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JerrySpringer
Penny Hoarding Member
669 Posts |
 Posted - 07/06/2008 : 11:42:34
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The wife wants me to get rid of the old Pentium. After I take out the hard drive, who is the most dependable to give away the CPU and 17" monitor to? I am thinking of posting on Craigslist or a community freecycle type bulletin board but I do want to have to answer a phone or deal with flakes. What luck have you all had with giving away a 250 MHz era computer?
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Kurr
1000+ Penny Miser Member
2906 Posts |
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JerrySpringer
Penny Hoarding Member
669 Posts |
Posted - 07/06/2008 : 16:04:22
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| Yeah, the monitor is the boat anchor here. The CPU I could hide from the wife and strip it on a day when the moment is right, LOL. |
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HoardCopperByTheTon
Administrator
USA
6807 Posts |
Posted - 07/06/2008 : 16:33:40
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Lots of charitible organizations and possibly your local recycling centere will be happy to take the CPU. Just make a few phone calls and drop it off.  |
If your percentages are low.. just sort more. If your percentages are high.. just sort more.
Now selling Copper pennies. 1.6x plus shipping. Limited amounts available. |
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fasTTcar
Penny Hoarding Member
Canada
573 Posts |
Posted - 07/06/2008 : 20:57:11
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| I put 2 on the curb tonight and they were gone in 15 minutes. |
www.londongoldbuyer.com |
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fb101
Administrator
USA
2856 Posts |
Posted - 07/07/2008 : 08:31:08
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| Are the motherboards and other boards useful or only the processor chips? |
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tyoon21
Penny Sorter Member
52 Posts |
Posted - 07/07/2008 : 09:25:49
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quote:
Originally posted by fb101
Are the motherboards and other boards useful or only the processor chips?
Here is a breakdown on what is worth it in a computer. I'll try to be as complete as possible.
Starting with the outside you have a plastic housing. This is generally classified as #7 plastic or ABS plastic. Unless you plan on separating the colors, shredding it and hording about a ton or so usually this material is not worth anything. However, there are some people that will take it for free which is great for the environment.
Working on the inside you will see a steel case. This case is galvanized steel and is worth collecting. Each case weighs around 7-10 pounds and at todays rate I got $10 per 100 lbs of steel. Make sure you remove all the plastic though because some yards are picky about that.
The inside of the computer will reveal some really fun goodies. First thing first, unscrew anything that has a screw. You should be able to remove the motherboard, hard drive, disk drive, CD/DVD ROM drive, power supply, any slot cards and the slot covers. Save everything as I will describe piece by piece here.
The motherboard should have a processor on it. You can usually recognize it by the name, either Pentium or AMD. Newer computers will have a fan on top of the processor. Remove the fan and underneath that is an aluminum heat sink. If you can get to it, the fan contains trace amounts of copper wire. The aluminum heat sink is considered extruded aluminum. The processors either scrap for gold yourself or gather a lot of them and Ebay them. Also on the motherboard should be RAM chips. Take the RAM and again either Ebay them or cut the fingers off for gold recovery.
The hard drive and disk drive are relatively worthless. If you get bored you can scrap a couple small motors out of them and also keep the steel. Lately I have just gathered a bunch of them and sold them as lots on Ebay (see the trend so far?)
The hard drive on the other hand is a good source. The casing is considered cast aluminum. Sometimes there are steel pins in them which will lower the quality a bit so if you can remove them it's worth it. Inside you will see a shiny set of discs. If the hard drive is from 1997 or newer or is 20GB in size or larger then these disks contain a trace amount of PGM. Remove the screws with a torx wrench and save the platters for processing or Ebay. The magnets that hold the acutator arm are extremely strong so be careful with them. Apparently though you can sell these for their nickel content however I haven't had much success with that.
All the slot cards, gather them up and cut the fingers off for gold recovery or Ebay them. Lately I have Ebayed them with much success.
The PCI slot covers, save them in lots of 5 or more and save the screws. Again, these have more value on Ebay than as scrap steel.
