Dispose, recycle old desktop computer?

[swingdjted]

Title says most. I'm looking for ways to get rid of an old Dell computer, complete with kybd, ball mouse, CRT screen, and tower.

It's running xp pro, and has the following specs:
60GB ide/pata hard drive
20GB ide/pata hard drive
CD ROM drive
Creative Sound Blaster 5.1 surround PCI sound card with a lot of great dsp features and other "sound font" options (includes spdif digital out).
512MB SDRAM (I don't think it's DDR)(2x256 133MHz cards filling 2 of 3 dimms)
Intel Pentium II processor
3.5" floppy drive
motherboard has 2 USB (not usb2) ports and an Ethernet port, on-board stereo sound (line in, mic in, green out), on-board VGA (blue plug) video, parallel port, com port, Kensington lock, ps2 mouse/kybd inputs, and some oldschool bus ports that are longer than pci slots (what are these called?)
pci faxmodem includes in and out phone lines, and mic-in/speaker-out plugs.
200 watt power supply unit
120mm-ish case fan.

It runs Office 2003 Pro (word, power point, excel, outlook, publisher, etc.) and many other rather expensive oldschool office programs like Front Page, Visio, etc. It runs Winamp (even AVS/milkdrop) and Firefox like a charm. Youtube vids even work well on it.

I just don't use it or want it anymore (been over a year since I've needed it - was a garage computer for a while for looking shit up on the net and playing networked music, but I use a slightly newer P4 for that now.

What should I do with this thing?

All answers, serious or not, are welcome.



edit - just looked through it to back up anything necessary. Looks like I already did that job sometime in the past. Best screen resolution for it seems to be 1280x1024.

[fc*uk]

When I have needed to get rid of old computers, I have always contacted the manager of the IT department at my work place. More often than not, the system will be too old for them to put it to use, but they can still take parts (cd-rom, ram, hds; literally everything but the CPU). What they don't use they recycle through who eer they use for that sort of thing.

[kofplayer]

it'd be a waste to throw it away. whatever you do with it, i hope it lands up with someone who will utilise it

[Too-DAMN-Much]

send it to me, crate it up and PM for the address, at the very least, i could use the extra hard drives, not able to pay shipping or any similar costs however, at the best i could probably give it to a kid i know who can't afford to build one.

[k_rock923]

Office Space

[hgnis]

Originally Posted by k_rock923

Office Space

Damn straight.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?do...0494980077764#

[Widdykats]

Originally Posted by hgnis

Damn straight.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?do...0494980077764#

Thank mew...no, really!!!!

[cooky560]

Originally Posted by Widdykats

Thank mew...no, really!!!!

That video is ace Love Office Space

[Too-DAMN-Much]

at least i offered to cannibalize the hard drives instead of totally destroying it

[NJK]

create a nas server.

that is what i've done with an old computer
or it's perfect to run linux and create a home server..

[baafie]

Charities depend on donations of this sort of equipment. In the US, you can include public schools as well.

[swingdjted]

I honestly would send components or the entire system if someone paid shipping up front.

I would create a server, but I already use my main computer for local network file sharing.

[cooky560]

If you have no use for it as a secondary system, either sell it, or donate it to a thrift store or local school, they will be grateful for the gesture

[johanwhite]

If you really do not want it then give it to your relative's children who need PC for their study. If you are a rich person then you can also donate it to some organization. Your PC has a good configuration.So you can sell it and get a good amount from it.

[Warrior of the Light]

ebay or this:

[Widdykats]

^ Woah! Nice!

[swingdjted]

I like the fishtank idea. that wouldn't be very hard to pull off.

Originally Posted by johanwhite

Your PC has a good configuration.So you can sell it and get a good amount from it.

Perhaps in 1998 it was worth quite a lot, but in 2010... It wouldn't be worth what it costs to ship whole. The CRT monitor has a lot of heavy glass in it. That case is multi-layer stainless steel (strong enough to hold that glass monitor without flexing) with a plastic shell. It's insanely heavy (and therefore expensive to ship). Parts would be reasonable weights for shipping though.

All of our students have school-issue brand new MacBooks, so the school wouldn't really accept this as a gift. I wish someone would have a use for it.

Below is what it looks like taken apart. Everything is in working order and could easily be put back together in about 10 minutes. The processor and CPU cooler is the black box on the left below the mobo - it connected like an expansion card would.

The pci and other expansion slots are on a separate large card under the PSU wires. That large card is plugged into the mobo, and the expansion cards (faxmodem and SoundBlaster sound card) are plugged into it.

One of the 2 fans belongs to the PSU, the other pulls inside air over the CPU cooler and out the back. The metal boxes are either hard drives, 3.5" floppy drive, or CD drive, depending on which you're looking at.

I still don't know what kind of black ports are next to the white PCI slots. They're longer, and an older technology.

