How many people use a laptop?

@Iamh4b1t (121)
United States
May 4, 2007 10:44am CST
My brother-in-law and me are working on a new idea of buying old and broken laptops then fixing and selling them. I'm wondering if this is a good idea. We have the knowledge to fix them so that is not an issue, I'm just wondering how many broken laptops are out there. My hope is that since they're broken we can get them for relatively cheap, then fix and sell them on ebay or on our website. We already have a website up please check it out and tell me what you think. Thanks! http://www.lapdawgs.com
6 people like this
21 responses
• Ireland
4 May 07
I have a laptop at home and a laptop in the office. Alot of people like laptops and if you can fix them up and sell them for cheap then is a good business. Our company is mobile phone related but we get people in all the time asking about second hand laptops because they are fairly expensive to buy new in shops.
1 person likes this
@Iamh4b1t (121)
• United States
4 May 07
Great information! Thanks for the response.
• Ireland
4 May 07
Your welcome.
• India
4 May 07
nice idea you have adopted nice site thanks for the link i will use it in future...thanks
1 person likes this
@Iamh4b1t (121)
• United States
4 May 07
Thanks for the comment I'm glad you liked it.
@nilzerous1 (2434)
• India
5 May 07
The idea is pretty good, considering the sky-high price of sealed-pack laptop, it must be great to have the option to have one at affordable service. But dealing with second hand goods is not the best idea unless you have excellent technical competency to repair it. Also you have to bear lots of phone calls from the buyers for want to post-sale service that may not be too easy to tackle. Still the idea is good and there is a definite neo-market for old used laptop.
@Iamh4b1t (121)
• United States
8 May 07
Great comment! Ya the post sale service is something we're still looking into. My initial thought is that we'll sell everything on eBay and gauaranty it against DOA for 7 days. Beyond that they're up to themselves. It's possible we'll offer some type of service beyond that but nothing in the works as of yet.
@Marie2473 (8512)
• Sweden
5 May 07
I think it is a great idea AS LONG AS you sell them cheap as well. I would never buy a "fixed" one at a too high of a price. Then I much rather go to a store and get a warranty. The laptops here are not that expensive anymore. We have one in our house that we bought for about $1000, a brand new toshiba with windows vista and all. Also 5 years warranty =) I am sure that if u get them very cheap and sell them cheap you will have a great buisness. Checked out your website and it looks very nice. You need to promote it hard =)
@Iamh4b1t (121)
• United States
8 May 07
Thanks for the comments! We're still in the initial stages but we are definitely planning on promoting it through various different ways. Right now we're on a shoe string budget but hopefully that will be changing soon =)
@Denmarkguy (1845)
• United States
5 May 07
In principle, it's a great idea, because laptops are still fairly expensive. My main concern would be about what you mean by "fixing them," when you talk about "old and broken" laptops. I have had quite a few non-working laptops sitting around the house-- but their biggest problem (besides fading screens) tends to have been that they were getting out-of-date, and would really need memory and processor upgrades to be of much use to anyone. So unless "fixing them" would involve giving them more processor beef, and more RAM, it would be an iffy proposition. That said, in the city where I lived before, there was a company called "Mr. Notebook" that specialized in refurbished portables, and they seemed to be doing pretty well-- you might get some ideas from checking their web site: http://www.mrnotebook.com/ One thing to consider as a source of old notebooks is to form partnerships with businesses that have either a sales force, or travelling employees who use laptops, and frequently upgrade to new gear-- you might be able to buy their old castoffs in bulk (working, or not) at firesale prices. Good luck with your venture!
@Iamh4b1t (121)
• United States
8 May 07
Great idea and thanks for the website! Most laptops can only be upgraded to a certain point so I don't think we'll be doing much upgrading, maybe some ram or a bigger hard drive here and there but then I'd end up with a bunch of old parts that no one wants. Thansk again!
@Iamh4b1t (121)
• United States
8 May 07
Great idea and thanks for the website! Most laptops can only be upgraded to a certain point so I don't think we'll be doing much upgrading, maybe some ram or a bigger hard drive here and there but then I'd end up with a bunch of old parts that no one wants. Thansk again!
• United States
5 May 07
My wife and I each have our own laptop and use them three times as often as the desktop we have. But then again the desktop is windows and the laptops are MacBooks, so that may have something to do with it, heh. The laptops are just more convenient for us, with our wireless router i can be anywhere in the house and in our yard outside and still be able to surf the internet.
• United States
5 May 07
oh and i forgot to mention i checked out the website and i liked it. Wish you would have been around six months ago, i had a HP laptop fry on me so I ended up taking it apart and selling the still functioning hardware, would have been easier just to sell it all together.
@Theresam (1177)
• United States
4 Jun 07
It sounds like good decision. We have a couple of laptops that we bought used. I don't know if they were broken before or not. Do you have a source? Craiglist would also be a good place to find laptops-you can post in their 'wanted' section.
• India
4 May 07
An excellent idea, there is a huge demand for used laptops because the new ones are very expensive and out of budget for a lot of people. Do a good job on fixing them and best of luck,you will do very well.