Now comes the power supply. There are two ways to approach this. Most of us will cut the power cord and other wires for copper then scrap the power supply as steel. It's important to remove all the connectors though. If you have some time on your hands and want to really get all the metals out than open the supply up. FIRST THING TO DO IS TO DISCHARGE THE CAPACITOR. AGAIN...DISCHARGE THE CAPACITOR TO AVOID AN ELECTRIC SHOCK. To do this take an insulated screw driver and touch the leads. After a few shocks it should discharge. If you do not feel comfortable dealing with electrical equipment then don't open the case and toss the power supply in the scrap steel pile.
After you have discharged the capacitors you will see a couple transformers which can be popped off and scrapped. Also there is a ferrous steel donut with copper wiring on it. Cut the copper wire off and send the donut to the steel pile. At this point in time you are left with a scrap board and a steel case. Pitch the board and save the steel.
I think that's about it. Feel free to PM me if you have any questions.
Cheers!
Tom |
Take this job and shove it. I don't want to work here no more... |
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simplicitycounts
Penny Hoarding Member
USA
535 Posts |
Posted - 07/07/2008 : 09:43:13
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| Minnesota is running a special thing right now where you can haul your computer monitors, tv's, and other electronics in for free. Call your local municipal waste place to see what they charge. Before the state picked up the tab it would cost $5.00 to $25.00 to get rid of a CRT tube. That was not fun. |
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horgad
1000+ Penny Miser Member
USA
1641 Posts |
Posted - 07/07/2008 : 10:17:54
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So basically what you want to save is all of the obvious metal, the wires, the CPU, and the fingers? The rest (plastic case, mother board, cards less fingers, ram less fingers) can be discarded. I assume if space is an issue for some us that just cutting of fingers and keeping the the CPU and maybe some wires would be the way to go?
I am surprised that the boards themselves are not worth keeping, but I don't know much about it... |
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JerrySpringer
Penny Hoarding Member
669 Posts |
Posted - 07/07/2008 : 11:15:12
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I am going to just give away the monitor and hold on to the CPU. Like I said, it is easier to deal with CPU later on. The monitor is a huge space eater.
BTW, that air conditioner is still on the side of the road, visible on my bike rides. I would have thought someone would have picked it up by now as I can not be the only one that sees it. It has been over a month now. Watch, I put the computer monitor on it and come back to see both gone. LOL. |
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tyoon21
Penny Sorter Member
52 Posts |
Posted - 07/07/2008 : 14:05:17
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quote:
Originally posted by horgad
So basically what you want to save is all of the obvious metal, the wires, the CPU, and the fingers? The rest (plastic case, mother board, cards less fingers, ram less fingers) can be discarded. I assume if space is an issue for some us that just cutting of fingers and keeping the the CPU and maybe some wires would be the way to go?
I am surprised that the boards themselves are not worth keeping, but I don't know much about it...
Whoops...
Sorry about that Horgad. The boards are actually worth keeping as well. What I do is get about 10-15 pounds of them and sell them on Ebay. Like everything else they tend to fetch a nice price on Ebay, however the more you have the more likely people are to bid. Shipping is a big issue on Ebay. I like to cram as many as I can into a flat rate shipping box via USPS.
The older boards with the nice gold ribbons are the best. Also anything that comes from military computers are really good. The newer motherboards aren't selling as well as they have figured out how to use less gold more crap metals.
Fingerless RAM does have some value however not that much. The black IC chips contain thin strands of gold however you have to grind them down fairly fine in order to harvest it. I generally just sell them off whole however if you cut the fingers, take a flathead screwdriver and harvest off the IC chips. Once you get a big enough bag of them you can sell the whole thing off.
I also forgot to mention you can if you are really interested harvest silver out of the keyboard. Underneath all the keys is a thin mylar sheet with silver contacts. It's a pain in the ass to harvest and from what I heard it takes roughly about 15 keyboards or so to get a decent size pellet.
Cheers!
Tom |
Take this job and shove it. I don't want to work here no more... |
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tyoon21
Penny Sorter Member
52 Posts |
Posted - 07/07/2008 : 14:07:54
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quote:
Originally posted by JerrySpringer
I am going to just give away the monitor and hold on to the CPU. Like I said, it is easier to deal with CPU later on. The monitor is a huge space eater.
