How much is my 1994 RadioShack laser worth?

[RedCowboy]

I have found that old stuff gets valuable around the 200 years old mark, but it depends, stuff like that is worth what someone will pay for it, as it means nothing to me I don't want it for 50 cents, but someone who had one when they were new and that time of their life was special may want to hold one again and pay 50 dollars.

 

[Rokakku]

I might be interested in it OP if you don't have any luck.

 

[lasersbee]

It appears he has been banned.

Not to my knowledge....

View Profile: Eidetic - Photonlexicon

Jerry

 

[laserdude1232]

Turns out the batteries in them are original and still work!

http://imgur.com/a/08fjQ

 

[lasersbee]

So... Did you contact him on PL ???

Jerry

 

[Rokakku]

So... Did you contact him on PL ???

Jerry

I tried signing up for PhotonLexicon a few days ago. I never got a confirmation email so it won't let me do anything. I tried talking to someone via the contact me page but nobody got back to me. Maybe OP is having the same problem.

 

[laserdude1232]

He got back to me. The signup worked fine on PhotoLexicon. He also contacted me via eBay messages. What he's willing to pay is too low for what its value is to me.

 

[Benm]

I doubt it will be that valuable for a couple of reasons:

As for actual usability it's just not there - requires odd sized batteries and has output power lower than something intended to annoy a cat you can buy for $2 off ebay.

As a collectible it could be, but i doubt this is -that- are. It might have cost a 100 bucks or so back in the day, but there were little other options at the time, so i presume quite a number of these have been sold.

I'm not really sure what somone would pay for it as a collectible, but i doubt it would be over the retail price back at the time.

There sure are laser collectors, but i don't see why they would want this specific model at a premium price: there are pleny of similar laser pointers from that era, most of them probably still work, so it's not that special.

It could be to someone wanting to collect all radioshack products of the time and this one being the single thing missing, but good luck finding that collector. You can list it on ebay or other sites, but i seriously doubt someone will be paying over $100 for it at the moment.

 

[laserdude1232]

Update: The laser sold for $52.21 and will be put in a laser exhibit in a museum.

 

[GSS]

Update: The laser sold for $52.21 and will be put in a laser exhibit in a museum.

Nice A few members seemed to be right as far as there's always one out there wanting:beer:

 

[Rokakku]

Update: The laser sold for $52.21 and will be put in a laser exhibit in a museum.

Out of all the places it could go this is a good outcome. Do you know what museum?

 

[Benm]

Cool that you found a buyer for it, and as i expected nothing over $100. It's nice to have it in some museum though

Another group of buyers for things from the 70s,80s or 90s would actually by hollywood prop houses, so they can be used for movies or series set in that era.

Obviously props can be fabricated, but sometimes getting the real thing is cheaper than making a lookalike. That would be valid for things like 90's cellphones, crt tv's, and to some extent era-correct cars and such.

As a prop something usually doesn't have to be in working condition though, whereas a museum or collector could be interested in something that still works so they can do demonstrations and such.

One of my webdevelopment clients is an auction house, and i see all kinds of things passing through their listings as i work on their website and back end. As they also do a lot of online bidding and i do database maintenance as well, sometimes things stand out.

They source inventory from consignors but also do house clearances where they sell most of the inventory etc.

At some point they had an item that was 'just a lot of books including the bookcase', with an estimate for $50-$100 or so as there was nothing special about it. Looking in the backend i see a bid of $1500 on that lot, which i found a bit odd considering the low estimate, and suspected some technical error could be at play here (eg someone entering $15.00 as $1500). The minimum bid on any lot is $20 though, so that couldn't be the case. It could have been $150 though, who knows.

So i mailed one of the owners of the auction house about this fairly random discovery and they were a bit puzzled as well, but decided to investigate it for a bit. Turns out that among that heap of books was one very rare one.

They proceeded to keep the item in auction, but wrapped the bookcase in saran-wrap like material to avoid anyone stealing the rare book.

This precaution alerted other potential buyers that came and look at that lot, and it sold for a decent price.

To clarify: in this situation the auction house could still legally retract that lot and auction off the rare book seperately. They decided not to do that and the lot sold for a considerable price once a few other buyers figured it out too.

Normally they'd contact the consignor about such a choice but that was not possible in this case as the lot came from a house clearance from someone that died, and the inheritants already agreed on a price for the inventory minus costs of delivering the house cleanly.

 

[Glitheras]

Wow i was following this forum for a while. The Radio Shack 63-1040 was my first laser pointer i ever purchased. i foolishly sold it when i was in high school because i had more powerful lasers since. but i never forgot my first laser. i recently was able to get this again for $1.25 yes thats correct $1.25 plus $7.95 S/H. so excited !!! now where the hell do i get batteries for this.

ebay item: 324009712643