Damage to 2008 Mac Pro tower

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Level 2

255 points

Damage to 2008 Mac Pro tower

I sold a 2008 Mac Pro on eBay. The buyer returned it because it came up with a flashing question mark when he attempted to reboot. But when I opened the box and unwrapped the bubble wrap, the front carry handle was bent. He says it was undamaged when he returned it, but there was no damage to the box indicating any kind of incident during shipping. (Also, after I removed the drive and reinserted it, as I advised him to do, it booted up fine.)

Anyway, as far as the damage goes, the only thing I can think of (other than the buyer is lying) is that when I removed it from the box, I couldn't tell the orientation while it was bubble-wrapped and had it resting on the carry handle. That couldn't cause this kind of damage, though, could it?

Mac Pro, OS X 10.11

Posted on Dec 9, 2020 8:38 AM

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Answer 1

Tesserax

Level 10

152,163 points

Dec 9, 2020 10:36 AM in response to Dan Radmacher

FWIW, I have this exact Mac Pro model. In all the years I've owned it, I could place it upside-down on its handles and they never buckled. However, it was put into this position gently and not for any extended period of time.

So ... a few ways that I can imagine this could have occurred:

It was placed upside-down with the side case, where the warping appears, not secured.
With the Mac Pro upright, the handle was hit with some type of object heavy enough, and hard enough, to flex it as you see it.
With the Mac Pro upside-down and the front handle resting on some type of object, force was applied to the bottom of the unit pushing it down on this object.

Again, if the shipping container was not damaged, it would be very unlikely that this could have happened during transport ... especially with a reputable shipping company.

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Answer 2

Tesserax

Level 10

152,163 points

Dec 9, 2020 10:28 AM in response to Dan Radmacher

From what I can tell from the image you provided, it appears that some type of force was being applied to the center-right of the handle that caused it to distort at the handle/case attachment point. This could be caused by a number of thing, possibly including it was placed upside down on top of a pipe, for example. But that would make more sense if the Mac Pro was not in a protective box, but before being placed in it ... especially if the shipping box it came in did not have similar damage at this location.

Regardless, you should notify eBay to, at least, have it on record ... and possibly some form of remedy.

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