The Thrift Near Miss thread

[Stan]

Jarts = lawn darts? The big darts with the target ring that you set out on the lawn and try to pitch them up in the air to accurately land within?

 

That's them! There were several different sets released over the years, I believe the last one was sometime around 1985, maybe even slightly before that. Mine is from the 60s, which makes it even more awesome. And now I have two sets, the display, shall we call it, and my beater set that I actually use.

[Rik]

Yeah!big time!.I once found what turned out to be a 2600 DEV unit at the thrift store.This was when i just started collecting,so i had no idea what it was,i thought it was just a crude home mod.I described here what i found and was told i should run back and get it.About 15-20 minutes later i went back and it was GONE!Lesson here is NEVER second guess if your not sure about a find,BUY IT ANYWAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Tempest]

I remember seeing a complete TI-99/4a setup (complete with the PEB) at a SA once but at the time I didn't know if I wanted it. I came back 2 days later and it was gone.

 

On the other hand I found a Colecovision with a ton of games at a SA once and had a guy come up to me while I was standing line complaining that his friend who worked at the store was supposed to be holding that for him and it shouldn't have been put out on the floor for me to (and I quote) "Get my grubby little hands on". I pointed out that they're not supposed to hold things for people (it's actually against the rules) and he stormed off in a huff. I still own that very Colecovision.

 

Tempest

[Almost Rice]

I can just picture the 3 of you stalking this guy around the store, pretending to look at other things and waiting to pounce if he so much as sneezes.

 

I do not feel too bad. The guy was hispanic and in a hispanic area thrift store. I know he was debating if it was worth it for his kid. I did not want to pressure the guy. I was probably the only collector of the bunch. I do not usually get NES stuff, but I wanted a NES system since they came out. I just could never justify buying one.

[Lendorien]

I have sort of a meta-story... caused by this very thread!

 

I went to all three area Goodwills looking for those ColecoVision games Lendorian mentioned. Nothing. Hit Berlin, 'stallis, and even Waukesha. I'd have been thrilled to have found the CV power supply since I have 2 CV's but only 1 PS. No such luck. Not even any sign of the CV controllers anywhere. Someone must have gotten there before me. Best thing I saw today was an NES Tecmo Bowl, which I left behind.

 

Oh well, the fun was in the chase!

 

Saw that tecmo yesterday. Was tempted to get it, but meh. I don't play football games. Why would I play that one?

 

Never been to the New Berlin goodwill. It any good?

[Mirage]

I have sort of a meta-story... caused by this very thread!

 

I went to all three area Goodwills looking for those ColecoVision games Lendorian mentioned. Nothing. Hit Berlin, 'stallis, and even Waukesha. I'd have been thrilled to have found the CV power supply since I have 2 CV's but only 1 PS. No such luck. Not even any sign of the CV controllers anywhere. Someone must have gotten there before me. Best thing I saw today was an NES Tecmo Bowl, which I left behind.

 

Oh well, the fun was in the chase!

 

Saw that tecmo yesterday. Was tempted to get it, but meh. I don't play football games. Why would I play that one?

 

Never been to the New Berlin goodwill. It any good?

 

No, not really. I mean, it was average, nothing special. A little dirtier and less organized than most even. I actually find a lot more stuff up north and far west than I ever do in Milwaukee. I haven't had a lot of luck in the Milwaukee area ones. I hope I at least hit the store with the CV stuff! Those are the only Goodwills I know of in the area, and frankly, I don't hit them that often anymore due to what I just said.

[Lendorien]

I have sort of a meta-story... caused by this very thread!

 

I went to all three area Goodwills looking for those ColecoVision games Lendorian mentioned. Nothing. Hit Berlin, 'stallis, and even Waukesha. I'd have been thrilled to have found the CV power supply since I have 2 CV's but only 1 PS. No such luck. Not even any sign of the CV controllers anywhere. Someone must have gotten there before me. Best thing I saw today was an NES Tecmo Bowl, which I left behind.

