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However, there are charities which specifically reuse and distribute old (but not too old) computers. I'm thinking of groups like this which make sure the computers are working, install Linux on them, and give them away. They also do repairs on those computers so they keep lots of spare parts around. I see that the ACCRC specifically gives out computers with "at least 1.7GHz processors and 1GB RAM" so 2006 era systems should be fine.

Find a group like that and the GP is set.

If you go to Weird Stuff Warehouse in Silicon Valley, you can get enough cheap previous-generation stuff to build a data center.

• 1U rackmount servers, $50. Working, just obsolete by a few years.
• Rack-mount networking gear. Working, just about 1/4 the density of current gear, and 100Mb/s, not gigabit Ethernet.
• Rockwell 12-channel GPS module, $8.95. Nothing wrong with it, it's just 71mm across, which is huge by mobile standards. Good time standard.

That's all working stuff, not junk. It's kind of depressing. Most of the gear there was valuable only a few years ago.

There's a service in Oakland CA which takes discarded desktop systems. They check them out, try some board swaps to get them to work, clean them up, build them up to a minimally usable standard, wipe the hard drives, install Ubuntu Linux, and send them out to schools that need computers. That's about as good as recycling seems to get.

And around the Bay we have the Alameda County Computer Resource Center. They build computers to give away to folks in need, to "narrow the digital divide."

One of the best places is ACCRC. Usable stuff is refurbished for charity organizations, schools, etc. and the rest is handled responsibly and locally by ECS Refining in Santa Clara

Unlike the "normal" e-waste companies who take hardware and ship it Chindifrica to places where kids melt components off PCBs over an open fire, ACCRC actually does it right.

My God, has it really been 5 Thanksgivings since I wrote my Alice's Restaurant parody in response to a comment on a Slashdot post on "Whose Burden is it to Recycle Computers?" when the CA law came out.

The punchline to the joke is that less than two years after I wrote it, life imitated art. Officer Obie really did have a problem when someone took a big pile of garbage and turned it into something that a school could use, and it was only through the dumb luck of blind justice that the Judge didn't see it that way.

I've never had to pay a dime to ACCRC, but whenever I make a dropoff, I've always tossed a few bucks in as a donation, because I know that anything useful will get used - if not at a school, at least in an art project, and the rest will be disposed of of safely and responsibly.

So we'll sing it again when it comes around on the guitar.

"Reuse any hardware you want from Natalie's Restaurant,
(excepting drives with .JPGs of Natalie)
Reuse any hardware you want from Natalie's Restaurant,
Monitors, just around the back,
Just a half a mile from the railroad track,
And you can get any grits you want at Natalie's Restaurant."

Do de do, dee de doo de doo...

One of the best places is ACCRC. Usable stuff is refurbished for charity organizations, schools, etc. and the rest is handled responsibly and locally by ECS Refining in Santa Clara. Small fees are charged since this isn't as cheap/profitable as sending it overseas. But in the past they've taken stuff for free on Earth Day (April 22) so I save my small circuit boards and cables till then. The bottom line: do your own research. Especially if a recycler is eager to take anything and everything for free.

'This trade has become a thriving business. Companies called "fake recyclers" approach well-meaning organizations -- charities, churches, and community organizations -- and offer to hold a Recycling Day. The charity provides publicity, legitimacy, and a parking lot for the event. On the designated day, well-meaning residents

...who figure that one big pile of garbage is better than two little piles of garbage, bring in perfectly-functional equipment and sing it with me the next time it comes around on the guitar.

You can get anything you want at Natalie's Restaurant. (The punchline, half a decade later, is that the 21" CRT I salvaged from a dumpster still works, yet I've gone through one LCD monitor due to a failed inverter and a lack of easily-available spare parts since then.)

The only thing I've noticed in the five years since I wrote that parody is that it's getting increasingly hard to find surplus equipment these days. Product lifecycles are shorter, so consumption isn't reduced. It's sure as hell not getting reused. And it's only getting "recycled" in the sense that it's being dumped into the homes of people so poor that they melt solder off printed circuit boards over an open pit fire.

Recycling hardware for which you have no further use is a good idea, but if you're going to recycle your old electronics, do some research and find an organization that's doing it right. ACCRC turns the scrappy scrap into scrap, turns the interesting scrap into art, and the non-scrap into computers that go directly to people in its own neighborhood.

Donate to ACCRC. A recycling shop run by Linux geeks.

