adam, You must be talking about e-gunner.com auction. All I can say is the $510 bid was a "proxy bid" that someone would have had to outbid for you to get notice. So your $500 bid was highest but did not meet reserve. It never got to your $510 because nobody bid over that bid. The reserve price will be pretty close to "buy it now" price. So if your hundreds below "buy it now" your not close on reserve price.

I normally email the seller and ask what their "reserve" price is some will respond some ignore my question. I also have a price that I am willing to pay and I put that in as my bid if it does not meet their "reserve price" I move on. I think they should just list the reserve price as the opening bid and be done with it (like some sellers do )

Adam. in my opinion, any "Auction" with a Reserve price is not an Auction. If they are going to play that way, the reserve price should be listed up front so folks don't waste their time as you have found out firsthand.