Should I be scared of buying a Refurbished product?

[kingofbongo]

Hey,

I'm thinking of buying a refurbished plextor DVDR. Could people please post their experiences with refurbished products? Are the majority which are refurbished come with a warrantee like the original?

 

[kingofbongo]

bump

 

[ethebubbeth]

you pays your money and you takes your chances... i got a refurbished radeon 9700 pro that had a bad voltage regulator. Refurbished products do have a much higher failure rate than their oem or retail counterparts, but you should prolly be ok. Warryanties are generally pretty bad though... the one on that graphics card was about 15 days

 

[kingofbongo]

Thanks for the tip, any other experiences?

 

[tigerwannabe]

i had a refurb ctx monitor that worked well for 2 years--got it for half price. i traded up and, last i heard, the thing was still going strong.

 

[Akaz1976]

Refurbs are higher risk tranx no doubt. And they come with shorter warranty times (usually 15-30 days).

So it really comes down to your willingness to tinker with your system to make it work (refurbs are likely to take more work) vs. the lower cost!

Akaz

 

[BG4533]

Originally posted by: kingofbongo
Hey,

I'm thinking of buying a refurbished plextor DVDR. Could people please post their experiences with refurbished products? Are the majority which are refurbished come with a warrantee like the original?

If you do buy it make sure to thoroughly test it while it is still under warranty. It could end up costing you more than the original by wasting DVDs. I have purchased one mobo refurbed and had a bad experience with it. It would not fully boot, then I flashed the bios, it worked fine for a while and then it started rarely booting. It ran fine once it was booted though.

 

[Mitzi]

I bought a refurb'ed Dell 19" screen for £99 (approx $140), the only damage was a near-invisible 2cm scratch on the screen. The monitor is still running like a trooper over 18 months later. A bargain, but as someone else said you take your chances, I only had a 30 day warrenty on this screen.

 

[sciencewhiz]

I bought my factory refurbished IBM laptop about 2 years ago. It had a one year waranty. I had troubles with it about 9 months after I bought it, and they fixed it under warranty. Now my screen is starting to go bad, but very slowly.

Generally, if you can get a long warranty on the refurb, you know the manufacturer has faith in the product. If you have a short warranty, you take your chances.

 

[tk149]

"Refurbished" means different things to different resellers.

Newegg, from what I've read, thinks "refurbished" means they glance at it to make sure there's no obvious physical defects, then they resell it and let the new user do the testing.

Other resellers actually test their refurbished products and clean them up.

I think "Factory Refurbished" is your best bet. They seem to have the longest warranties. I also think you take a much greater risk with products with moving parts. How many worn plastic gears do you think a DVD drive has? How much testing would be required to see if a gear is about to fail?

I have the following refurbished products:

21" NEC monitor - three years old now
21" Dell Trinitron - 7 months old
Toshiba VCR factory refurb - 10 years old, dying now.
Multiple Dell keyboards - all working great

 

[Mltsao]

I bought a refurb ATi Radeon 8500 about 6 months ago. Still running strong.
I also bought a Epox Via 266A motherboard a while back on newegg and it ended up new.

It usually depends on your luck. Some people say that in some places referbs are returned products.

 

[ZimZum]

For a toaster oven or a George Foreman grill I'll buy a refurb, but not computer components and sensitive electronics.

 

[Technonut]

I recently purchased a refurb CyberHome CH-DVD 500 home DVD player from NewEgg for $39.00 shipped. It turned out to be a brand new player sealed in the retail box. Most other places sell the same player for $79.99... It works very well also.

As for computer related refurbs, I have purchased quite a bit from NewEgg with great success.

 

[kingofbongo]

If newegg doesn't fix any refurbished products, items listed on their refurbished products page must just be products which have been returned to them for some reason.

Sound reasonable?

 

[tk149]

Originally posted by: kingofbongo
If newegg doesn't fix any refurbished products, items listed on their refurbished products page must just be products which have been returned to them for some reason.

Sound reasonable?

That's the impression I get. Check out customer's comments in the Hot Deals forum. Lots of people say they are hit or miss on Newegg refurbs. If you get lucky, you get a great price. If not, you're out shipping/handling charges. I'm not bashing them ('cuz I order new stuff from Newegg all the time), just telling it like I see it.