 

Oh well, the fun was in the chase!

 

Saw that tecmo yesterday. Was tempted to get it, but meh. I don't play football games. Why would I play that one?

 

Never been to the New Berlin goodwill. It any good?

 

No, not really. I mean, it was average, nothing special. A little dirtier and less organized than most even. I actually find a lot more stuff up north and far west than I ever do in Milwaukee. I haven't had a lot of luck in the Milwaukee area ones. I hope I at least hit the store with the CV stuff! Those are the only Goodwills I know of in the area, and frankly, I don't hit them that often anymore due to what I just said.

 

 

Yeah, it was the one out on Main in Waukesha. Used to frequent the store up in Fond du Lac when I lived in the area. That was a great store. I don't think I ever saw any game systems there though. I did net some good PC software though. Once found original in box copies of King's Quest 2 and 3. Sold them on E-bay for about 30 bucks each. I think. It was a while ago. My knowledge of PC gaming has actually gotten me a few hundred dollars that way.

 

Oshkosh by comparison was always pretty lame.

[Mirage]

Yeah, it was the one out on Main in Waukesha. Used to frequent the store up in Fond du Lac when I lived in the area. That was a great store. I don't think I ever saw any game systems there though. I did net some good PC software though. Once found original in box copies of King's Quest 2 and 3. Sold them on E-bay for about 30 bucks each. I think. It was a while ago. My knowledge of PC gaming has actually gotten me a few hundred dollars that way.

 

Oshkosh by comparison was always pretty lame.

 

Yeah, the Waukesha one is the one nearest to me, so I go there a lot more often. Never really found anything there though. Someone must have nabbed that CV stuff last night, cuz I was there right at opening this morning, drat! The OshKosh one is horrible, totally... it's more like a dollar store. I rarely bother with that one anymore.

 

</threadjack>

[shadow460]

Aside from near misses, I have left several things behind. I left an Atari 1200 price under $10 behind with no hookups or games, and I left behind a 2600 Woody with hookups and about 30 game up to R4. IMO, it just wasn't worth it to spend even $40 on stuff I already had copies of.

 

Another time, though, I grabbed up an Atari cassette drive with its box for a few bucks. It sat around for years until recently I got an Atari 400 with a handful of games. I spent my last $7 on that old computer. One of the games was a Romox cart. I split them from the computer and sold it all as two lots. I made my money back on the tape drive and computer lot alone, and the money I earned from selling the games was pure profit.

 

I guess the key to my thrifting success lies in one) not putting tons of time into it (hence going once every couple of weeks), and two) keeping my eyes peeled all the time, and three) always being ready to buy. Always. I think there's been times when I've seen something that's on my "instant purchase" list and bought it, then when I told my wife she was a little unhappy over it. Good thing for her, though, because we both know a few things that are on each others' "instant purchase" lists, and we've picked up stuff for one another like that.

[RickHarrisMaine]

The old metal tip ones? Speaking of poop, I was scared poopless of those as a child. Flinging heavy, sharp metal objects though the air was always a great idea, especially in the '70s.

 

Yep, that would be them. It's nearly impossible to find them now because they were ordered to be destroyed. They have these lame-o jobs that Walmart sells that bounce and totally ruin the fun of it. I mean, hey, the threat of death and an ominous THOOK in the ground is the way to go. Really, though, they're totally fine, the reason people got hurt was because they were acting like idiots with them and trying to catch them in their mouths and such.

 

Funny story about those things. It was about 1977 or so, and I was in the hospital having my adenoids removed. the kid I was sharing a room with had an accident with those things, and lost an eye.

 

okay, maybe it's not such a funny story.....

 

 

I seriously can't believe they ever sold those in the first place.....of course, they also sold the Pinto in the 70's too.

[phaxda]

My worst-ever miss was not videogame related. I had a guy buy a pair of B&W (Bowers & Wilkens) speakers right under my nose. He had just finished confirming that they were $10 for the pair and a Salvation Army employee was taking them up to the front for him. $300 speakers, easy, and the other guy knew exactly what he had and gave me a nice big smirk as he sauntered by...