BTW, that air conditioner is still on the side of the road, visible on my bike rides. I would have thought someone would have picked it up by now as I can not be the only one that sees it. It has been over a month now. Watch, I put the computer monitor on it and come back to see both gone. LOL.
JerrySpringer,
If you really want to get down and dirty you can harvest from the monitor. There is a copper yoke in there which can fetch a few dollars. HOWEVER....be warned. Inside that monitor is a bunch of lead particles which can be hazardous to your health. Also, there is a nasty capacitor in there which can deliver quite the shock.
I tend to give monitors away to a recycling center. If you go on youtube and type in monitor recycling you can see some really neat stuff about it.
Cheers,
Tom |
Take this job and shove it. I don't want to work here no more... |
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n/a
deleted
110 Posts |
Posted - 07/08/2008 : 00:26:42
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Tyoon,
Good info. I do it a little different though, to save a little time. The recycling center I use pays for any computer circuit boards. They currently are paying about .65/lb. This includes the mother boards, ram, etc. As for the power supplies, disk drives, etc, they consider these low volume electric motors, which they are paying roughly .15/lb. So if someone wants to save time, effort, they can just sell to a recycling center as is. |
24 Empty Missile Tubes, A Giant Mushroom Cloud....It's Miller Time!!! |
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JerrySpringer
Penny Hoarding Member
669 Posts |
Posted - 07/08/2008 : 00:40:39
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| Thanks for the replies on this topic. I never really knew/thought that the constituent materials in the CPU and monitor were such a salvage bonanza. If you have the space, time and patience, it could be a lucrative side thing to pick up junk computers. I'd do stuff like that more often if I had the resources. I pretty much only utilize my salvage search time by bicycle riding to pick up recyclable cans and bottles from the side of the road. I live a deposit state and each container gets 5 cents (tax-free, lol). I do that in conjunction with my trips to the bank from coin pick-ups and dumps. I decided early that if I want to collect copper, I'll need to use a bicycle to do it with. Too much money would be spent on gasoline if I used my car for this and I am getting some good exercise. I try to view the exercise as the real driver for all this too. I may never see a huge gain from the coins I am collecting but it is great being outside on these summer days and not caring about fueling up a gas tank or stop and go traffic woes. |
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tyoon21
Penny Sorter Member
52 Posts |
Posted - 07/08/2008 : 08:45:50
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quote:
Originally posted by USNavySubSailor
Tyoon,
Good info. I do it a little different though, to save a little time. The recycling center I use pays for any computer circuit boards. They currently are paying about .65/lb. This includes the mother boards, ram, etc. As for the power supplies, disk drives, etc, they consider these low volume electric motors, which they are paying roughly .15/lb. So if someone wants to save time, effort, they can just sell to a recycling center as is.
Thanks Subsailor!
That's awesome that your recycling center will pay for boards, disk drives, and such. I have a large stack of power supplies that I am getting tired of stripping them down. I sold a small lot of CD ROM drives, I think 8 of them in all for a grand total of 99 cents...
I need to start calling around again to see if these yards in my area will take this stuff. It would greatly simplify things.
Cheers,
Tom |
Take this job and shove it. I don't want to work here no more... |
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simplicitycounts
Penny Hoarding Member
USA
535 Posts |
Posted - 07/10/2008 : 01:23:47
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| My scrapyard in MN just started taking lowgrade boards at .03 a pound, and high grade boards at .50 a pound last summer. They got interested in it because of the large number of empty towers I was hauling in. I told them about the guy in PA that pays for the boards, and they found their own broker for them. Previously they had to pay to dispose of the boards people would sneak in on steel scrap. |
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horgad
1000+ Penny Miser Member
USA
1641 Posts |
Posted - 08/14/2008 : 07:17:52
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"Now comes the power supply. There are two ways to approach this. Most of us will cut the power cord and other wires for copper then scrap the power supply as steel."
Tom or anybody,
I cut apart all the wires in a computer and the metal strands are not copper colored. Do you separate wire by copper and not copper and are insulated non copper wires worth saving?
