USA How much is my Home Theater PC worth currently

[Daniel J. Grossi II]

I'm not an accountant and I haven't taken any accounting classes, so I don't know how to properly depreciate the value something especially a computer that has been custom built by me. However, I did take Micro Economics and using fair market value has always worked in the past and still works a little, but I get ridiculed when I ask people how much this is worth considering I'm having a really hard time finding these computer parts any more and told they don't hold much value.

I think it's terrible that we pay so much for electronics to pay salesmans commomision, but the people who make these parts don't get paid much and can't afford them. Also, for something as nice as this build was when I built it and now that it's pretty much complete except I would like it to have more hard drives that it's almost if not completely obsolete already. Also, some people have told me it's not worth selling for as much as some people expect me to depreciate, so what can you people on here tell me that would help.

I built this for my siblings and my parents, so they could do pretty much anything they wanted with it too if that''s not irrelevant for me to say. Also, when I try to look up how to depreciate an item online I can't determine or find the salvage value. Some people have told me to take 20-25 percent of the cost of each parts new or used price, but they aren't happy when I tell them how much that ammounts to because it's more than their willing to pay or they just want to give me a hard time. Others have told me to take [pricepaid]/[yearsold]/3.5, but at that value its not worth selling and is why I am just considering parting it out, but I'd like to know what accountants think anyway. Here are the specs and prices paid for each part:


My Core i7 HTPC Computer Specs
-Motherboard: MSI Big Bang-XPower LGA 1366 Intel X58 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard $299.99
-Memory: OCZ Reaper Edition 12GB (3 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333 (PC3 10666) Low Voltage Desktop Memory Model OCZ3RPR1333C9LV12GK x 2 $319.99
-Processor: Intel Core i7-980 Gulftown 3.33GHz LGA 1366 130W Six-Core Desktop Processor BX80613I7980 $589.99
-Video Card: EVGA 015-P3-1580-AR GeForce GTX 580 (Fermi) 1536MB 384-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support Video Card $649.99
-Sound Card: Creative PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Champion Series Sound Card $199.99
-TV Card: Hauppauge WinTV-HVR-2250 Media Center Kit Dual TV Tuner w/ IR Remote PCI-E x 1 $114.99
-HD Recorder Card: Hauppauge Colossus - Record your high definition video gameplay and TV programs by H.264 for resolution up to 1080i, PCI-Express x1 Interface
Harddrive - Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 ST31500341AS 1.5TB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive (bare drive) - OEM price $119.99
-Blue-ray Writer: LITE-ON 12X BD-R 2X BD-RE 16X DVD+R 12X DVD-RAM 8X BD-ROM 8MB Cache SATA Blu-ray Burner with 3D Playback iHBS212-08 LightScribe Support $109.99
-Power Supply: COOLER MASTER Silent Pro RSA00-AMBAJ3-US 1000W ATX12V v2.3 / EPS12V v2.92 SLI Ready 80 PLUS BRONZE Certified Modular Active PFC Power Supply $208.98
-Case: Silverstone Tek Crown Series Aluminum ATX Media Center/HTPC Case with 2X USB 2.0 Front Ports, Black (CW02B-MXR-USB2.0) $399.99
-CPU Cooler: CORSAIR Hydro Series H80 (CWCH80) High Performance Liquid CPU Cooler $109.99
-RAID Card: LSI MegaRAID Internal Low-Power SATA/SAS 9261-8i 6Gb/s PCI-Express 2.0 w/ 512MB onboard memory RAID Controller Card, Single--Avago Technologies $148.98

Total $3667.86

 

[Steve-LevelUp]

Computers can be especially difficult to determine a value for something. Honestly, accountants are not specialists at valuing items at fair market value. However, what fair market value would be is whatever someone would be willing to pay for it. So, probably going to a tech forum and asking them, 'how much would you pay for this computer' you would probably get a good sense of how much it is worth. it seems like a 25% discount is reasonable, but computers do lose value very quickly, so a 25% decline might not be sufficient.

 

[Drmdcpa]

The other response is very good in that accountants generally do not place fair market value on items. That is an appraisers job.

It was also good in directing you to a tech place to get a better FMV. It also nailed on the head that FMV is what a willing buyer would pay to a willing seller, neither being under duress to engage.

It was further on the mark indicating that computers and computer parts devalue greatly and quickly in today's environment.

It did not address depreciation. From an accounting perspective depreciation has nothing to do with FMV. It is merely an accounting method to allocate costs.

If you find a buyer that needs that specific build and cannot afford to build it themselves, you might get top dollar. But the costs to locate that buyer will detract from getting top dollar. Chances are it is best to keep or part it out. Often the parts on custom builds are worth more than the whole. But you then have to add the costs of selling and shipping the indivual parts, so chances are you are not going to net anywhere near what you are expecting.

 

[Daniel J. Grossi II]

The other response is very good in that accountants generally do not place fair market value on items. That is an appraisers job.

It was also good in directing you to a tech place to get a better FMV. It also nailed on the head that FMV is what a willing buyer would pay to a willing seller, neither being under duress to engage.

It was further on the mark indicating that computers and computer parts devalue greatly and quickly in today's environment.

It did not address depreciation. From an accounting perspective depreciation has nothing to do with FMV. It is merely an accounting method to allocate costs.

If you find a buyer that needs that specific build and cannot afford to build it themselves, you might get top dollar. But the costs to locate that buyer will detract from getting top dollar. Chances are it is best to keep or part it out. Often the parts on custom builds are worth more than the whole. But you then have to add the costs of selling and shipping the indivual parts, so chances are you are not going to net anywhere near what you are expecting.

I don't know if I can find an appraiser who can tell me the value of this item because I've tried getting an old 8 track car stereo appraised and I got turned down for appraisal offers, even though I paid to have it appraised. I realize the 8 track was way outdated, but I had to try because I had no idea how much it was worth and didn't wanted to under value it. Same with this HTPC because most people seem to be telling me it's worth nothing while retro users seem to agree it hold some value and I need to make enough to upgrade it either by parting it out or selling it entirely.

I bought an new motherboard a while back, but I still need at least a new processor and memory because the existing processor isn't compatible with newer motherboards, newer processors aren't compatible with the existing motherboard in use, and the memory isn't compatible with newer motherboards due to lower voltage requirements of 1.5V or 1.35V found in newer memory compared to 1.65V to 1.5V support found in the existing memory, which nobody on here probably understands. The processor incompatibility is due to socket change in newer processors and sockets having more pins or as there called now as lands. However, I don't have the money to upgrade it and I've put it off for so long that the entire system and parts might be obsolete.