Atari 7800 ProSystem with 54 games

Always thought the Atari 7800 was a great budget system, as it was both more powerful than the NES (though overshadowed by it) and fully compatible with the classic 2600 console. That must be why the thing is so popular with collectors and retro gamers. You can find out a ton more about the Atari 7800 via Wikipedia, the Atari 7800 page, atari7800.com and of course Atari Age. For some emulation fun try this link.

To actually own a 7800 you could try this Atari 7800 ProSystem & 54 games & 4 controllers eBay auction. You'll also be getting 2 AC adapters and all necessary cables. Games include California Games, Xevious, Double Dragon, Pitfall II, Ms. Pac-Man, Donkey Kong and Food Fight. Seller ships worldwide and the average 7800 (without games/extras) goes for an average of 35$, 20 pounds or 28 euros.

The rare and expensive Sinclair ZX80

Yes, that lovable 1kb rarity that paved Sir Clive's way to glory has once again appeared on eBay, and here's that rare Sinclair ZX80 auction. Seller ships worldwide and the computer comes with manual, RF lead and some information sheets.

Sega Genesis, Sega CD, Sega 32X with games and, err, more gaming related stuff

The complete SEGA 16-bit family with a splash of some early 32-bit. Just follow the link to this Sega Genesis & expansions & games eBay auction and bid your way to a Sega Genesis, a Sega CD, a 32X unit, 3 controllers, 1 joystick, 1 four player adapter, all necessary cables, PSUs and 38 games. The games (covering all three systems and among other top stuff) include: NBA Jam, Star Wars 32X, DOOM, Jaguar XJ220 CD, Sonic 2, Aladdin, Mortal Kombat and ToeJam & Earl. An average price for this huge lot would be something between 200-250$, though it seems this auction might end at a much lower point. Seller only ships within the US.

eBay Rampage: Ultimate Play the Game

Ultimate Play the Game, Ultimate, was founded back in 1982 and was what the Stamper brothers were doing before focusing on turning Rare into the behemoth it now is. Ultimate also happened to be the most successful developer to ever grace the ZX Spectrum (and quite a few other 8-bit formats), producing what are widely considered the most technically accomplished games to hit the platform and what objectively are some of the most impressively boxed and expensive tapes 80s kids could get their hands on. Find out more here and/or here.

Alien 8 in all its boxed glory. Worldwide, ends 23 Oct. 2008.

Underwurlde for the Speccy. Worldwide, Buy it Now.

Atic Atac Spectrum tape. UK only, ends 26 Oct. 2008.

Nightshade in all its beauty. Worldwide, Buy it Now.

Knight Lore for the BBC Micro. Worldwide, Buy it Now.

Tranz Am ZX Spectrum. Worldwide, ends 26 Oct. 2008.

Entombed for the Commodore 64. Worldwide, Buy it Now.

The Ultimate Pen!

Unleash the Amiga 1200 Power

Truth be said, you could easily grab a cheaper Amiga 1200 than the one pictured above, though you'd still be missing out on quite a bargain. This setup, you see, is almost as powerful as retro machines go, as it includes an extra disk drive, a CD-ROM drive, a fully working hard disk and -impressively- the rare Microbotics M1230XA accelerator with its shiny 68030 processor. What's more, all necessary leads, the PSU, a decent selection of books and manuals, a joystick, a mouse and a ton of software (on CDs, FDDs and the HDD) have been happily thrown in. Grab it via this expanded Amiga 1200 eBay auction. UK only bidders I'm afraid.

SNK Neo-Geo CD with 9 games

The Neo-Geo was an amazing and amazingly expensive machine and so SNK decided to keep the amazing bit, remove the expensive part and add some pretty annoying loading times by coming up with the Neo-Geo CD. An impressive 2D CD-based powerhouse with a ton of AES/MVS ports that was actually affordable and didn't need them overpriced cartridges. Apparently, it's even more so now. Try this Neo Geo CD & 9 games eBay auction and see what I mean. Seller ships worldwide. Grab this for less than 200$, 150 euros or 115 pounds and consider yourself lucky. Grab it for its current price and throw a party.

Nintendo's Limited and rather rare Game & Watch Super Mario Bros. (YM-901-S)

The lovingly boxed, excellently preserved, obviously boxed and quite frankly beautiful Game & Watch version of Super Mario Bros. (YM-901-S) that you can see in the pictures above, is one of the most expensive Nintendo handhelds you can get your retro gaming hands on. Notice the yellow and very cartoony Disk-Kun case? Well, there's probably only 10,000 of them around the world (mostly in Japan) and they were given away for the Nintendo Famicom Grand Prix F1 Race competition. Find out more about the thing here.

Nintendo LIMITED Game & Watch-Super Mario Bros (YM-901-S) eBay auction. Seller ships worldwide. Oh, and its serial number is 21800421.