Thanks
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natsb88
Administrator
USA
1850 Posts |
Posted - 08/14/2008 : 09:36:36
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quote:
Originally posted by horgad
"Now comes the power supply. There are two ways to approach this. Most of us will cut the power cord and other wires for copper then scrap the power supply as steel."
Tom or anybody,
I cut apart all the wires in a computer and the metal strands are not copper colored. Do you separate wire by copper and not copper and are insulated non copper wires worth saving?
Thanks
I noticed some like that as well, but they took them all as 50/50 insulated copper. I don't know if they're tinned or plated or actually aluminum, but they didn't seem to care. Maybe I just got lucky. |
Nate
The Copper Cave
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n/a
deleted
91 Posts |
Posted - 08/14/2008 : 11:07:50
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same here, they generally dont even look to close.
I actually save my power supply's for working on in the colder weather. Some yards actually will give electric motor prices on them. |
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n/a
deleted
91 Posts |
Posted - 08/14/2008 : 18:03:39
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picked up a lot of computers today
27 laptops
150 monitors
185 pc's
10 "server equipment"
50+ high end laser copiers
lots of misc
altogether 12 pallets for the low cost of free
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WheatieFan
Penny Pincher Member
USA
106 Posts |
Posted - 08/14/2008 : 22:37:33
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quote:
Originally posted by horgad
I cut apart all the wires in a computer and the metal strands are not copper colored. Do you separate wire by copper and not copper and are insulated non copper wires worth saving?
IME, all of the wires coming out of the power supply are copper. If they don't look it, it's because they are plated with tin. My scrapyard doesn't care. They go right with the electrical cords and other copper wire. Same with cat5.
Ribbon wires and parallel, scsi, are a different story. I don't have any takers for ribbon wire, but haven't looked too hard. Multistranded wires like scsi, parallel, and the monitor cables that have 25+ wires in them are copper, but may be separated into a lower grade. I used to sneak one or two into the regular wire, but now separate them and get a "lo grade copper wire" price.
Keep in mind that although there are standards, all yards are different. If you have a lot of low grade wire, you might be better off selling to a place that calls it all #2 insulated for a lower price than separating it out to a place with higher prices.
WheatieFan
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horgad
1000+ Penny Miser Member
USA
1641 Posts |
Posted - 08/15/2008 : 07:06:49
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| Thanks. Good news...into the copper wire pile it goes. |
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tyoon21
Penny Sorter Member
52 Posts |
Posted - 08/15/2008 : 21:30:01
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quote:
Originally posted by horgad
"Now comes the power supply. There are two ways to approach this. Most of us will cut the power cord and other wires for copper then scrap the power supply as steel."
Tom or anybody,
I cut apart all the wires in a computer and the metal strands are not copper colored. Do you separate wire by copper and not copper and are insulated non copper wires worth saving?
Thanks
Horgad,
I was curious about this too and posted a thread on this earlier. Seems to be that the wires are copper with a tin coating. Either which way, I haven't had trouble selling these as coppper wire to the yard.
I am surprised though that yards are not allowing ribbon and SCSI with the other wires.
I am curious about the 9V power cord. After cutting the ends off do you keep these separate or mix them in with the other wires?
Cheers!
Tom |
Take this job and shove it. I don't want to work here no more... |
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n/a
deleted
91 Posts |
Posted - 08/15/2008 : 21:54:57
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| my yard accepts the ribbon and scsi as #2 insulated and we also do not have to remove any of the ends on any of our wire. |
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n/a
deleted
110 Posts |
Posted - 08/17/2008 : 12:08:50
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| My yard accepts ribbon and scsi as #2 also. If it's #2, it all goes into the same pile. Including power cords, etc. |
24 Empty Missile Tubes, A Giant Mushroom Cloud....It's Miller Time!!! |
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Gr33nday43
New Member
Uzbekistan
10 Posts |
Posted - 08/17/2008 : 15:57:38
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| If anyone can't sell this...I will happily pay for motherboards, cpus, ram etc. Basically anything with gold in them. Go out and find some computers, and sell the components to me! I recover the gold, and refine it. I can also refine your gold for you, and return the gold for a small fee. |
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Recycling computers
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