@Iamh4b1t (121)
• United States
4 May 07
Thanks for your comment, Yes I know I've wanted a laptop for a long time but new ones are so expensive, I bought a broken one for less then $100 and fixed it. Now that it's fixed I could probably sell it for $300 or $400 but I want to keep it =)
@bam001 (940)
• United States
4 May 07
My laptop is ALL that I use. I have a personal laptop that I use when I work from home. My employer also bought me a laptop with a docking station to use at work. To top it off, my sister liked using my laptop so much that she bought her own. Everyone I know that does a good deal of computer work has a laptop. I think this is a great business idea...wish I had the know-how to do this myself!
@Iamh4b1t (121)
• United States
7 May 07
I'm loving the responses! It seems like more and more people are either getting a laptop to use along with their desktop or ditching the desktop entirely. I definitely hope this works out for us. Thanks for all the comments and keep them coming!
• United States
4 May 07
I think that this is a great idea. I would love to have a lappy! As soon as you get some ready, let me know and I might look into buying if I can afford it! I use ebay for buying and selling so I think that is a great idea too! I like the layout of your website as well. Its very easy to navigate which is a big issue for me! Keep up the good work and let us know when you start selling them!
@Iamh4b1t (121)
• United States
4 May 07
Thanks for responding! I'm glad you liked the site. So far we're in the preliminary stages. We just have a couple of laptops that we're working on right now but we hope to get more as more people learn about the site. Thanks again and please do keep us in mind.
@mehale (2200)
• United States
4 May 07
If you are able to purchase broken laptops and repair them with minimal investment, it should be a good business. Laptop computers are very popular today, especially with more people working on the go. However, if you wind up with quite a bit invested in the computer by the time it is fixed, you may not be able to price them where they will sell. You would still have to market it as a used or rebuilt computer and would not be able to ask as much for it.
@Iamh4b1t (121)
• United States
7 May 07
I've been thinking the exact same thing and I think my solutions is simple. Always buy at a low enough price that I can still part out the laptop and make at least my money back. At first I was thinking I'd buy a lot of older laptops but with my philosophy the old parts don't go for much therefore I need to focus on laptops no older then say 5 years or so. Anyways great comment! Thanks
• Nigeria
5 May 07
Hello well thanks alot of people love laptop in my country and i thinks it will be btter if u do business with me cos i am a marketer of computer accessories.If you make a laptop and ship to me to seell for you and you give me a reward of 10% form ur gain then will can do the businees together.if u are intrested ou can gi ve me a call +2348080808973339
• United States
4 May 07
i actually have a laptop and a regular pc, i get irritated with my laptop often because it doesn't have a mouse so now i have to go get one of those so i can even do half of my work on there, but a laptop is a good business to get into because alot of people i know always has a laptop and a regular pc
@Iamh4b1t (121)
• United States
7 May 07
I know what you mean, you should also look into getting a small portable mouse. Some even have retractable cords.
@PsychoDude (2013)
• Netherlands
4 May 07
I don't think it would sell well, laptops don't tend to go broken like many computers do but mainly suffer from continuous heat on every single part. Also parts are hard to replace on laptops because you can't buy most of it as easily in the shops. So you'll end up selling something which will most likely die off within a year again, but then simply another part of the system. So if you'd give some warranty on it, you'll probably get a lot send back. If you don't give any warranty you'll just risk ending up getting a lot of bad reviews and get a hard time selling. What adds on this is that new laptops tend to be expensive and having them repaired by the manufacturer isn't too expensive during some form of warranty period in comparison, so many people prefer doing that instead. So by the time you'd end up buying then the thing probably is already 3~4 years old or so, an age at which a laptop is pretty much on the point of dying.
@Iamh4b1t (121)
• United States
4 May 07
Thanks for responding. I've seen a lot of used laptops for sale on ebay and it seems like most of them sell. You're definitely right about heat issues. I was actually thinking of giving one of those laptop coolers along with every laptop. So far it's been just a thought, I haven't looked into how cheap I could get them. Thanks for the feedback!
@aswinvs (453)
• India
5 May 07
i dont have a laptop but one of my frnd have a laptop and i used in a quite number of occasions its just like ordinary computer in a capsule form the thing i loved abt the laptop is that its scrrena and the convenienece of usig the keyboard
• Indonesia
5 May 07
i like laptop. its very simple to bring anywhere dont like PC. PC is very big.i think laptop is very good for the future because its very simple for anyone
• Malaysia
5 May 07
i'm using a laptop :D ..hmm i think it's a pretty good idea that you've got there. i have 2 laptops that are not working - care to buy them? hahaha...i don't know how to get rid of them, so it's stashed somewhere in the store room. if there's someone like you who buys broken laptop, that would be awesome!
• China
5 May 07
I'd like a new one.Second-hand things always have many problems.
@Viralg (66)
• India
5 May 07
yea coool but u noe ur rates should be subsidized and repair stations should b near to the users house!!! take into account this!!
@dixits (104)
• India
5 May 07
many of the buisness man who need laptop in their work use it because it is easy to carry and suitable at work place and they can do their work wherever they want and it is higly reliable