[Lendorien]

Was at a thrift shop today. Someone was walking out with a NES power pad and the game card with SM1/ Duck Hunt and Track and Field on it as I came in. On the bright side, I did find a gamecube game worth 40 bucks I'm going to sell on Amazon. Got it for 4.

[pinball22]

I can't think of any notable misses, though I'm sure I've had some... I think I'm blocking them out of my mind.

 

My family and friends used to play Jarts all the time in the late 70s/early 80s... I never really thought about it being dangerous, since we didn't do stupid things with them. In retrospect, though, a game about throwing heavy pointed things with weird trajectories is probably a bad idea. I should go look in my Dad's storage room and see if they're still out there. And then be sure not to play with them in the presence of children.

[Tempest]

Ahh Jarts. Boy I remember those. I'd buy a set of those in a heartbeat if I could find them. The only thing I ever damaged with them was my grandmothers bird bath (boy was she mad!).

 

Tempest

[the.golden.ax]

Was at a thrift shop today. Someone was walking out with a NES power pad and the game card with SM1/ Duck Hunt and Track and Field on it as I came in. On the bright side, I did find a gamecube game worth 40 bucks I'm going to sell on Amazon. Got it for 4.

 

 

Not allot of Cube games worth $40. What did you find (maybe someone here would be interested?)

 

AX

[+FujiSkunk]

I have two bad near misses, or more specifically, missed opportunities. One I actually bought.

 

One day at a Goodwill I found both an Atari 800 and an Atari 1200XL. Neither one seemed to work properly, unfortunately; if memory serves, the 800 wouldn't power up at all, and the 1200XL wouldn't respond to the keyboard after powering up. At the time I wasn't much into trying to repair Atari computers, so I sold them both as-is on eBay.

 

In the glowing feedback left by my buyer, he mentioned the 800 powered right up and worked perfectly for him. I will swear I was using the correct power supply, but, apparently I was doing something wrong.

 

Oh well, even as-is they sold for more than what I paid for them. In retrospect I wish I had kept them both, though.

 

My second miss was a Yamaha DX-7 synthesizer. Any child of the '80s knows this was the synth to own back then. A great many '80s pop songs use the DX-7, and the technology is not entirely unlike what went into the first generation of PC sound cards, and the Sega Genesis. In other words, if you like '80s-era synth music or chip tunes, you like the DX-7. Goodwill had one of these beauties, and I actually passed it up because it had a couple of broken keys on the keyboard. Needless to say, it was gone the next week. I'm still kicking myself for that one.

Edited February 19, 2009 by skunkworx

[Lendorien]

I have two bad near misses, or more specifically, missed opportunities. One I actually bought.

 

One day at a Goodwill I found both an Atari 800 and an Atari 1200XL. Neither one seemed to work properly, unfortunately; if memory serves, the 800 wouldn't power up at all, and the 1200XL wouldn't respond to the keyboard after powering up. At the time I wasn't much into trying to repair Atari computers, so I sold them both as-is on eBay.

 

In the glowing feedback left by my buyer, he mentioned the 800 powered right up and worked perfectly for him. I will swear I was using the correct power supply, but, apparently I was doing something wrong.

 

Oh well, even as-is they sold for more than what I paid for them. In retrospect I wish I had kept them both, though.

 

My second miss was a Yamaha DX-7 synthesizer. Any child of the '80s knows this was the synth to own back then. A great many '80s pop songs use the DX-7, and the technology is not entirely unlike what went into the first generation of PC sound cards, and the Sega Genesis. In other words, if you like '80s-era synth music or chip tunes, you like the DX-7. Goodwill had one of these beauties, and I actually passed it up because it had a couple of broken keys on the keyboard. Needless to say, it was gone the next week. I'm still kicking myself for that one.

 

Hmmm. I wonder how hard it would have been to fix the yamaha issue. Could have been something as simple as a broken circuit. Too bad about the 800. That would have made me sad too!

