Obsolete Hardware Piling Up

loosenut writes: "The SF Chronicle has a lengthy article about the disposal or recycling of old computers, many with toxic components. If you are like me, you probably have a couple of 486s and Pentiums sitting in a closet somewhere. What is to become of these ancient beasts?" Read to the end of the article and it notes that Europe is planning to force manufacturers to recycle their products at the end of the product's lifespan.

Comments

Is it really worth keeping old hardware in use?

[Tord]

I see all these comments on how it's a waste to throw away or recycle old hardware and how even the oldest machines can be configured to handle certain tasks, but I just keep thinking if it's really worth it.

If you send away an old computer to a school they might initially do a small saving compared to buy new equipment, but in the long run I believe the school will suffer enormously from having a diverse range of out of date hardware. The service costs must get enormous since all computers are very different and old parts keeps breaking down and have to be replaced so things will have to be reinstalled. All computers will also have to be configured individually since some are too old and slow to run the same OS and programs as the latest ones. I can understand the benefit of a big company donating a large batch of almost identical computers to a school though, but I also believe that donations to schools just are second grade sollutions, government should push in enough money to keep the schools with a healthy machine park since the kids are our future and investing in their knowledge is a good investment. Graciously providing schools with old equipment that is "just enough" might in worst case actually counteract its purpose since it then might get harder for the school to demand money for new equipment.

The second idea of keeping them around as routers and firewalls is also something I see as doubtful in the long run. Compare for example the power consumption of an old 486-66 with a modern dedicated router without any moving parts. Add to that other factors as the likely breakdown frequency, space requirements, noise generation, air flow needs and risks like causing fires due to old dusty hardware that will run very hot if a fan breaks down and I doubt that it's a saving in the long run.

Giving them to schools and institutions in third world countries or just playing with them yourself or giving them to a relative who might need a second word processing computer to use when the kids play on the family's main machine might still be a good idea though, but I doubt many of the suggestions given here.

I'm doing my bit.

[Kris_J]

I'm saving classic Macs from landfill by turning them into aquariums. My little page is here. If anyone in Perth, Australia, is interested in one please drop me a line.

I still haven't found a good way to dispose of the monitors and power supplies though...

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Read the article?

[MonkeyMagic]

Read to the end of the article and it notes that Europe is planning to force manufacturers to recycle their products at the end of the product's lifespan.

This is Slashdot. You'll be lucky if anyone bothers to read the start of the article.

Re:terminals around the house, for the kids

[egjertse]

I've scraped together a load of miscellaneous hardware from closets/drawers around my computer room, and am in the process of turning the resulting P100 system into a home stereo (minus the amplifier that is). Old desktop case is just a plus - fits nicely in the stereorack along with the amplifier. Stuff in a soundcard and a CD-ROM drive (cheap-o thing, no speed needed), and you have a pretty neat CD player.

Add a hard-drive, Linux/BSD and mpg123, and you have an MP3 player.

Add ALMB or similar software, and you have an interface that can be controlled via IR or a small keypad. With LCD displays and keypads from Matrix Orbital you have one mean looking stereo!

PLEASE READ: Your *TIME* + old hardware == smiles!

[aussersterne]

Slashdot readers can do an incredible amount of good in their own community, wherever they are from! Please understand:

Okay, there is some hardware that is unworkable in the Internet age. A 4.77 MHz PC/XT with dual floppies and a green-screen counts as "unworkable" and should be junked.

But a LOT of what is being junked these days are things like VLB 486 machines, low-end Pentiums. They should go to schools, community centers, and churches. I know, there are lots of arguments against this:

1. They are full of old parts and are likely to need lots of repair and maintenance.
   
2. They are too slow to be worth anything.
   
3. Much faster used machines (compared to, say, a 486SX/25) can be had very inexpensively.
   

The answer to all of these questions is YOUR VOLUNTEER TIME as a computer expert. I give my time locally to a number of small computer centers and networks which are not for profit. Here are my answers to the concerns above:

Regarding #1 (Repair and maintenance): Yes, a power supply fails every now and then in "my" networks, or a video card goes bad, or a monitor. But part of what we're talking about is the glut of older hardware. It's not a big deal for a Slashdot user to swap out a power supply, a video card, a monitor -- and older hardware of this type is in ample supply. Yes, a school will have trouble justifying $400 in repairs to get an old 486 PC fixed, but the average Slashdot user can cannibalize three old 486 PCs into one working one that will help 10-20 kids in a matter of 30 minutes or so without needing spare parts or incurring expense. It's a matter of having the correct knowledge to get this older stuff working.

Regarding #2 (Slow): A 486/25 may be too slow to run Internet Explorer 5.5 under Windows 98 for streaming media -- it's true. But put Windows 3.1 and Netscape 3 (you can still download it at Netscape.com) on a 486/25 with 8-16 megabytes of memory and it's about fast enough for WebMail. Stick it in a corner of the community center and write "For E-Mail Only" on the front of it. Donate or get somebody to donate a little of their time to help people learn to use WebMail. Then try telling a little Russian grandmother that's just made contact with her children in Russia for the first time in 15 years that the machine is too slow to be worth anything. She'll tell you that it was worth something to her to have this public e-mail machine there.

