Lately, I've gotten a lot of questions about buying a used or preowned PDA. Is it safe? Is it smart? Just like buying anything used, you have to decide what is acceptable in terms of previous wear and tear and overall risk. There are two basic definitions we are going to talk about, used and recertified. Used means the product is "as is", it may work and it may not. The other term is recertified. Recertified means that the manufacturer has repaired the product to like new status, but cannot legally sell it as new.
There were more than 13.1 million PDAs and handheld computers sold in 2001 and it's estmated that number will be 30 million by the end of 2004. As the PDA market continues to grow, there are going to be a lot of used PDAs available. With that in mind we want to discuss should you invest in a used PDA; and if you do, how do you get a reliable product for a reasonable price?
Everybody has their opinions on new or used products. My goal is to advise you of some differences between used and recertified PDAs, where to purchase, and the consequences of the purchase. All of these options involve risk of some kind, but snagging that great deal may be worth the risk to most people.
In the next section, I'll give you the information you need to start looking at used PDAs.