[lapetino]

Ahh Jarts. Boy I remember those. I'd buy a set of those in a heartbeat if I could find them. The only thing I ever damaged with them was my grandmothers bird bath (boy was she mad!).

 

Tempest

 

One of my good college buddies' brother got one of these stuck in the top of his head. Thrown by my buddy. Instant ER, many stitches, slight skull fracture, no more Jarts. Of course, I think my Dad still has a set in his garage.

[hattg]

The old metal tip ones? Speaking of poop, I was scared poopless of those as a child. Flinging heavy, sharp metal objects though the air was always a great idea, especially in the '70s.

 

Yep, that would be them. It's nearly impossible to find them now because they were ordered to be destroyed. They have these lame-o jobs that Walmart sells that bounce and totally ruin the fun of it. I mean, hey, the threat of death and an ominous THOOK in the ground is the way to go. Really, though, they're totally fine, the reason people got hurt was because they were acting like idiots with them and trying to catch them in their mouths and such.

 

I have about 4 or 5 sets, boxed of those. Different ones, there are Yard Darts, Jarts, Sliding Jarts. Got them to sell on ebay, but they won't let you sell anything that was recalled. People sneak them in and they get sold before the auctions get closed though. May have to try CraigsList now. :-)

[gulag picture radio]

My biggest near misses were a player piano for $25, a marchin bass drum for $10, and a priceless collection of 16mm home movies from an avid traveler in the 1930's for $28. I still weep a little about it.

[Lendorien]

This weekend, I was at a goodwill and missed out on an xbox with two controllers for 15 bucks. One of the controllers was some strange dual handled promo controller. A hispanic fellow got it before I did. Darn.

 

Also missed out on a PS2 steering wheel and pedals for 5 bucks. I was debating buying it when some kids came by and grabbed it.

 

Nothing major this week.

[Lincoln]

while making the rounds last week, I spotted snes street fighter II turbo and battletoads and double dragon for $3 each. I wasn't sure I wanted them so I left them. I went back this weekend to pick them up and they were gone :/ that'll teach me to exercise restraint.

Edited March 30, 2009 by Lincoln

[Almost Rice]

I just missed out on a woody 4 switcher with 3 common game. Not much of a miss since it was labeled $15 and I am not too interested in 2600 stuff.

[Noelio]

Just this past week the local main thrift store put a load of 2600 & 7800 games as well as 7800 controllers & adapter.

Everything but the machine... Eeeek!

 

I did get the adapter, thankfully, but I couldn't help but wonder what they did with the 7800 console.

Logic tells me that if someone bought the console before I arrived, then they would definitely know to get the adapter. Yet another thought is that they only wanted the console or maybe the people in back tested the console only for it to fail the test. Either way I would have loved to get another 7800. They were very common around here but I haven't seen one in some time.

Anyways I did get the adapter and pole position 2 as well as a spare "hand cramper" controller. Woohoo!

 

I also missed out on an original style Commodore 64 & 1541 "overhead door" combo recently from the same place. That was somewhat by choice as I could have raced back home to fetch the wallet but didn't bother.

[Noelio]

Just this past week the local main thrift store put a load of 2600 & 7800 games as well as 7800 controllers & adapter.

Everything but the machine... Eeeek!

 

I did get the adapter, thankfully, but I couldn't help but wonder what they did with the 7800 console.

Logic tells me that if someone bought the console before I arrived, then they would definitely know to get the adapter. Yet another thought is that they only wanted the console or maybe the people in back tested the console only for it to fail the test. Either way I would have loved to get another 7800. They were very common around here but I haven't seen one in some time.

Anyways I did get the adapter and pole position 2 as well as a spare "hand cramper" controller. Woohoo!

 

I also missed out on an original style Commodore 64 & 1541 "overhead door" combo recently from the same place. That was somewhat by choice as I could have raced back home to fetch the wallet but didn't bother.

 

Oh I did nab a cool vader 2.6k