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Making Stuff Out Of Broken Computer Equipment?

Posted by timothy on from the counts-more-if-you-broke-it dept.

Class Act Dynamo writes "Recently, my keyboard stopped working, so I bought a new one (nice cordless number, really excellent). I was about to throw the old keyboard out when I thought it would be interesting to take all the keys out of it and turn them into refrigerator magnets in order to have a simple 'megnetic poetry' type of thing going. As the fumes from the industrial strength glue went to my head during this project, I began to wonder what other types of craft-type projects people had undertaken with their unusable old perpherals and such. Then I began to wonder why there was a purple octopus on my couch. I decided to ask slashdot readers the first of these questions."

26 of 594 comments (clear)

  1. Hmmm by xneubien · · Score: 5, Funny

    What about the good ol' Celeron Paperweight?

    1. Re:Hmmm by bobhagopian · · Score: 5, Funny

      As a matter of public safety, TAKE ALL PINS OFF THE PROCESSOR. I'm speaking from experience. Though they're not strong enough to really draw blood, you can definitely feel 478 points of discomfort.

    2. Re:Hmmm by Battle_Ratt · · Score: 5, Funny

      Yes, and putting them in the hallway at night is a great way to see who is raiding the fridge.

    3. Re:Hmmm by Captain+Tripps · · Score: 4, Funny

      I use old intell PII's as goatee combs
      I read that as "goatse combs", and immediately regretted it.

    4. Re:Hmmm by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

      I got a broken C=64 and an Atari 2600 off ebay for $10, and turned it into a Beowulf Cluster of Cray Supercomputers. Right now it's rendering a 16384 x 12288 GIF of Natalie Portman and a donkey using a copy of Povray I made out of an old broken CP/M disk and a copy of QBASIC. I'll tell you when it's finished.

  2. Why is there a purple octopus on your couch? by Dachannien · · Score: 3, Funny

    Because purple octopi like to watch TV too.

    1. Re:Why is there a purple octopus on your couch? by Feyr · · Score: 4, Funny

      try french, and quit bitching about english. enlish is actually pretty damn easy :)

    2. Re:Why is there a purple octopus on your couch? by illuminatedwax · · Score: 3, Funny

      Actually English seems to have inherited all of the problems of French in ADDITION to its own. Kind of like how Windows has all the same problems as UNIX PLUS some of its own.

      --Stephen

      --
      Did you ever notice that *nix doesn't even cover Linux?
  3. What I do with old computer parts by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    I make computers out of them.

  4. Hamster Cage by obfuscated · · Score: 5, Funny

    Computer cases with clear sides make great hamster cages! Just make sure to file down the really sharp stuff. Add some tubes from case to case and papow! You've got your first Hamster-powered cluster.

    --

    -- dK ... Narf Poit!
    1. Re:Hamster Cage by chota · · Score: 5, Funny

      Also, for added effect, be sure to name your hamster "Beowulf."

      The chicks dig it.

    2. Re:Hamster Cage by Dogtanian · · Score: 4, Funny

      Computer cases with clear sides make great hamster cages [...] You've got your first Hamster-powered cluster.

      I heard that they use a Beowulf cluster of those to run the Hampster-dance website.

      --
      "Slashdot - News and Chat Sites Deviant". (Click "homepage" link above for details).
  5. My favorite use for old hardware... by john_smith_45678 · · Score: 5, Funny

    is the one they put the printer to in Office Space.

    PC Load Letter?

    --
    John Kerry is a Joke!
    1. Re:My favorite use for old hardware... by SCSI-Wan · · Score: 4, Funny


      PC Load Letter?

      What f**k does that mean?

    2. Re:My favorite use for old hardware... by UserGoogol · · Score: 3, Funny

      After painstakingly removing the words "what the fuck does that mean" and "office space" from my Google search, I found good explanation

      It (more or less) means the printer thinks you don't have the right kind of paper.

      --
      "Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity." -- Hanlon's Razor
  6. The ladies have some ideas.. by fadeaway · · Score: 4, Funny

    The answer is three weeks.

    Three weeks until your girlfriend gets sick of asking you to clean up the overflowing pile of old and unused components that's steadily taking over the office. Three weeks until you come home and find your monitor decorated, in a most Martha Stewart-like fashion, with superglued sticks of RAM and old CPU's.

    Message recieved.. loud and clear. Over and out.

  7. Purple Octopus... by selderrr · · Score: 4, Funny

    that, my dear friend, is what the sun-walkers out there call a woman

    don't touch it, don't feed it, don't talk to it. If you stop washing yourself & brushing your teeth, it's supposed to go away by itself.

    dunno if this matters, but you have all slahsdotters sympathy. We're standing right behind you like one geek. Let us know how it turns out.

    --
    When will I end this grieving ? When will my future begin ?
  8. Toys for the girls by pilybaby · · Score: 5, Funny

    I'm sure I've seen "toys for girls" that look just like my MS wheel mouse. I'm sure it can't be that hard to plug in a vibrating motor and some batteries. If you make it a wireless one you could even use a caddy to charge it. And the best thing is that you don't have to worry about someone finding it in your desk draw. You just say it's an old broken mouse. Kill two bird with one stone. Hell you could do it and have it stay as a fully functioning mouse too.

    1. Re:Toys for the girls by myowntrueself · · Score: 3, Funny

      And the girls who use them could sell them secondhand to geeks at a *huge* markup!

      --
      In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
  9. Mouse Necklace by bokmann · · Score: 3, Funny

    I once made a necklace our of a dead mac mouse... just fed the end that normally attached to the computer back into the mouse case, and voila!

    On a dare, I wore it out one night (while still in college). I took it off when a hot girl asked me why I was wearing a medic-alert necklace.

  10. Re:My cousin by jpmkm · · Score: 3, Funny

    Who the fuck just puts food on a table and eats off it? Have you not heard of plates?

  11. Pioneers of the GUI by Halcyon-X · · Score: 3, Funny

    Looks like Apple had been planning the Aqua interface long before any of us realized...

    --

    .sig: Open Source, Open Mind

  12. Spell it "Calamari". It tastes better that way. by NotQuiteReal · · Score: 3, Funny
    I know, Calamari is often just squid, but the fancier places often put in little, whole octopi, like a little garnish, I guess.

    Calamari at a nice Italian restaurant - about $16.99 or more.

    The look on your 10 year old's face when you have an octopus on your fork and then eat it; priceless...

    --
    This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
    1. Re:Spell it "Calamari". It tastes better that way. by fciron · · Score: 5, Funny

      Actual record of my twelve year old at a tapas place

      "Can I have some of your fried chicken?"
      "That's good. Gimme some more."
      "Can I have another piece, please?"
      "This looks like some kind of alien octopus?"
      "THIS IS CALAMARI!"

      The look on his face as he slowly realized he'd eaten squid all on his own. That's priceless.

  13. Re:Got two dead keyboards? by bonkedproducer · · Score: 3, Funny

    I've got a keyboard made from several DOAs that reads
    "HELP-CAPTIVE-
    IN-KEYBOARD-
    FACTORY"

    hanging on the wall - most folks have to look at it 5 or 6 times before they get the joke.

    --
    Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence in society - M. Twain
  14. Re:My gf does by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    Wow! You've got a keeper!