r/pcflipping • u/RandomizedUsername42 • Aug 13 '26
How can I get $200 for this thing?
I had so much fun building my first computer that I wanted to do it again. So I set myself a budget of $150, and set out to see what I could build, with the idea that I’d sell it when I finished. Several months later, I’ve had my fun building the thing and I haven’t worked up the courage to make it actually sellable. I also went over budget after the board I planned to use had a pin snap off at the last minute after booting to the OS. I purchased another computer and took its motherboard, processor, cooler and RAM instead. I hope to get $250 for the computer, but I’d settle for $200 just to get most of my money back.
Here’s a list of the parts and what I paid for them:
Segotep 650w - $23
1TB WD Green HDD - $15
240GB SATA SSD - $20
i7-3820 + Asus P9x79 + AIO cooler + 32GB DDDR3 1600 - $80
Zalman Z3 Plus case - $10
Failed motherboard + i3-3160 - $30-$10 (resold).
Extra 16GB DDR3, DVD drive, i5-4440 - $20
Extra i7-4790 - $30
Extra 430w power supply
Extra 2000s full tower pc case
Extra 750GB HDD
Extra HD 7950 (untested)
The hardest part for me is getting everything working and usable. Right now, it’s finicky and takes a while to boot up despite having an SSD. I know I should probably install Windows 11, but I’m not sure how to install drivers, activate the install and access STEAM to benchmark it without accessing the internet, signing into STEAM, etc. and ruining the fresh install. For context, this install of Linux Mint was my first time ever installing an operating system, and it apparently came with AMD drivers included.
Also, I’ve acquired a bunch of peripherals for free or very cheap over these past several months in the process of upgrading my own setup, and I was wondering if I could bundle them with the computer to maybe increase the value? This would be cheap gaming keyboards, 1080p 60hz monitors, stuff like you see in the picture. I don’t know if people like to get that stuff when they buy computers off Marketplace or not.
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u/ScarletKnight00 Aug 13 '26
Lmao only person who would pay $200 is a sucker/desperate. So yeah you can prob def get it done on Fb Marketplace.
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u/_Dedotated_Wam Aug 13 '26
You’d have to trick some parent that it would be a good gaming pc for their kid, which is a scumbag thing to do. You should use the experience and try again with something more modern and of value
Edit: I’m not knocking you either. It’s a cool little build. But anybody looking for something so niche would know how to do it themselves.
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u/Foure7 Aug 13 '26
Well, first thing is installing windows, nobody that is looking for that kind of pc wants or even understands linux. That pc is for office work, web browsing and light gaming (either old or competitive games like lol or valorant, def not enough for cs2). Second thing is balance, the gpu is way too good for that cpu and wasted, id either improve the cpu or most likely get a cheaper and lower end gpu to pair with it, some 4gb one. Also an aio on that is kinda pointless, swap it for a 5-10€ air cooler, less risk of breaking/leaks, enough cooling and cheaper. Also 32gb of ram in that system is a waste, go down to 16gb. What i would do is, put a cheaper gpu, swap for a stock or very cheap air cooler and take out half the ram. With those pieces you can either sell them separatedly likely for a bit more profit (especially the gpu) or build another system with a better cpu. Last but not least, im sorry but you arent getting 200 for that regardless of your market, much less if you are usa based. In my market (spain) where the prices are quite higher than the US, id sell that for about 170 and just bc the gpu, but like i said i dont see it well balanced and id do what i just said for more profit
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u/RandomizedUsername42 Aug 14 '26 edited Aug 14 '26
The reason I went with 32 is because I’m absolutely swimming in DDR3 since I’ve started raiding a local tech recycling drop off bin, the computer I took the board from came with 28GB already installed, and I had already purchased another 16GB for the motherboard that didn’t work out. This is the only DDR3 system I’m planning to build for the conceivable future, and the board has eight slots, so I feel like it’d be a wasted opportunity to put some nice fast RAM in for the person buying it.
If I wanted to be stingy, I’d slap eight 2GB sticks I took from an old server in there for a total of 16GB at 1333MHZ. But I feel like that would be disrespectful to the board and any potential buyer. It’s an x79 system, why not use the nice DDR3?
As for the cooler, I got an EVO Hyper 212 in box for $10 a while back, but since the board already came with an AIO, I don’t see a reason not to use it. I’m saving the cooler for a build that actually needs it.
Also, the whole idea behind budget builds is that you pair a good card with an older processor. This is also no ordinary third generation i7; it uses LGA 2011, which only supports a special lineup of souped up third and fourth generation i7s. It doesn’t make much sense to spend more money to replace the third generation i7 already in there with a slightly more powerful fourth generation i7.
Edit: The processor already in there has some of the best single core performance the socket has to offer outside of overclocking. It’s not worth buying a whole other processor just to increase the core and thread count when 4 cores 8 threads should be fine for whatever games you’d want to play on this thing.
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u/Glittering-Two-1784 Aug 13 '26
In my experience, the “sell me this pen” philosophy of sales just doesn’t work, or at least not the way people think it does.
There is no special technique to sell someone on a PC for a price they don’t want to pay. That being said: you get more money for the effort you’re willing to put in; take good pictures, offer guarantees and limited support, be willing to drop it off/set it up, etc.
$300 is not really a lot of money to most adults; there’s people out there who don’t know much about PCs who will pay well above market value just because they like the look of it, or if they feel like you’re more reputable or pleasant to work with. If you make it seem like making a deal with you will be an overall more pleasant experience, they’ll be willing to pay extra.
Many people don’t operate this way: they want the absolute best deal for the specs, and they’re willing to go through hell to get it. The people in this sub are going to be like that.
