2024 eBay pricing, What the actual?

[8bitDenial]

The Vic-20 was my second computer back in the day.

I started my voyage into computing with a 1K ZX81 (for which I promptly bought a 64K Memotech RAM expansion; which absolutely NOTHING took advantage of), before deciding I needed a colour computer to plug-into into my (even then) ancient Black and White portable TV, and promptly "upgraded" to a 3.5K Vic-20 computer.

I briefly owned a Vic-20 again in the 2010s during a collecting (HOARDING) phase and still own a Mega Cart I bought from the first run but sadly; I can't currently put my hands on, along with an FE3 kit which had sat unbuilt in its box, from the day I bought it from Sinchai in 2013 until I finally put a soldering iron to it, just last weekend.

Having only recently picked up a clean, tested, working Vic-20 for (I think) a very reasonable price with local pickup, I've just started checking UK eBay to see what other interesting items I can find to add to my latest nostalgic experience.

What the heck, eBay? Why is everything Vic-20 related so damned expensive. Especially in the UK?

I thought vintage C64 items are expensive but original Vic-20 hardware prices currently seem completely absurd.

When did THIS happen?

[srowe]

Having only recently picked up a clean, tested, working Vic-20 for (I think) a very reasonable price with local pickup, I've just started checking UK eBay to see what other interesting items I can find to add to my latest nostalgic experience.

What the heck, eBay? Why is everything Vic-20 related so damned expensive. Especially in the UK?

I thought vintage C64 items are expensive but original Vic-20 hardware prices currently seem completely absurd.

When did THIS happen?

Prices have been rising for a while. I got back into the VIC about 10 years ago. At that point prices were cheap, I got an early PET keyboard VIC plus a C64 for £25. Now you'd be pleased to get them for 10x that. There seems to be an odd contradiction, as more people find Dad's box of computer stuff in the loft and flog it there are more people wanting to reminisce about their first computer. On top of that there seem to be some sellers just taking the piss. It's got a lot harder since Covid to find a bargain (and, perhaps, the items I'm interested in are rarer anyway).

[Mike]

There seems to be an odd contradiction, as more people find Dad's box of computer stuff in the loft and flog it there are more people wanting to reminisce about their first computer.

Or the sellers simply count on uninformed buyers. For example, nearly all cartridges had their ROMs being dumped so the ROM dump can be softloaded. There's not anything anymore that counts as rare in that regard (except perhaps a one-of-its-kind prototype cartridge that pops up every now and again, if it's not a fake). Yet some people insist on having a physical copy and that keeps the prices high.

We had discussed this in an earlier thread here: Why is the Machine Language Monitor cartridge so expensive? In that particular case, prices on eBay now regularily reach the 3-digit range, and it's completely absurd: I can't imagine there's a surge of upcoming new coders using VICMON.

Regarding the base unit, about the only chip that needs a FPGA re-implementation to ensure an indefinite lifespan of the platform would be the VIC-I chip. As soon as that is available, that might give a hope prices for original hardware go down once again.

[8bitDenial]

I've owned a MiSTer FPGA since a little before COVID hit and the ensuing chip famine. There's a stable Vic-20 core for this.

Wouldn't this rely on an FPGA implementation of the VIC chip?

I don't know enough about the MiSTer's many cores; I just enjoy them.

[Mike]

Wouldn't this rely on an FPGA implementation of the VIC chip?

That's a common misconception.

As I wrote elsewhere: a complete emulation of a computer, be it a software-only as in VICE or as combination of hardware and software in a FPGA has substantially relaxed timing requirements, as ultimately 'just' each screen frame has to be completed within a 1/60 or 1/50 second, and sound can be buffered, so both keep in sync.

A drop-in replacement for a video chip has much stricter timing requirements. Whatever comes from the surrounding computer, and whatever goes to the computer, has to be handled on the sub-microsecond time scale, and the type of logic to handle this is at least somewhat different than what you can get away with, say, the MiSTer VIC-20 core.

Emphasis added.