:
This is of course the earliest and lowest spec ...

I would be very suspicious of a machine that is now considered to only be worth £300 given current exchange rates. That seems very very low indeed even for a machine that retailed at about £1500 when new. If it was a PC I would say the price is about right but for a Mac it looks at least half the price it should be so the seller is either ill informed of the actual value or a con artist.
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Thanks for expressing that. I have seen scams in many places before, so I am def. looking at this with the skeptics eye. I won't act on it unless I can get lots of communication with the lady and feel comfortable with all the vibes. See the background I added above.
 
Don't go for it. I saw the same ad on craiglist when I was shopping for a Macbook Pro. It is exactly the same one and also do not respond to it. It is a scam my friend, and yes it is too good to be true. I have a friend who is selling his high Core Duo MBP for about 900 dollars because he wants to upgrade to the high end 2.33
 
I also inquired about this and got the exact same response you did. As the old saying goes, if it sounds too good to be true ... it normally is.
 
Spidey79 said:
Don't go for it. I saw the same ad on craiglist when I was shopping for a Macbook Pro. It is exactly the same one and also do not respond to it. It is a scam my friend, and yes it is too good to be true. I have a friend who is selling his high Core Duo MBP for about 900 dollars because he wants to upgrade to the high end 2.33
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As we say here: Proof or it didn't happen.

How do you know it's the same one when the information I posted was from personal contact, not the original craigs list. Sorry if I sound skeptical, but you even seem to offer proof that it could be feasible, saying your friend is selling his top of the line 1st gen for only $300 more. How do you "know" it's a scam?

I'm not by any means attacking you, just encouraging you to give more basis for your claims so I can better weigh them in my judgment of the whole situation. Thanks.
 
LOL I don't believe people still fall for this. Here is a ad from MY local craigslist for the same thing. Just copy and paste some of that text from the "personal" reply into google and you'll get tons of responses for that same ad AND different things with the same wording, but substitute plasma for mbp or something... DEF a scam. You wll get yet another copy and paste reply with further contact, saying they are using some sort of special service for packages that you will be able to see the object and then OK the money send etc.

http://bn.craigslist.org/sys/512210770.html

Same computer... same price... same reply.

This is a scam. If you haven't heard of it before, you and your friend clearly don't look for electronics on craigslist much if at all.
 
je1ani said:
That EXACT same ad is here in SF bay area listings.. IT'S A SCAM!!
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I'm looking through the SFBA list right now and can't find it... can anyone give me a link or more specifics so I can find some evidence of this?

Edit: Thanks ktbubster for the link.

You're right - I don't do craigs list electronics. I've always been an eBayer myself.
 
Even if it is a scam, I'd avoid it. I had no end of problems with my 1.83 CD MacBook Pro. In the end, Apple just replaced it. I believe most of the problems were related to excessive heating...
 
ktbubster said:
I'm not sure why I feel inclined to help people that can't recognize obvious scams, but .... here

http://www.google.com/search?client...has+25+Months+of+Apple+Care&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8


i googled the response you got, like I said to do, and the first 3 links (including one from better internet whatnot) clearly show it is a scam.
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I meant to edit my last response with a thanks for the links - I don't know why it didn't save. But the point is Thank You. I'm sorry that I took up your time asking questions. I have a perfect record on ebay and generally see scams for what they are, but like i've said, I have no experience with Craigslist and since my friend sent me email from what seemed to be someone with whom she had established contact/trust, my warning sirens didn't go off.

My first google searches and craiglist.org searches didn't produce anything, so that's why I kept asking. It's not as if I can't use google or anything, but I can see how it is annoying that you had to do a search for me. Sorry.

killyp - thanks for the advice in general about that model.

Everyone - thanks for keeping me on the right track - I was just excited about the opportunity to have a mobile to work with until I can afford something better. Thanks for being part of our great community. I'm sorry I took up time for an obvious scam.
 
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