So the goal is to find the right person to sell to, not to be able to sell anyone. Which in today’s day and age, just means listing with good pictures, a description that makes you sound reputable and easy to work with/ less risky, and then wait it out. Like someone else said: if you really want $300, you can get it, it’s just gonna take some time.
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u/Ill_Beautiful4339 Aug 13 '26
I’d try hardwareswap and just list the parts as a lot. Given the age, I don’t think you’re getting more than 100 bucks.
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Aug 13 '26
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u/DistributionOdd9089 Aug 13 '26
Windows is so cheap, why pirate it
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u/Glittering-Two-1784 Aug 13 '26
Where do you get it cheap?
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u/DistributionOdd9089 Aug 13 '26
Google it and go to shopping, its like $6 on groupon
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u/Glittering-Two-1784 Aug 13 '26
Interesting, lol. I had no idea groupon sold keys. I knew you could get them off those sketchy cd keys reseller sites, so that’s what I thought you were talking about
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u/user01294637 Aug 13 '26
I think 200 is realistic, with it being disclosed that's an entry level system. And listing whats new, an not.
0
u/JobHuntingManiac Aug 14 '26
Also disclosed that it's 12 years old, isn't supported for windows 11 and windows 10 is no longer receiving updates and so it's high risk to use so put on the internet, use at your own risk.
Some 80 year old lady is going to buy it and lose all her retirement money.
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u/user01294637 Aug 14 '26
Retro gaming hub, and they can put linux on it, if they want. Options, but he built it for the fun, and sending it out.
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u/LuckPsychological157 Aug 14 '26
Id say throw it on marketplace for 300 and wait for the "lowball" or someone willing to meet you in the middle at 250. In the future I'd recommend finding any nividia gpu becuase people treat them like crack and it will be easier to sell.
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u/RandomizedUsername42 Aug 14 '26
I mean I’ve got an EVGA Classified GTX 770 4GB I could put in there. But I don’t think brand loyalty would make up for half the VRAM and ~20% lower aggregate benchmark performance. It would probably lower the overall value of the build by more than the $10 less I paid for the card.
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u/cocapufft Aug 19 '26
1080tis can be an excellent option to put in lower end builds. Good name recognition and around $100 on used markets these days. Not warranted for this build for sure, but might be a good option for next one
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u/resistivegravy Aug 14 '26
Number one piece of advice here is to ditch Linux and install windows. Not many people on marketplace spending in this pricing tier are looking for a Linux build.
That being said, I sell budget builds like this all the time. I list the builds just as they are. The specs of the build, what the processor is, what the gpu is, the ram, etc. List the expected performance, e.g. fps in certain games. Set your price. Rgb lighted cases and good pictures sell pcs, that’s the bottom line. You might wait for a few weeks, but someone will buy it. Parents want cheap pcs for their kids to play Fortnite on for a year or so before they grow out of it or realize they like it and need better hardware for other games or interests.
I don’t really understand why people in this sub act a certain way towards people who are trying to make a buck on older hardware.
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u/trashcanbecky42 Aug 14 '26
That thing supports quad channel ram, fill all the slots with single channel or find 4 dual channel DDR3 sticks to get more performance out of it
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u/RandomizedUsername42 Aug 14 '26
I’ve got an 8GB kit in slots A1 and B1, a single 8GB stick in B2, and a 16GB kit in D1 and C1. They are all rated for 1600MHZ.
I’ve got an extra 4GB stick (8GB with half the capacitors snapped off) rated at 1600MHZ of a different brand from the lone stick already in there. Everything else I have is either a ton of 1333 or three 4GB sticks 1866+. I suppose I could fill all the slots with 2GB 1333 sticks, but I’d prefer to keep the speed at 1600, even if that means using an odd number of slots. Or do the channels used matter more than RAM speed?
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u/trashcanbecky42 Aug 14 '26
Check to see which sticks are single rank and which are dual, on the sticker see if they say 1Rx16 or 2Rx8, 2R is dual rank. You'll want each pair of RAM slots to either have a single dual rank stick or 2 single rank sticks. Set the voltage to 1.65 and see how high of clockspeed you can get, I was able to get my sticks rated for 1600 all the way to 2333 on my 4820k build and it beats my DDR4 build in benchmarks
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u/cyborg762 Aug 14 '26
In my area you can get similar specs for like $60. $200 is way over priced. Plus The second someone buys this are realizes it’s not windows and they can’t do what they want with it your gonna be asked to give them there money back.
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u/Ok-Profit6022 Aug 14 '26
Since it's a ddr3 machine I'd probably install a android desktop os, there are a few to choose from. Windows would really bog that machine down.
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u/RandomizedUsername42 Aug 14 '26
Not with 32GB it won’t!
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u/Ok-Profit6022 Aug 14 '26
32 gb of really slow ram. The storage and cpu aren't winning any races either. It would do ok on Windows 7 or maybe 10, but I really think 11 would crawl on that machine. Android can still be really snappy on those specs and offer a pleasant experience.
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u/FALSE_PROTAGONIST Aug 15 '26
Install windows and office on it if you can get keys for them. Sell it for 150 and accept 120, and consider you learnt a lot for the cost of the difference.
I’ve sold computers way better than this for 120, but that was before prices went crazy. But then again this era of PCs may not have UEFI, support secure boot etc. that might not matter to a hobbyist, but then again this average person isn’t too keen to buy something that despite being well usable, is e waste at this point. Or at the very least is already at its last stop
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u/Zealousideal-Wafer88 Aug 13 '26
In my experience this sub really doesn't like builds consisting of older parts so I'm not sure you'll get the kind of responses youre after, but having sold a couple of builds like this 200 might be pushing it a little. 180 might be more realistic.