Old PC's--Anything Worth Salvaging?

[Major Tom]

Some electronics experimenters repurpose the PSU's as power supplies for their workbenches.

 

[Al18]

I think there’s still demand for old computers. There’s still a lot of programs, especially games that will not run on newer computers. Retro gaming is a big thing, especially running on old CRT monitors.

 

[jim584672]

I used to use old PCs as Internet firewalls, running off of streamlined Linux software. It was a pretty handy use for them. But at some point, the age of the hardware made them rather inefficient to run (from an electricity standpoint).

Nowadays, if the older hardware isn't capable of running a Linux distro as a backup PC (occasional need for DW), the hard drive gets thoroughly erased, and the hardware gets dropped off for electronic recycle.

The latter has worked well as I am now getting comfortable with Linux, especially for online account accessing. I figure once Windows 10 is EOL, that will be my last Windows PC, and it will be retained to run certain Windows applications I am unable to find Linux replacements for.

Finding a way to run software like TurboTax in the future is going to be a challenge when they eliminate Windows 10 as an option, as they did for Windows 7 several years back.

I run Windows in a virtual machine using QEMU so I can use tax software. Virtualbox is another option but is less performant, QEMU is more complicated but faster.

 

[statsman]

I run Windows in a virtual machine using QEMU so I can use tax software. Virtualbox is another option but is less performant, QEMU is more complicated but faster.

Good information for future PC builds. Thanks.

EDIT: On the other hand, if future TurboTax requires Windows 11 or more recent, that's going to be a problem if I don't have a Windows 11 license.

 

[Sunset]

Funny - on Monday I just stripped three old units - two Dells running Windows 7 and one Emachine Vista. Ended up keeping a couple neat looking finned aluminum heat sinks from the CPUs, 4 4Gb ram sticks and two hard drives. We found that B*st B*y accepts electronic waste for recycling - free.

Would like to screen and pull data and pictures from the two 1 and 2Tb disk-type hard drives and transfer same to our two new-to-us SSD Lenovo Tiny Thinkcentres. Have a cable that goes from the HDs to a USB port on the Lenovo, but I can't open the data files or even see them. Scared I'll wipe out the Windows 10 on the Lenovos or over-write them if I go into Bios. Can anyone suggest how I can do this - freebie software?

BTW - the Tiny is just about exactly 1/8 the physical size of the old Lenovos and thus way easier to move north and south when we snowbird away.

When I put old HD in my desktop I put them inside. I would basically plug the HD's (one at a time) into the current computer as extra drives (not boot drives) and boot up normally.

Do the HD's require a power connection as well as a data connection ? My very old HD's are like that.

If that's not the issue, can you see any files on the HD's at all ?

Since you are using a usb cable, I use something similar to this for my external old HD's (but don't wave it around that this idiot. )

 

[jim584672]

Good information for future PC builds. Thanks.

EDIT: On the other hand, if future TurboTax requires Windows 11 or more recent, that's going to be a problem if I don't have a Windows 11 license.

I doubt that would be a requirement at least for a few more years.

 

[Fermion]

Some of the older pentium chips had about $50 of actual gold in them.

 

[rk911]

my BIL passed away in 2021. while my wife and I were sorting thru his "stuff" (he was a prolific hoarder) I found half-a-dozen old laptops. I harvested the hard drives, a number of thumb drives and assorted cables. later, I looked at each hard drive for whatever data might be useful (he was really into family geneology). i consolidated those files onto an unused drive on my system, wiped and formatted the harvested drives, kept a a few that were >= 1TB and sold the rest.

 

[calmloki]

When I put old HD in my desktop I put them inside. I would basically plug the HD's (one at a time) into the current computer as extra drives (not boot drives) and boot up normally.

Do the HD's require a power connection as well as a data connection ? My very old HD's are like that.

If that's not the issue, can you see any files on the HD's at all ?

Since you are using a usb cable, I use something similar to this for my external old HD's (but don't wave it around that this idiot. )

The Tinys use NVME SSD hard drives - darn things are smaller than the RAM sticks I saved. In the past I have plugged in extra hard drives internally to desktop machines and accessed them just fine - in this case I want to keep the speed up and the old SATA HDs are about a third the size of the Tinys. I have a cable that goes from USB to power/data on the old HD, providing spin power and a data path. I'm not seeing individual files.

 

[SecondAttempt]

Another thought is to donate old stuff to schools. Many have very old equipment they try to keep running so even old video and sound cards might be useful to them.

 

[Qs Laptop]

Some of the older pentium chips had about $50 of actual gold in them.

As a former semiconductor fabrication engineer, I seriously doubt that.

 

[Qs Laptop]

When I put old HD in my desktop I put them inside. I would basically plug the HD's (one at a time) into the current computer as extra drives (not boot drives) and boot up normally.

I had considered doing this as well. But I'm not sure the power supply wiring is compatible with the older IDE drives.

Since you are using a usb cable, I use something similar to this for my external old HD's (but don't wave it around that this idiot. )

This could be the ticket for reading old hard drives. I suppose you could also read DVD/CD drives as well.

 

[jollystomper]

Another thought is to donate old stuff to schools. Many have very old equipment they try to keep running so even old video and sound cards might be useful to them.