The complete Atari Lynx II experience

Atari's final attempt at a handheld console, the Atari Lynx 2, is a vastly underrated yet glorious console. It's better (though not as rare) than the original Lynx, sports stereo sound, better battery life, a fantastic colour LCD screen, a few extra touches and the same variety of impressive custom chips that put 16-bit computers to shame. Happily, you can now grab it boxed, complete in a carry case, with 9 equally boxed games, the AC adapter, car cigarette lighter power adapter, sunvisor screen protector and all them bits of documentation you might want. How? Well, by following this Atari Lynx 2 lot auction link of course. Seller ships worldwide and I would consider a price between 70-80£ (120-140$ or 90-105 euros) more than reasonable.

The games you'll be getting include some of the best Lynx carts ever released, such as the fantastic WWI warplane-sim Warbirds, the excellent brawler Ninja Gaiden, Checkered Flag and the truly impressive Toki. Find out more about the included games over at AtariAge and do try the best freeware Lynx emulator available: Handy.

Super StarFox Weekend Prizes

One for the people who just have to own every one of those lovely collectible bits of gaming history: the Super StarFox Weekend Prize (1993) Collection eBay auction. It consists of a lovely StarFox jacket, a t-shirt, four pins and, yes, an advertising banner, all carrying the 16-bit era StarFox logo. Only for ageing SNES fanboys that live in the US.

Taito F3 Board with 5 great games (JAMMA)

Yes, I know, quite delicious really. It is after all a Japanese Taito F3 Package System motherboard with five pretty brilliant classic and very original arcade games: Space Invaders DX, Bubble Bobble 2, Bubble Bobble 3, Pop 'n Pop and Puchi Carat. Carefully read the auction text, make sure you know what you are bidding on and that your Jamma cabinet hasn't been stolen and follow the link to this Taito F3 & Games JAMMA eBay auction. Oh, and here's a nice JAMMA FAQ.

Epyx presents the C64 Fast Load Cartridge

The Epyx Fast Load Cartridge (a.k.a. FastLoad) must have been the most successful Commodore 64 add-on ever. Well, at least in the US where disk drives were pretty common, that is. The Fast Load, you see, was -arguably still is- a cartridge that dramatically sped up drive accessing speeds thus reducing loading times and making playing those impressive big games truly fun. It also came with some pretty handy built-in software too (DOS Wedge, a disk editor and a basic MLM). You can grab one via this C64 Epyx Fast Load Cartridge auction too. Seller ships worldwide.

Sega Master System, 25 games & extras

In contrasts to Brazil and Europe, the Sega Master System went largely unnoticed in the US, despite being a technically impressive 8-bit console with tons of great games. So, in an attempt to set things right, here's a fantastic US only Sega Master System eBay auction. The offer includes an original Sega Master System 1 system (the rarer and better version of the console), a joystick, a lightgun, two joypads and 25 boxed games including: Fantasy Zone, Spy vs. Spy, Alien Syndrome, After Burner and Rampage. The average SMS sells for 20-25$, so getting this lot for anything less than 55-65$ is a definite bargain. Oh, and this SMS buyer's guide might come in handy too.

The Spectrum Games Bible

If you are anything like me, which I sincerely wish you not, you're probably aware of the twisted pleasure of discovering an unplayed retro game and experiencing the hidden gaming joys and gems of, well, the ZX Spectrum. Now, truth be said, you could just search eBay for Spectrum games and hope to be lucky or -and that's the way of the wise- go for the amazing collective work that is the Spectrum Games Bible. I did.

It's a series of books, you see, chronologically presenting hundreds of games with some truly well-written reviews directly from the huge community of Speccy lovers. The third book, covering the golden Spectrum years of 1987 and 1988, has just been released and sports over 350 reviews. Happily you can easily grab it (the first two too -hoho) here for a very reasonable price.

A box with a VIC-20 (and some extras) in it!

The VIC-20 (VC-20 in Germany) by Commodore was the first computer tho sell one million units worldwide, and though it only managed to survive for five years it was home to a ton of Jeff Minter Llamasoft classics, Satoru Iwata's first conversion jobs and an astonishing selection of cartridge and tape based games. The machine came with a 6502A processor clocked at 1 MHz, 5k of RAM (well, for the basic unexpanded model), decent graphic capabilities, 4-channel sound, datasette and disk-drive interfaces, a cartridge slot and a proper keyboard complete with function keys.

For a chance at one of these lovely home-micros you could do worse than this boxed VIC-20 & extras eBay auction. Seller ships worldwide and you'll be bidding on a VIC-20 in its original box, a datasette, a game, quite a few manuals and four tapes filled with software. The average VIC-20 usualy costs something around 20$, 12£ or 14 euros.

Mind you, the VIC-20 homebrew scene is still going strong...