. I suspect there is more stuff packed into closets, garage, and rafters. I know there is vintage 50s and 60s electronics and test equipment out there somewhere, though I haven't seen it since I was a kid. And I think there's also stacks of obsolete laptop computers and luggables, which were probably already obsolete when he started buying them as surplus and now are doubly obsolete.

Where you wanna go is the Electronics Flea Market in Cupertino.

...as a seller, not a buyer. Talk to whoever walks up, even if you end up giving most of the stuff away, you'll also get an idea as to what, if anything, is worth charging for. (But don't let Dad go. He will buy as much as he sells ;)

Haul it to the Flea Market, and whatever people don't buy (or take for free :), that you can send to the recyclers. (I use ACCRC for my recycling needs, on account of they'll not only recycle the dreck, they'll probably find a cool use for any interesting/vintage parts that happen to show up... or even just build a skull out of old PC motherboards and flat panel displays.)

We have an excellent organization in the San Francisco Bay Area http://www.accrc.org/ run by a bunch of Linux geeks that takes anything you can plug in and finds the best use for it. I've always donated in person as I live just a few miles away, but their web site has info for out-of-state donations.

Donate your stuff.

• FreeCycle
• Computer Recycling Center
• Alameda County Computer Resource Center
• Goodwill
• Salvation Army

Also, check out your city's or county's website. They may have local programs for recycling old hardware.

Oh, yeah, you could also donate all your stuff to me.... :)

I went on Tuesday to a recycling place. I gave them my monitor, they took $10. That's $1/year on the monitor. Not bad considering the original cost. Don't balk at the cost. If you can afford a system, you can afford to pay someone to recycle it.

On Fridays, Californians get to recycle monitors and TVs for free*. And computers are $5 all the time. Laptops are free.

Here's the ACCRC pricelist in Berkeley.

In one of those oddities of California legislation, they have mandated that Fridays are free (recycling companies get reimbursed by the state on those days, I believe) for monitors.

"In compliance with SB-20/SB-50 you may bring in up to 5 monitors, TVs or Console TVs on Fridays for no charge. There is some paperwork to fill out and you must be a California Resident. Please bring California ID."

http://www.accrc.org/what.html

That's for alameda county, but the program is statewide, so there's certainly a place close to you.

One of those nice googling accidents brought me to the Almeda County Computer Resource Center, where computer recycling for non-profit is already in full swing, and I've counted at least two major efforts in my own state plus another australia-wide organization.

It seems that old puters + Linux for recycling is good business these days

Open Letter to SCO

Dear Sirs:

It has come to my attention that you claim certain intellectual properties involved in the UNIX operating system and that you intend to prosecute those who violate those claims.

To be more specific you claim that Gnu/Linux is a derivative of your Unix IP and as such is your IP. After extensive research on my own part and reviewing the considered opinions of those in the field of IP litigation I have concluded to my own satisfaction that your position consists of bullpuckey.

As such I feel I should bring my company to your attention. My name is James Burgett and I am the executive director of a not for profit organization called Computer and Technology Resource Center (CATRC). We recycle unwanted equipment and give it to underprivileged people throughout the world.

What I feel should come to your attentions is this: We install Gnu/Linux on over 1200 machines a year and we fully intend to continue. We send said computers to schools, not for profits and underprivileged people throughout the world. We have been doing so for over 3 years and I can safely say that all of them could be classed as "servers". On the basis of your pricing (assuming that our inevitable litigation extends past your discount deadline), my organization owes you at least $ 5,036,400 (5+ million).

We also advocate the further distribution of your alleged IP by other agencies and governments at home and abroad and could quite possibly be held liable for a lot more. (I'm sure you can come up with a price for this.) We have also assembled many multi processor systems (By the way, what is your price for multiprocessor systems?)

So based on an assessment of our operations and your claims. I have concluded the following:

Your ownership of the IP is dubious at best (Novell copyrights, Unix system labs vs. UC Berkeley, distribution of all contested IP by you under the GPL while Caldera,.... etc.)

Your ability to enforce your claims is laughable at best (you would have to deal with Novell's copyrights before you can sue anybody, then demonstrate that you did not release said IP as your Linux distribution and last that you have the right to those copyrights at all as they seem to violate some of IBM's patents. This combined with the fact that your lead attorney seems to be under investigation in Florida that may lead to his disbarment leads me to the conclusion that you are not a credible threat.

