[X4U] Refurbished

[Stroller]

On Jul 16, 2004, at 12:13 pm, Paul Moortgat wrote:

> I can buy a refurbished Hitachi 160 GB in an IceCube case for 135 
> Euro.  Can I take that offer?  I don't know how far 'refurbished' 
> goes.  They offer the full warranty.
>
> This is their German text:
>
>  IceCube FireWire Gehäuse mit eingebauter schnelldrehender
>  160GB Festplatte ( 7200rpm / 8MB Cache), Oxford 911 Chipsatz,

I spoke to the UK importer <http://www.mag-cables.co.uk/> of MacPower 
range of cases after reading your posting today. He doesn't have the 
IceCube in stock, but its successor, the Pleiades. The internals are 
apparently the same, but the case is aluminium, to match your G5.

Specs are at: 
<http://www.macpower.com.tw/products/usb_firewire_sata/firewire_400>

A 160gb drive to go in such a case could be obtained for as little as 
£61 (inc VAT) for an IBM, or £70 (inc VAT) for Western Digital (I think 
  they're still offering 3-year warranties on their EIDE drives, and 
they're the only manufacturer I know of doing so) new from 
<http://Scan.co.uk>

So the factors that determine the value of this offer is the value of 
the case, cost of shipping, exchange rates & VAT, and whether you're 
prepared to risk a "reconditioned" hard-drive. MAG seemed cagey about 
dealing with me and seem to prefer to deal with the trade; 
nevertheless, when I gave him my business name & told him I'd bought 
from him once before he quoted me a price. He might prefer to recommend 
a reseller to you, depending on how you approach him so perhaps I 
should say no more than the price he quoted me was a little short of 
£50.

I am EXTREMELY happy with my MacPower "Clearlight" case, which is the 
USB2 & Firewire version and which rarely requires its external mains 
adaptor, but there do seem to be other suppliers who make good cases 
aimed at the value market.

Scan do the "Icy Box" in Firewire for £35 - their competitors have a 
photo at <http://www.rlsupplies.co.uk/products/product.asp?id=2955>. I 
am also very happy with the 5.25" version of RL Supplies 
<http://www.rlsupplies.co.uk/products/product.asp?id=717> - I have a 
Pioneer 107 in it, and it still comes up as "Apple Supported / 
Shipped".

So I think you could get a comparable drive cheaper, or for little 
more, new & in the UK.

Stroller.