Roland D50 rip off on eBay

[Stupid American Pig]

He did not rob me! and I live in houston!

Regards,
Craig
SAP

[_oswald]

Ebay is a festival of morons.

In November I was bidding for a MOTU MTP AV (serial) and I was in the clear for a win until the last day when a lad came up and started bidding... well, I ran it up as high as I would be willing to pay (and then some, took a gamble to run him in a bit) and in less than 24 hours I won the exact same unit on Ebay in another auction for 50 dollars less than what he paid (including shipping.)

Though if you want a 'shit-gone-broken' story, I arranged to buy an Alesis AirSynth from a forum member at ReasonStation.net about two years ago. It arrived, sure enough... in a padded envelope.

What kind of moron sends gear in an envelope? Then I open it up - busted to shit. The thing is in like 4 pieces (still is). I take a ton of images, send them to him and demand my money back. He tells me that I have to go to the post office and claim it. I figured there is no way in hell they'll pay 50 bucks to make up for the worlds most retarded packaging job ever, so I decided to call it a 50 dollar loss and now I have a bag of busted junk next to my bed.

[garzmil]

now I have a bag of busted junk next to my bed.

ouch, sounds like your lady was a bit rough with you.

[noisemaker]

I have sold/bought tons of gear on eBay...never a bad experience. I only purchase from people with super-good reputations, though (no guarantee but it helps).

I will say, though that from time to time I have been shocked at how much people are willing to bid up certain items. I have to admit I've made way more than I deserved on some occasions.

[quincy]

I think if you check people's feedback and use some common sense then its fine.

If its a more expensive item then make sure you email and get some answers first. You can tell a lot by the kind of response you get.

As for spending huge amounts on second hand electrical gear of any kind - may be asking for trouble. I wouldn't spend £300 on something used and electrical at a car boot sale so i won't do it on ebay either.

I have done abot 30 ebay transactions either buying or selling, and never had one problem. Dodgy auctions are usually pretty obvious, and if you email and don't get a reply - then thats a bad sign.

I think ebay is a good system if you approach with caution, and remember that if something looks too good to be true then it probably is.

[neverwhere2012]

only bad ebay experience i ever had was when i bought an Akai S3200 from someone. it was listed as having 32MB of ram and buy it now of $500. i had the money and thought a nice studio sampler like that would be kickass, so i got it. product came, perfect condition, PDF manual and strangely, a 16mb stick of ram separate from the sampler. figured it just hadn't been installed, opened up the thing and couldn't find where the ram went. worse yet the only manual that exists for the S3200 is that of the S3000XL which has a completely different front panel and interface. started getting a little pissed but figured "hell, it's still got 16 MB, whatever"... so i sat on the thing for months intending on buying a zip drive and building sample libraries, then i finally called Akai to find out what the deal was with the ram.

come to find out, the S3200 takes these old archaic ram boards that only akai sells for the unit. i did plenty of research on the 3200 before i hit buy it now, but nowhere did it talk about the S3200XL being the model that takes standard sampler ram. so i dig a little deeper, call akai's number for spare parts or whatever to get a quote. what do i find out? 250 f**king dollars per board. not only that, to get to 32 MB i have to replace all the ram in the sampler with 8 mb boards instead of the 4mb ones in there. so i was pissed. refused to pay $1000 to max out the ram in a sampler that cost me $500 that wasn't even new technology to begin with.

the conclusion? i sat on the thing, for a while, still intending on getting a zip drive and making the best out of it, then low and behold, i get a guitar center sales flier. a pair of Oktava MK-012's with shockmounts, 3 Oktava MK-219's, and 1 Oktava MK-319 with shockmount plus 6 20' XLR cables -- $499. i go down to the f**king guitar center, find my friend that works there, trade in the goddamn sampler for $450, sell him a bag of stompboxes i don't use for $50, get my mics and cables and sort of break even. the funny part of this? when they were quoting me a price for the sampler, they claimed there was one in another store selling for around $600 or less so they couldn't give me more than $450. i go back a few days later and how much is that sampler marked at? $1000. i almost burst trying to contain the laughter. they sat on that thing at $1000 for a goddamn year before they started to drop it down gradually. course, not too long after i walked into that guitar center and stumbled upon a mint condition Roland Super JX for $200. every bank programmed by the previous user with beautiful patches. one of my favorite pieces of gear i own.

[Cyprus]

since it's broken I don't want it back and it would just be a reminder to me how some low life stole 450$ from me.

What the heck are you doing? Why did you just accept that? Obviously this guy ripped you off, you don't have to take that! It's the LAW that this guy has to sell the item in the condition that he stated. If the postal service banged up the package, THAT'S HIS RESPONSIBILITY, that is also the law.

File a complaint with the FBI and Ebay. CALL THIS GUY, don't let him get away with it, hell give me the number and I'll call him. I hate people like him, and it'd almost be worth it to drive wherever the hell he lives and break his nose.