Your only redeeming feature is your histrionic and ill-conceived rants, which admittedly have an enviable ability to generate press.

As you represent no threat and can only bring us press, I humbly request that you use us in your act of corporate self-destruction.

If you choose not to sue us I should inform you that I have been consulting with my attorneys about options for initiating lawsuits against you based on some of the fallacious claims made by you about operations such as ours that use Gnu/Linux. You have made direct accusations about Gnu/Linux and its users that could only be construed as accusations of theft.

As I am not a thief and find your accusations harmful from both a personal and corporate standpoint I demand that you immediately cease and desist from your unsubstantiated statements or face litigation.

In conclusion let me thank you for this wonderful opportunity to promote our message on your dime and fully expect to be giving away what you claim is your IP long after your company is dead and gone.

Yours sincerely:

James Burgett

Executive Director

Computer and Technology Resource Center

Primary website: www.accrc.org

email james@accrc.org

Other problem is receiving. It's needed another ngo to receive (to don't pay taxes/customs for it) and it needs to be in a city with a major dock (in Brazil there is about 4 cities like that) to receive the computers. And distributing may also be a problem, like having contact with other NGOs in the country not just those in your city.

In Brazil I know two NGOs that recycle computers:
* CDI - but they use only windows (have a contract with microsoft), have some burocracy to give the computers to NGOs (like use only windows and need someone 40hours/week dedicated to computer courses) and often trow useful parts away (because can't use windows with them).
* MetaReciclagem - they use linux, have a nice structure but aren't national (altought it's located on a huge city that can absorb any amount of computers sent to them)

In US i know ACCRC - they use linux, i know they have sent computers abroad, but until what i know just to political organizations that eventually redistribute them (don't know if you have something against that)

Sending complete computers is expensive, although it's not very expensive to send small valuable parts, like you can send several memory modules or one motherboard with processor, or even harddisk and pay U$6. Use the usps site to calculate (and use Economy Letter Post).
It may look it don't worth to pay that much, but here hardware is more expensive, like, an used 1gb hard disk would cost no less than 25-30U$.

In my particular case I'm volunteer on a small NGO here in Brazil and we use some computers for teaching (in fact 4, we don't have room for more). They have low memory (32MB), so sometimes is boring wait for openoffice and other software loads. They also have 2 free slots each, so it would be interesting to receive some EDO memory modules, of over 8MB each. If you have many EDO memory modules around and is willing to send them, they're welcome :)

Probably not near the poster of the topic, but folks in the SF Bay Area can check out the Alameda County Computer Resource Center. They were /.'d a couple years back. They won't rebuild you 386, but they will strip it down and recycle everything inside without a single scrap going outside of the US for those purposes.

there is the Alameda County Computer Resource Center. They even have a list of fees that they charge to make sure they can properly dispose of the items. They take many types of electronics, "We want everything you can plug in that you don't put food inside of." They also turn around and provide computers and other things that work or are repaired to schools, charities, non-profits, and disabled folks. So it's a win-win situation, you get rid of your computer parts and they help someone else.

there is the Alameda County Computer Resource Center. They even have a list of fees that they charge to make sure they can properly dispose of the items. They take many types of electronics, "We want everything you can plug in that you don't put food inside of." They also turn around and provide computers and other things that work or are repaired to schools, charities, non-profits, and disabled folks. So it's a win-win situation, you get rid of your computer parts and they help someone else.

ACCRC

Don't forget about FreeGeek in Portland, Oregon and the Alameda County Computer Resource Center. The take donated equipment, recycle some and install Linux on the less antiquated computers for interesting projects and donation to needy individuals.

FreeGeek has an interesting concept: anyone who volunteers for 8 hours can take one of the Linux boxes home and take classes on how to use it.

There's a small profit to be made on scrap and precious metals that can be stripped out of old computers, which is part of the reason these non-profit organizations can sustain themselves. They don't charge for computer donations, but monitors are such a pain and hazard to dispose of properly there's a fee involved.

If anyone wants to start up something similar in Seattle, email my username at my homepage domain.

Anyone know of any tech jobs in Cuba?

According to the ACCRC, an organization that tries to ship refurbished computers to less advanced countries, it's illegal to for a Cuban citizen to own a computer.

The Alameda County Computer Resource Center in Oakland doesn't just recycle old computers (and none of that China dumping shit either), but provides hardware to many organizations and individuals who otherwise would go without.

