@Xanxi - man - did you ever nail it! And what's testing really? It works and gets recognized? What if there is some noise or static in the audio or video that only reveals itself after a few weeks? What if it only glitches with a particular combination of hardware? Following a few of these new accelerators that are being made right now, I'm learning all the crazy issues these guys have even today...after all these years . I thought we had all this stuff sorted out? I thought it was easy. But what are we learning? Even today they make an accelerator that has issues with SCSI?
It is hard and unreasonable in my view to treat these used items and sellers like a best buy. These are not currently manufactured goods, they don't have the resources. Some want to be treated this way, until a buyer screws them over, which let us not forget happens too. Buy an item, switch out some chips, claim what you got is not working? There are issues in both directions.
We should stop pretending everyone is perfect here - buyers or sellers. No such thing as perfection. Hence, approach transactions with caution.
Anyhow, you guys know I can get ranty. And I think the whole vintage thing is coming to a crashing end. First, how may more do you need? Second there isn't much to be nostalgic about past 20 years+...what, you're gonna want that Core Duo Lenovo PC you had? Second, the kids don't care about vintage compute we like here, so that's going to crash hard. Will the next gen be buying up these Amigas? Or cassettes? Or radios/stereos/turntables? No they won't. Additionally, let's not kid ourselves, the shipping costs are killing it. Plus all the shipping companies charge us brokerage/duties/taxes - all kinds of other crap. How many times have you said to yourself..."no, because shipping costs are too much." Even guys in Europe are starting to say that to themselves for shipping within Europe! Stack easy and cheap emulation options on top of this and what have you got?
So...just enjoy the final stages of the whole thing, including all the fun and games in buying and selling. These bad transactions are stories, battle scars...cost of dealing with vintage hardware. We'll look back on them fondly.