[k_rock923]

Originally Posted by swingdjted

I like the fishtank idea. that wouldn't be very hard to pull off.



Perhaps in 1998 it was worth quite a lot, but in 2010... It wouldn't be worth what it costs to ship whole. The CRT monitor has a lot of heavy glass in it. That case is multi-layer stainless steel (strong enough to hold that glass monitor without flexing) with a plastic shell. It's insanely heavy (and therefore expensive to ship). Parts would be reasonable weights for shipping though.

All of our students have school-issue brand new MacBooks, so the school wouldn't really accept this as a gift. I wish someone would have a use for it.

Below is what it looks like taken apart. Everything is in working order and could easily be put back together in about 10 minutes. The processor and CPU cooler is the black box on the left below the mobo - it connected like an expansion card would.

The pci and other expansion slots are on a separate large card under the PSU wires. That large card is plugged into the mobo, and the expansion cards (faxmodem and SoundBlaster sound card) are plugged into it.

One of the 2 fans belongs to the PSU, the other pulls inside air over the CPU cooler and out the back. The metal boxes are either hard drives, 3.5" floppy drive, or CD drive, depending on which you're looking at.

I still don't know what kind of black ports are next to the white PCI slots. They're longer, and an older technology.

I'd say that they were ISA slots if I had to guess based on the description, but I can't really see them in the picture.

[Too-DAMN-Much]

well.... this is only a pretty safe bet, but anything with an exposed circuit board pictured above is likely garbage via static electricity after that pic.

shag rug + static + electronics/circuit boards = not quite as interesting as touching a doorknob after shuffling around in slippers, but close.

fwiw, it's probably worth the most as scrap, aside from the hard drives, i'd say at the least slap those in your extra, they're nearly impossible to damage short of a high power magnet and you can only say you've got enough space for so long...

[QOAL]

I doubt Ted has been rubbing balloons over the floor then dropping them on the boards.

Also, going with the donation idea, if it's possible.
Though considering it's a P2, it might be hard to find a recipient that would find it acceptable, performance wise, in this day and age.

[Too-DAMN-Much]

is that even nessecary with most carpets? first i've heard if so...
hell... lineoleum is even worse too isn't it?
if it were off white concrete/cement though...

no clue how easy static is to work up in iowa, but... if i didn't do all my work with the innards of computers on this concrete floor in the garage i'd waste a lot of parts in oregon, to say the least.

oddly enough, time of year seems to make no difference at all either.

[swingdjted]

heh...

I'm horrible at remembering to take anti-static measures. Even the components of my main computer have sat on carpet a number of times, and it's often that I shock the case when opening it to clean. Nothing I have ever owned has actually gone bad because of it yet, but I should be more careful.

I had it apart yesterday, now it's back together and running. Norton Antivirus 2002 is telling me my subscription has expired and that virus definitions are out of date... Never got around to putting Avast on it.

A more zoomed in shot of the old expansion slots (sorry poor quality) It looks like they might be what you said based on the Wikipedia pictures:

[Rellik]

Yup , those black slots are definitely ISA alright. A low end sound card or a 56K modem are about the only things you could even put in those slots.

[Warrior of the Light]

Even if you sold it for $0, it's still cheaper than paying for throwing it away

[deeder7001]

I actually gave several computers away last year that are about the same age(maybe a little older). I just put it up on Craigslist and a couple days later some teenagers picked them up for use with old games.

[Widdykats]

^ Good idea. Craigs is free. (and local)

[swingdjted]

That's probably the best idea yet. I'll give it a try.

Thanks

[deeder7001]

Any updates on getting rid of the computer?

[swingdjted]

One of my students said if nothing else, he'll use the motherboard and cards for a home made computer desk top. (he wants to make a table top out of smoothed out motherboards and cards).

[Too-DAMN-Much]

sounds like a sufficiently nerdy solution, we want to see if it happens

[samy]

You can donate it to a school in your neighbourhood, they don't need new computers since it's only to show the kids how to type properly and maybe get them to draw something on paint (my wife is a Kindergarten teacher and the school has once been given about 20 barely used computers. The gesture itself was nice but a 4 year old obviously wouldn't need it)

[Warrior of the Light]

why not? my nephew is 4 and he uses the computer on a nearly daily basis - Children's games mostly.

[swingdjted]

Gone.

One of my students took it to learn linux. I believe he'll make good use of the hardware. Sadly the software will need to die, so I'm going to wipe the drives clean for him, not that there's anything on them that is questionable.

[Too-DAMN-Much]

dang, i wanted pics of the circuitboard-table

[swingdjted]

Well, he says it's still in the works, so maybe I'll get to see it and shoot some photos if and when he finishes.

[beanboy89]

If I know anyone looking to rid themselves of an old computer, I'll always be glad to take it. I can always use more hardware.