If you're local, they're definitely worth your time, your old hardware, and your money.

Its too bad the Merc was too busy spreading the bad news to spread a little good news as well.

Alameda Country Computer Resource Center is an excellent program, about 30 minutes from the Mercury's office, recycles and reuses, and installs Linux on much of what passes through their doors, and ships what they can't use to a special facility in Canada where it is smelted for valuable ores. (and no it doesn't get dumped in Canada, they have stricter laws about that kind of thing then we do)

Also they only charge $10 for computer drop off not $30, and accept a number of items for free. They publish a schedule of fees on their website.

Its too bad the Merc was too busy spreading the bad news to spread a little good news as well.

Alameda Country Computer Resource Center is an excellent program, about 30 minutes from the Mercury's office, recycles and reuses, and installs Linux on much of what passes through their doors, and ships what they can't use to a special facility in Canada where it is smelted for valuable ores. (and no it doesn't get dumped in Canada, they have stricter laws about that kind of thing then we do)

Also they only charge $10 for computer drop off not $30, and accept a number of items for free. They publish a schedule of fees on their website.

Speaking as someone involved in the project: trust me, these organizations do plenty to help "our own" as well. Check out www.accrc.org to see how most of our refurbished equipment is used, or better yet, come down and help!

Yeah, we collaborated heavily with the freegeek project, and many of the computers being shipped down were set up by them. We worked out of the accrc, which is a cool non-profit in the SF Bay Area. They also set up lots of Linux computers to donate to low-income families and the disabled. If you want to get involved, show up, or if you want to help, we can always use more ram or monetary doations.

Don't throw out your computer! Donate it and give it new life, or at least recycle it, since it's a hazardous waste.

Regarding the boxes. They are all donated either to ACCRC in Oakland or FreeGeek in Portland. We spent the last several weeks going through all the old lower end boxes they had and trying to make workable boxes out of them. Because we were getting together 235 computers we lowered our standards from what ACCRC or FreeGeek normally will send out. The boxes range from 100 mhz to 333mhz P I's and II's. Our goal at accrc was to get 64 megs of ram but freegeek doesn't have quite the resources that accrc gets from the bay area so they used 8meg edo simm's which means the box only gets 32megs total. All of the boxes have NIC cards, 1 gig or better hard drives, and a video card. There were sound cards in a bunch of them but we didn't have the time to go through and configure them. The same goes for modems, we actually tried to add modems but if kudzu didn't find it we just left it in there unconfigured and moved on to the next box.

The final setup we used was based on a netinstall / net boot system that the freegeek folks have put together called lessdisks. After a little pain recompiling the kernels to make sure we had support for all the random ethernet cards we got the install process really streamlined. We'd make sure the box had a hard drive, ram, video, and ethernet. Then we'd pop in the netinstall disk. It boot up using grub and our kernel would just nfs mount from a local server. Everything else was pulled over the network. We had scripts for formatting the hard drives which just set everything up with boot, swap, and one big main partition. On the server we had a clone of a server which was used as the base for each install. After everything was copied over we ran a bunch of scripts which tried to detect all the hardware. We then had like 4 questions which we need to answer on each box to detect the sound card, video for x, and mouse. This process made doing a couple hundred installs MUCH easier. Because we were finishing up the software configuration at the same time as we were rolling out boxes we have another option in the lessdisks install to do an rsync update. This let us fiddle with the spanish configuration and setup until two days before we packed everything up on palettes.

We used ICE for the window manager, Rox as a desktop, and KOffice for the basic apps. KDE, Gnome, StarOffice, and Mozilla were all way to bloated for this class of machine.

If you're in the Bay Area or Portland and are interested we will be working on sending more shipments of computers to south america in a few months. Please send me an email, evan at indymedia.org if you want to be notified when we start.

Go to ACCRC where they take old computer parts and recycle them around the world. They are a full linux house as well.

Odds are good that if you're anywhere near a metropolitan area, there's a place that will recycle your old PC. Further, in many states it's illegal to just throw an old PC out on the curb. It's not only your ethical duty, it's your legal obligation to make sure this stuff doesn't wind up landfilled.

There's several good resources on the net to help locate computer recycling centers. My favorite though, by far, are the good folks at the Alameda County Computer Recycling Center. The only bad thing I can say about them is that their front page won't render under Netscape 4.7 because of bad table code.

If you're looking for a list, there's a good one buried in the shitty graphics at this site.

