Gazelle? (They buy iPads, etc.)

[Paper Shredder Clay]

The day that Apple revealed the next iPad, I heard about Gazelle. Have any of you sold your tech devices such as phones or iPad to them? they offered me around $500. But shortly afterwards they were offering others a lot less because Apple knocked their refurbs down low. I'm a little hesitant to sell it to them but a lot of people seem to be selling their iPads to them, in hopes of getting a decent amount to buy the next iPad.

[Business Attorney]

I've never heard of them but I looked up their website. It looks pretty professional. I'd be interested to hear what others have to say.

[Harold Mansfield]

I just checked them out too. Looks interesting. Wished you would have jumped on that $500 at the time. I've never sold anything to be refurbished. Most of my old tech is collecting dust if I'm not still using it.
I have purchased refurbished before. A set of Logitech THX 600w Computer speakers, and my old XBOX (I traded a bunch of old PS2 games for it at Gamestop) and both still work 100%.
The speakers are actually still better than anything I have heard since in the same price range and it's been about 5 years now.

I may try these guys out. I have a few things I could test them out with that I have since upgraded or don't use anymore.

[Capitalist]

They have an affiliate program that I considered joining, but I don't have any sites that cater to that demographic. The affiliate program is doing very, very well on LinkConnector, so I have to assume that a lot of people are using the service. Beyond that... I don't know.

[vangogh]

They're new to me to, but what they're doing makes sense. Best Buy is doing something similar. It really does make sense. There are always going to be some people who buy as soon as something comes out and then upgrade once the next version comes out. There's another group that only buys once the price comes down enough. Makes sense for the early adopters to sell their used tech to the price shoppers. These stores will facilitate the transaction and naturally make a little something for themselves for making it happen.

I still haven't decided if I'm going to upgrade to iPad 2. I want to and I'm thinking I will. but I also need a new laptop at some point this year and I was planning on upgrading my iPhone. It's going to be an expensive year for me. I may decide to wait to see what the iPad 3 brings. If I do get the iPad 2 I'll give mine to my brother since he doesn't have one yet.

[Paper Shredder Clay]

I'm in the same predicament. I need to get a new laptop, this year. It was going to be a MacBook Pro when they announced it, but I am not happy with the minor update they did. I think I will wait until next year, when ssd should be cheaper and hopefully a unibody redesign. I want to wait until iPad 3 as well, I imagine it will have Retina Display. I have owned the past three iPhones and don't know about updating to the next one, unless it has some great new features.

[vangogh]

MacBook Pros are getting some great reviews. The form didn't change much, but what's inside is a pretty big upgrade. I've been seeing tests showing them to perform better than just about any laptop ever made. I was hoping they were going to remove the optical drive and replace the hard drive with SSD as well. What I really wanted was a 15 inch MacBook Air with more power than the current 13 inch Air. Rumor has it that this summer the Airs will get an update and use the new SandyBridge chip that's now in the MacBook Pro. If they do I'll probably get a maxed out 13 inch Air. If not I'll probably get a maxed out 15 inch MacBook Pro, and possibly replace the hard drive with an SSD.

My iPhone is a 3gs. Come Aug/Sept it'll be 2 years old and I'm thinking I'll get whatever the newest iPhone is at that point and probably sell my 3gs. Last year my brother sold his 3gs on eBay to upgrade to the 4 and actually sold it for more than he paid for it. I don't need or expect that, but recovering half the cost of the new iPhone would make upgrading a no-brainer for me.

The iPad is the question for me. It's too expensive to just buy a new one every year or even every other year for that matter. However this year I can likely give mine to my brother as a gift. Depending on whether or not he wants one this year and whether or not he'd be happy with version 1 as opposed to buying version 2 for himself will likely be what determines what I end up with. Not a big deal though for me to wait until version 3 or even version 4.