My experience has been that, in last 5-6 years this does not really happen anymore. More and more schools have moved to laptops, notebooks, or chromebooks for students, and the servers are provided by competing entities who want to "claim" the school as a client Very few will accept donated stuff. They also do not have the staff to manage and track donated inventory.

The additional issue is finding drivers for old cards in current operating systems.

 

[Time2]

You could collect them like this young guy. Connor Krukosky brought an IBM z890 main frame computer home. After some home modification got it into his parents basement. It's a fun story, he starts out a little nervous, but it is really fun.

 

[jollystomper]

You could collect them like this young guy. Connor Krukosky brought an IBM z890 main frame computer home. After some home modification got it into his parents basement. It's a fun story, he starts out a little nervous, but it is really fun.

I was actually at the user group conference when he presented. It was a lot of fun.

 

[target2019]

I'm a homebrew PC builder so I hate to throw components away.

I've got a couple of old Dell computers that were running Windows XP. They were middle of the road machines, had separate video and sound cards, expanded memory, CD-ROM drives, etc.

I can't think of anything to salvage. The memory sticks are of low capacity and too slow and incompatible with anything of recent vintage. The CD-ROM's are obsolete. The video boards are laughably anemic. Sound boards don't change much but onboard sound is more than adequate on new machines. The power supplies are likely 400 watts or less and probably not compatible with newer motherboards.

Other than keeping the hard drives, is there anything in these old boxes that would be worthwhile saving?

I still have shelves loaded with spare parts from my business days.

I look at the power supply, cables, drives, memory. Any adapters for multiple connections? If it's something I might use, then I put it on the shelf, and throw away anything more ancient.

As you say, the video and network adapters are useless for most people now.

 

[Fermion]

As a former semiconductor fabrication engineer, I seriously doubt that.

I was a little off. The pentium pro has 0.55 grams of gold in it.

At current $60.32 per gram price of gold, that is $33.17 worth of gold.

 

[brett]

Still running my 13 year old desktop. Replaced a hard drive, upgraded to 10, and bought a 27 inch monitor. It works fine for what I use it for. When the hard disk went I thought of upgrading to a new unit. Glad that I did not.

We switched to ipads for travel and for portable home devices. Our 13 year old notebook is sitting on a shelf somewhere.

 

[CRLLS]

I watched the video. He is a good speaker. To be fair about the value of old computers, he paid $0.001 (0.1 cents) on the dollar for the mainframe setup. It is not a wise financial path to buy new. I remember my first of 20MB HD (That's "M" not "G" or "T") was >$200, as was the going price for my 640KB of RAM.

 

[Qs Laptop]

I was a little off. The pentium pro has 0.55 grams of gold in it.

At current $60.32 per gram price of gold, that is $33.17 worth of gold.

Wow, that is more than I thought it would be. Of course, when we were reclaiming gold from the wafer fab process, gold was much cheaper.

 

[Qs Laptop]

I did some Googling and was kind of surprised that there is a niche group of people that are into Windows XP computers from the early 2000's. It turns out I could sell my video cards for anywhere from $12.99 (eBay) to $71 (Amazon and elsewhere.) I could sell my memory sticks for $10 a piece. I could even sell the complete Dell Dimension PC for about $100.

But there are many sellers of these items and the time and hassle involved would not be worth it, IMO.

I did purchase one of those IDE/SATA hard drive to USB converters, but not the one in the YouTube video as it is out of stock. So I'm going to remove the hard drives from these old Dell's and recycle the rest of the computers.

 

[target2019]

I have a Sabrent USB 3.0 chassis for 3.5 and 2.5 drives. One of the more useful purchases for sure.

 

[jollystomper]

I was a little off. The pentium pro has 0.55 grams of gold in it.

At current $60.32 per gram price of gold, that is $33.17 worth of gold.

Thanks for the video - I did not realize I still have 2 of the processors mentioned. A little more ammunition when I go to the recycling center .

 

[JohnRM]

Old computers

I remember a few decades ago my dad and I bought several external 1200 baud modems out of a tub skid at the Boeing Surplus store in Kent Wa. - not there anymore, sadly. We bought extras in case some did not work. It was a big upgrade from 300 baud. Now of course that's obsolete, but if we still had them there are collectors that would love to have that, or the punched card based calculator my dad used at work for a time. I guess these windows 10 machines won't be collectible because they are so boring, but who knows.

 

[FIREarly]

I'm a homebrew PC builder so I hate to throw components away.

I've got a couple of old Dell computers that were running Windows XP. They were middle of the road machines, had separate video and sound cards, expanded memory, CD-ROM drives, etc.

I can't think of anything to salvage. The memory sticks are of low capacity and too slow and incompatible with anything of recent vintage. The CD-ROM's are obsolete. The video boards are laughably anemic. Sound boards don't change much but onboard sound is more than adequate on new machines. The power supplies are likely 400 watts or less and probably not compatible with newer motherboards.

Other than keeping the hard drives, is there anything in these old boxes that would be worthwhile saving?

How about migrating your old computers into Chrome OS! It takes way less memory and hardware (cloud based) and will speed up the computers.

All you need is a flash drive, your old computer(s), and an internet connection.

Love the vlogged below:

https://youtu.be/uAD0-3BltHk