No problem. Don't forget the gatorade.html broken links, though. BTW that gatorade.html page is a riot.

Well, i've been working at the ACCRC For over a year and a half now. It's a terrific place. Most of our volunteers come from the homeless shelter next to our building. It's amazing how much people can leanr when they're immersed in technology so completely.

A couple of answers to previously proposed questions. The Athlon 850's and motherboards for them were graciously donated by AMD for use in our cluster. They also gave us a good deal of PC100 dimms to help us expand the cluster. 3Com donated all of our switches and ethernet cards.

Microsoft has never contacted us, nor are they likely to. I find it highly unlikely that they would attempt to shut us down because we distribute Linux. SuSe Gave us 30,000 boxed copies of 7.0 in its various incarnations, and this is the OS we distribute. We'd love to get any other distributions we could, but for now, we will use SuSe because we have a buttload of it.

Now, some related links! Webcams In the Ministry of Truth, AKA the media lab at the ACCRC.

Buy Shit from the ACCRC here. Extremely disorganized, just like the warehouse is.

Anyone in the bay area is invited to come by and check us out. We are open from 10-5 weekdays and 12-5 saturdays. We invite anyone to volunteer, no matter what your skill level is. Also, if you would like to send us your equipment for a donation and a tax write-off, send it to our street address, not our post office box.

Thank you ve5ry much for all your enthusiasm. We need volunteers badly! Volunteers get digging rights!!!!

Well, i've been working at the ACCRC For over a year and a half now. It's a terrific place. Most of our volunteers come from the homeless shelter next to our building. It's amazing how much people can leanr when they're immersed in technology so completely.

A couple of answers to previously proposed questions. The Athlon 850's and motherboards for them were graciously donated by AMD for use in our cluster. They also gave us a good deal of PC100 dimms to help us expand the cluster. 3Com donated all of our switches and ethernet cards.

Microsoft has never contacted us, nor are they likely to. I find it highly unlikely that they would attempt to shut us down because we distribute Linux. SuSe Gave us 30,000 boxed copies of 7.0 in its various incarnations, and this is the OS we distribute. We'd love to get any other distributions we could, but for now, we will use SuSe because we have a buttload of it.

Now, some related links! Webcams In the Ministry of Truth, AKA the media lab at the ACCRC.

Buy Shit from the ACCRC here. Extremely disorganized, just like the warehouse is.

Anyone in the bay area is invited to come by and check us out. We are open from 10-5 weekdays and 12-5 saturdays. We invite anyone to volunteer, no matter what your skill level is. Also, if you would like to send us your equipment for a donation and a tax write-off, send it to our street address, not our post office box.

Thank you ve5ry much for all your enthusiasm. We need volunteers badly! Volunteers get digging rights!!!!

I found this page in there:
Gatorade is a bad neighbour.

Warn customers that acquiring the PC "naked" exposes them to the possibility of unwittingly purchasing pirated software. Explain the risks: technical troubles, upgrade problems, viruses and the law. Politely decline to expose your buyers or their businesses to such troubles.

Three cheers to this group and their efforts to promote Linux. I hope they convert many people to the Power that is Linux. This article has impressed me so much that I'm going to donate towards this scheme: It's a hell of a lot better than paying the annual M$ tax. Cheer's to an organisation that is 100% Microsoft Free

There site navigation is totally borked so here are all the links on the site I could find:
Home
About
Donations
Internships
Press

There site navigation is totally borked so here are all the links on the site I could find:
Home
About
Donations
Internships
Press

There site navigation is totally borked so here are all the links on the site I could find:
Home
About
Donations
Internships
Press

There site navigation is totally borked so here are all the links on the site I could find:
Home
About
Donations
Internships
Press

There site navigation is totally borked so here are all the links on the site I could find:
Home
About
Donations
Internships
Press

There site navigation is totally borked so here are all the links on the site I could find:
Home
About
Donations
Internships
Press

There site navigation is totally borked so here are all the links on the site I could find:
Home
About
Donations
Internships
Press

I like these guys:
ACCRC. They take in old computers, strip them down to components, rebuild working computers out of them, put Linux on them and give them to the needy. If only they were not in California...

They take everything, working or not (though, due to toxic regulations, they charge $10 to take monitors).

They work out of a huge warehouse in Oakland and rebuild what they can and donate it to schools, developing countries, etc. What they can't fix, they recycle.

They are apparently even building a Beowolf cluster from donated PCs.