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Dear All,

I jumped into this very interesting forum since I currently hold quite a bizzare collector item.

It's the box number 000134 of Windows 95 Upgrade Retail ever produced by the assembly line, authographed by Bill Gates, Steve Ballmer (Vice President at the time), Bernard Vergnes (Vice President EMEA at the time) and Umberto Paolucci (Microsoft Italy CEO at the time).

For a number of very obvious reasons I will not bore you with I know it is authentic 100%.

Friends told me it's worth some reasonably serious money (three digit in USD), I'm having a hard time thinking so, but for the fun of it I've got into the task of assessing is value, so I came across this forum and who best...

I apologize for not eventually posting in the right subforum, if so pls redirect me to the right one.

Posting a couple of pictures too, if it helps.

Thanks in advance to whoever will be willing to share an opinion.

marcello

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Hi Marcello,

I moved this to our Is This Autograph Real? forum since it needs authenticating. If the autographs are real, and there's a good chance, I think it would sell for $2,500+. Perhaps a lot more unless a number of them were signed.

RRAuction.com has gotten great money for rare Silicon Valley autographs and artifacts. They know how to market them. Be sure to talk to while you're deciding what to do.

Hello Steve,

thank you for the warm welcome and for moving the message to the right forum.

I'll be interesting to see what everybody thinks about the authenticity, it will definitively help setting the fair market price.

I'll be waiting for the forum feedback before disclosing the reason why I believe it is authentic, not to spoil the forum judgemental process.

As per the number of boxes around, I believe this special edition includes the first 200 boxes, and I find it very hard to believe another one with 4 signatures exists and is still around after 25 years.

Also, thank you for the RRAuction info, I took a fast look at the website and they see the right ones to place it, I need to figure out how to do the whole thing from Rome, Italy, but that comes after reading whether everybody agrees or not this is an actual Billg signature.

Yesterday a Bill Gates autographed mouse went for about $1600 on rrauction.com with more than 20 bids. This one (which looks authentic to my unskilled eyes) is especially interesting because Ballmer has become noteworthy for reasons other than Microsoft - he owns professional sports teams now. The other autographs are poorly articulated which would impact cost, but it's also interesting that the signatures are on a Microsoft product. I agree with Steve that it would go for somewhere in the mid-$2000 range.

Would indeed be an interesting item if real, Ballmer and Gates (who I believe are no longer in contact with each other) are rarely seen signed together. I can't say I'm sold on it being real though

Thanks for you comments, I've indeed been quite busy these months and almost forgot I had this box in a closet...

I'm obviously more than sure it's real (I've personally collected the signatures off their hands at a MS sales meeting) but that's worth nothing, I understand it.

Would you suggest any way to have it certified? I hold proof I was a MS employee at the time, does that help?

It's time for me to get rid of it but I'm not a collector and know nothing about this world.

thank you

marcello

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