What happens to old hardware?

[Geomagick]

My computer stuff thats not being used at the moment.

A fully functional Dual P2 333 system.
A fully functional P3 450 system.

3DFx Voodoo 3 2000 graphics card
3DFx Voodoo 3 3000 graphics card
Soundblaster Audigy
Soundblaster Audigy 2 ZS
Aureal Vortex 2 Sound card
1 GB Corsair DDR550 Ram - not sure if it works ok though.
Abit IC7-G mobo
Asus A8n-SLI Deluxe mobo
Sigma Designs Realmagic MPEG2 Decoder card.

 

[diablofish]

Originally posted by: Neos

Originally posted by: Lord Evermore
It's part of being a packrat. Even nerds should throw out or sell useless junk.

I'm a packrat (or "collector" as I prefer). I have piles of old CPUs, some of which I pulled out of systems for other people and just brought home, or were being thrown out at work. Some I even just bought or traded for knowing I wouldn't use them. I have an Alpha mainboard and 21064 166MHz CPU that I bought just because it was cool to have an Alpha processor around. I have 6 or 7 mainboards sitting in a box, SuperSocket7, Socket370, SocketA. I have 30- and 72-pin SIMMs, some of which I brought home from work because they were going to be thrown out (this is less than 3 years ago). I have bits of cases I don't have anymore. Piles and piles of screws and cables. Fans, sound cards, video cards. I think I have an ISA modem somewhere. ISA and PCI serial and parallel port adapter cards. Pentium heatsinks. I've even got 3 unused monitors, a 17 and 2 19 inch. I have demo discs from PC Gamer magazine from over a decade ago. I have drivers on CD from my first 486 PC.

Only a very small portion of this could be considered being kept for "testing purposes". Of course most of it has zero resale value.

You, my friend - are worse than me. Married? Happily? Must have a secluded spot for all that STUFF and a very loving, understanding wife.

I'm fortunate to have a very understanding wife because I, like many of you, have a closet full of old computer parts.

You'd also be amazed at what people will buy off ebay. I've gotten rid of stuff (and made a little extra cash in the process) through the wonders of ebay.

 

[Pabster]

Damn, thought I was the only one with a basement full of parts. And rigs.

 

[Auric]

I sell schtuff or pass it on while it still has value or usefulness so don't accumulate junk. But then, I have never been a collector and have only gone through phases of accumulating things such as in childhood with toy cars, army men, hockey cards -even then it was only while they provided some entertainment value and were not just sitting around collecting dust.

Maybe you should nip your addiction in the bud before you become one of those crazy old people living amongst literal stacks of garbage.

So yeah, I'm with your wife

 

[Trey22]

Originally posted by: Lord Evermore

Originally posted by: Trey22
There's also the Freebies thread in the FS/FT section of the forums.

I always take older hardware, build machines and donate them locally... I've done at least 10 so far in the past couple of years. I give them to everyone from senior citizens to kids who just need a homework machine.

I'm socially inept as well as just plain being afraid of talking to people, so finding places that want stuff isn't easy for me. But I'd certainly love to build machines and give them to people that need them. I'd be afraid of somebody rejecting it though (yes I have issues).

What do you do about the operating systems and software? I'm not about to build machines that don't have an OS, nor give people pirated systems, but I'm also unable to do much with Linux and wouldn't really expect an old folk's home to know what to do with it even if I got it set up. And do those places not care about support issues, or do they have ways of support they just don't have the hardware?

Of course for me, building entire systems would cost me some more money, since I don't have lots of cases laying around. Only one spare at the moment.

I wouldn't necessarily mind just giving the stuff away, except that I'm not paying somebody to take it off my hands, even if recycling it is good for the environment and all that, this crap isn't sold to us with an understanding that one day it'll need to be recycled and that'll cost us money (yes I'm a lazy, self-centered American; getting us to consider it normal that we ought to go pay to recycle things when the people who recycle it will then be selling the stuff is going to take a while). And if I'm giving stuff away, I'm not paying for shipping, and really I'd begrudge the effort of packing it and taking it to to the post office.

90% of this stuff is so old that it's not even worth somebody buying, unless they simply have to have as much stuff as they can get, or needed a really specific item even though it'd cost them more than new and faster parts.

Then of course even if I could sell or give away parts, I'd have to spend a lot of time testing this stuff, because none of it was specifically protected against damage all these years. I wouldn't mind that if I was building a system of course.

Fortunately for me, I had a ton of Win98 CD's/COA's (all legit) to use for older pc's I'd put together for people. Software? Freeware! If someone needed MS Office, I'd throw on OpenOffice.

Computing is hobby for me, one I enjoy very much, so I don't mind spending a bit of time getting a system together, making sure it works. Since my donations are mostly local, I don't have to worry about shipping costs. Work provides me with plenty of boxes and packing material.

Don't get me wrong, when it's not worth building a new machine, I don't... that's what those $129 PC's from Fry's Electronics are for .

 

[Trey22]

cmdrdredd, if you ever want to get rid of your "junk" , let me know, those are the types of parts I could use to build up a couple more systems.

 

[SparkyJJO]

if you guys have "junk" lying around that you don't use and are considering throwing out well put it in the freebies thread in the FS/FT - there are many people there (like me) who gladly take stuff like that off people's hands. The person who gets it pays the shipping of course so it doesn't cost you anything, so instead of throwing it away give it to someone who could use it

My little brother for instance could really use a better motherboard, or CPU, or graphics card and he doesn't have much money (currently he's running a patched together system with a patched epox mobo, Athlon T-bird 1.2GHz, PC3200 RAM that only works at PC2100 speeds, gForce 2 Ti, and a 40GB hard drive that only 30GB is usable of). I'm sure he'd be willing to pay some shipping costs for a newer mobo or CPU or graphics card.

Freebies thread is a great place to unload your old "crap" because some people see it as treasure

 

[corkyg]

I donh't know where you live, but there is a national chain called "Computer Renaissance" that buys and sells used hardware. We have such a store here in Tucson, and they are good for many items - also a good source for something you might need. You can check here for store locations:

CR

And there are also organizations like Vietnam Vets that will collect junque and resell or dispose of it.

I also have a good friend in Ohio that teaches in high school, and is sort of the schools computer IT/guy. I send him lots of useful stuff periodically.