Regarding #3 (faster machines for cheap): Cheap is not the same as free. You can tell a school that they shouldn't bother with a stack of 486/66 machines because they can get Pentium II 233 systems for only $100-$200 each. Or you can donate a day and help them get 10 of those 486/66 machines running enough for kids to type a report or two and visit a few simple Web sites -- even if slowly -- costing the school nothing. If they don't have the cash, they don't have the cash. Telling them just how little cash they really need isn't all that helpful.

Here are some examples from my own experience:

A local church wanted to get three computers in a small network for their members to do Web, e-mail, family history and a few other things. They had someone in for an estimate and nearly died. So, they decided to try for just "a computer" (that's right, one) but decided they still couldn't afford it. Over the course of a weekend, I was able to get for them six PCs (mostly 486/66 machines) at $5.00 each from a local university who was basically tossing them. A bunch of 640x480 VGA greyscale monitors were free from the same place. "Useless" was written on top of each of them in black marker. At work, a pile of 10b2 ethernet cards and a bunch of coax had been laying around in a closet for a long time. I asked, and I got them. We booted up the machines, cleared out the cruft and just left Windows 95 behind. Installed the network cards, wired them all up, stuck a 56k modem and Linux and masquerading on the last one and 'ta-da' -- a six user network with basic Web, e-mail and applications. Slow? To me, dog slow. To them, a godsend. They didn't have anything else. One weekend.

Another anecdote: I got wind of the fact that a local government office was paying to have a moving company haul a bunch of 486 and low-end pentium machines out into the desert and smash them to bits because they had depreciated into oblivion. I contacted the agency and was able to get the machines and a bunch of color 640x480 and 800x600 monitors donated. Some of them needed work. Out of about 20 machines, about 11 good ones were assembled, mostly by swapping power supplies, drives, monitors, etc. Took the better part of an afternoon. A local surplus software company donated a bunch of Windows 3.1 and vintage 1995 "multimedia encyclopedias" and other early multimedia titles, including a few storybooks-on-a-CD. The systems went into a local school in a poor neighborhood who only had to foot the bill for a few sets of headphones for the kids. Those kids don't care that the machines won't run Office 2000, Netscape, or Quake II. They're happily using Compton's 1995 and Grolier's 1994 encyclopedias to write reports with Windows Write and print them to an old beat-up HP LaserJet II. All it took was knowledge and time to turn "old junk" magically into "classroom computers." My investment: a Saturday, a few blank floppies, a little sweat and nagging a couple of my friends to come and help out.

Yes, I've returned to both of these places once or twice to make repairs, but it's no problem. I have access to plenty of spare parts and each repair usually only takes an hour or two at the most -- if that long. True, there is no money in these budgets to repair older systems if they break down, but as long as someone with knowledge and old spare parts from our present glut is around, no money is needed when something goes wrong.

The point:

Part of what decides whether old hardware is useful or not is whether those with the knowledge to make it useful are willing to do so. Giving two Saturdays a month or just say the morning hours of every Saturday, you as a knowledgable Slashdot reader can make a lot of people happy by connecting them to the information age. This especially applies to those of you living in metropolitan areas where those on the "more ghetto" side of town often aren't fortunate to have access to computers or to have been the beneficiary of a made-for-TV Microsoft commercial about giving computers to poor folks.

Saturday LAN parties are great, but smiles are great too.

Just start asking around -- make it known that you're a computer professional and you're willing to give some of your time to your community to make technology happen for those who can't afford it. You'll be swamped with needs in no time -- needs that you can help to fill if you're willing to give a little time and to work on old hardware.

There are companies that deal with this..

[Liquid-Gecka]

There are lots of companies out there that recycle old computers.. They tear them down and recover all the rare metals and such (No sense trying to recycle silicon since it's not exactly hard to make and its hard to rebuild. However, the gold bonding wires (the wires that connect the metal pins on the package to the silicon wafer inside. The company that I work for recycles all chips that are damaged or not working properly (and sells as many of them as they can to people that don't need fast or reliable parts) This same process is used on PCB's, and other common components. The relative cost of removing a part and trying to reuse it (a Rpack for example) is too high for real world situations. Instead they simply recover the precious metals and call it a day. In time, just like cans/paper recycling, the process will get refined and improved and they may be able to catalog parts for reuse (a 5V regulator hasn't had many major changes in the last few years.. to reuse a regulator from a 486 in a power supply for a TV or something will not cause problems. (Recent ATX supplies require faster/better regulation, which means that an older regulator won't fit the required properties and such.)

Stop talking about re-use...

[GreyPoopon]

I see all of these responses talking about not recycling and instead re-using aged equipment for file servers, etc. But the article clearly states that that only delays the inevitable. Eventually, the hardware breaks. If you've got an old IBM XT with 10MB hard drive and a cracked motherboard, there's not much you can re-use it for. Eventually, it's just not worth keeping old equipment running. So, it all has to be thrown out or recycled at SOME point.

So, any bright ideas as to how these things can be efficiently recycled or used?

GreyPoopon
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