Seriously, if somebody ripped me off no way in hell are they getting away with it. I would rather spend thousands of dollars putting somebody in their place based on principles than I would to let some low life get away with ripping me off.

[tconrardy]

I did get my EMU MP7 from ebay.It was loaded as well and came with the nice gig bag too.I have been very happy with it.

TC

[whyterabbyt]

From ebay, without any problems:

2 cheap strat copies
Casio DG guitar controller
Casio DH wind controller
Roland Pad-5 drum controller
Darkstar XP2 synth
19" monitor
About 10-12 effects pedals

(and more than 30 toy guitars, keyboards and speak'n'spells)

I've had precisely two problems in 5 years, both when selling items; one guy sent a badly dated check then disappeared when asked to send a corrected one, the second made no payment at all.

[x3em]

since it's broken I don't want it back and it would just be a reminder to me how some low life stole 450$ from me.

What the heck are you doing? Why did you just accept that? Obviously this guy ripped you off, you don't have to take that! It's the LAW that this guy has to sell the item in the condition that he stated. If the postal service banged up the package, THAT'S HIS RESPONSIBILITY, that is also the law.

File a complaint with the FBI and Ebay. CALL THIS GUY, don't let him get away with it, hell give me the number and I'll call him. I hate people like him, and it'd almost be worth it to drive wherever the hell he lives and break his nose.

Seriously, if somebody ripped me off no way in hell are they getting away with it. I would rather spend thousands of dollars putting somebody in their place based on principles than I would to let some low life get away with ripping me off.

yeah, I hear you. a friend of mine who is a lawyer basically gave me the run down. I could take him to small claims court and would almost certainly win. but he also made it clear that it would take a lot of time and effort. and probably a lot more than 450$

Time is something I do not have. I work really hard and the time I have for myself I need to spend with my wife and friends and, messing with music etc.

It turned into calculated case of least hassle for me.

But hey, seriously. thanks for your reaction. I really do appricate your passion about it.

I do belive that he'll get what he deserves in due course anyway. most likely not the first time he has done something like this.

[x3em]

Ebay is a festival of morons.

In November I was bidding for a MOTU MTP AV (serial) and I was in the clear for a win until the last day when a lad came up and started bidding... well, I ran it up as high as I would be willing to pay (and then some, took a gamble to run him in a bit) and in less than 24 hours I won the exact same unit on Ebay in another auction for 50 dollars less than what he paid (including shipping.)

Though if you want a 'shit-gone-broken' story, I arranged to buy an Alesis AirSynth from a forum member at ReasonStation.net about two years ago. It arrived, sure enough... in a padded envelope.

What kind of moron sends gear in an envelope? Then I open it up - busted to shit. The thing is in like 4 pieces (still is). I take a ton of images, send them to him and demand my money back. He tells me that I have to go to the post office and claim it. I figured there is no way in hell they'll pay 50 bucks to make up for the worlds most retarded packaging job ever, so I decided to call it a 50 dollar loss and now I have a bag of busted junk next to my bed.

dude, that sounds like the same guy that ripped me off with that Juno. he packaged it up in cardboard and a minimal amount of bubble warp and taped it all up.

sigh.

come to think of it the original add said that the reason he was selling it was that he never used it becuase he prefered softsynth. he may even be kvr member.

[soulata]

I've got mostly positive results with ebay.

Actually, I got waldorf q for 300 e (as fixed price item), while another one was sold for a bit more in another auction.

k

[Artmuzz]

Don't get me wrong. The eBay seller was probably genuine and the Roland D-50 was real.
The thing I cannot understand is why some fool outbid me to £245 for a D50 which was in very poor condition. I've seen them go for between £120 to £190 on eBay and thats in good condition.
You would have to be very mad to pay all that for a piece of junk.


Artmuzz

[Gargoyle]

Certainly a rip-off but probably not a con - some people seem to just get carried away with the "winning" aspect of eBay, rather than thinking of it as buying something that they want. You might even find that the person who won it doesn't go through with it and the seller will be offering it to others or will be re-listing it very soon.

Only one bad experience here to report and that was a person who rather bizarrely couldn't provide the registration details for the software after he'd shipped the box. Not a huge loss, but annoying all the same. No other bad purchases at all, but I'm pretty careful. If it's a significant bit of gear, I'll always ask at least one question that a genuine seller or owner would be able to answer, and usually I'll ask for real photos of the item if there aren't any.

Unless it's an absolutely unique or rare item or something you actually need right away (e.g. to replace something in a project or a must-have thing for a repair) the best eBay advice is much like that when waiting for a bus.

Don't worry. There'll be another one along very soon.

(P.S. well done on the PAD-5 whyterabbyt, almost bid for it myself but saw it was you who was winning! )

[whyterabbyt]

Gargoyle quoth

(P.S. well done on the PAD-5 whyterabbyt, almost bid for it myself but saw it was you who was winning! )

Small world then Thanks for letting me get it

There was another one up at the same time, think its still going...