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Ask Slashdot: How To Donate Older Computers to Charity?
yanom writes "My school gave me several circa-2006 computers with no operating system. I fixed them up, and now they run Lubuntu fairly well, making them great internet/LibreOffice/general Linux workstations. I've been wanting to donate them to local nonprofits where they'll go to good use — for example, I've already given several to a local church for them to use in their afterschool care/tutoring program. However, I'm having trouble finding other places where these machines could go to good use. How should I best conduct this search? How can I find nonprofits that could benefit from these workstations?"
Are they P4 or Core processors? If they are P4, just recycle them.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
I don't care if this looks like a troll. I am a professional Linux developer, but I'm under no delusion that the general public is comfortable using Linux for general purpose stuff. The kind of people using computers at non-profits will just lost interest in a state of WTF if you put them in front of a Lubuntu machine. They'll just want Windows or Apple.
new PC can be bought for a few hundred $$$. comes with MS Windows and you can run office on it. very easy to set up out of the box
used PC you have to pay someone $50 or more per hour to configure them one by one and pay the software licenses
and even 2006 computers without 4GB of RAM are SLOW. try running Chrome with a few tabs open. there are $279 best buy specials with 4GB of RAM
destroy the hard drives if you're paranoid and just junk the PC's
A circa 2006 computer is in the only ~5x-10x faster than a Raspberry Pi, and has a power cost on the order of 100-200W/hr. So a 2006-era computer, even free, costs ~$90/yr just in power if its left on.
Similarly, for a non-profit trying to be uber-cheap, why not just go with ChromeBooks? If you are in a position where you can have a network (e.g. like an office environment), they are cheap, and the office and so-on that are needed for productivity.
Test your net with Netalyzr
They're doing it wrong then. There's money in scrap boards, memory, CPUs, and the metal itself. I can understand turning the things away however if there's not a support structure in place for them.
Alan Ralsky.
Like I said, if you are not picky.
just take them to goodwill and let them figure it out.
With the current state of things, computers and electronics are ubiquitous, cheap, and rapidly evolving. At this point, I consider machines from the era to be essentially trash, even when they can function well enough using your favorite distro. They take up too much space and use too much power, and they struggle to handle the world's new common platform: HTML+CSS+js. They will also accelerate down the slide to obsolescence much faster than newer equipment over an equal period of time.
I feel like dumping those things on charities is just giving them a burden. They may have to spend money to put the machines to use, and they will have to take care of throwing them away soon enough. I say use your energy to find a good recycler so that the metals in those old junkers might be reclaimed for tomorrow's tech.
"Here Lies Philip J. Fry, named for his uncle, to carry on his spirit"
Unless you're willing to donate your time to administer them and keep them running (including replacing hardware when it fails), just recycle the computers, non profits don't have the staff to keep old hardware running, and though they may have someone that understands some Windows basics, they aren't going to have anyone that knows anything about Linux.
My wife works for a non-profit and when well meaning people donate old computers, they thank them, then hand them off to an eWaste recycler (who fortunately takes them for free)
I applaud your altruism; but I've done the same kind of thing in the past, and regretted it.
Not to be too paranoid, but please make sure you've got all your paperwork in order, (you have to right to pass on the PCs etc.), and explicitly state 'no warranty' etc. What if one of the PCs catches fire, and burns down the old folks home you donated it to? Yeah, I know I sound nuts, be we live in a crazy world.
Oh yes, and regarding support. They'll drive you nuts. Really.
Junk the things and just give some cash to a worthy cause.
Find some charitable organization to distribute them, like your church. Or possibly a store like goodwill.
There's money in scrap boards, memory, CPUs, and the metal itself.
No, there's not. The "money" that one gets is a pittance next to the effort spent salvaging the junk in the first place.
The United Way distributes cash donations to local non-profits, so they may well know who would need the computers.
But then they have to deal with finding a recycling center that will take them, and that takes time and effort away from their charitable mission, and storage is not free. My local recycling center charges money for computers because they're such a pain in the ass to deal with.
Hail Eris, full of mischief...
E pluribus sanguinem
Charities are not a waste disposal service. Have them disposed of properly and safely, and the useful materials extracted and recycled. Even if you find a charity who'll take them, you're just dumpling that problem on them a year or two from now - and, as several other commenters have said, they probably use enough power the charities would be better of buying something newer.
Some came it with a usable operating system; some had to have one installed. I'd always stick Ubuntu on.
None of them ever failed to sell. After all, the price was right, and the people usually needed whatever they could get. I felt good about it, because a computer that would have seen the scrap heap got reused. Let's face it: for word processing and simple spreadsheets, it doesn't take that much computer. You can also browse the web, if you stay away from overbloated sites. Email is a no brainer.
And, if they didn't like Linux, they were free to install Windows or whatever they chose. Given the financial state of a lot of these people, I doubt they could have afforded Microsoft's price. But Linux at least let them see the machine was funcitonal.
Pittance? I helped a local non-profit earn $3000 last year by salvaging their "junk" through my volunteer work.
I volunteer in the IT department at a free clinic. If you're in Georgia - Georgia Free Clinic Network. We could use those machines.
If you're in another state, check out the free clinics there. I'm sure they could use them too.
On another note, if you have old hardware, unless asked, I suggest you don't bother installing an OS or any other software. Your heart is in the right place but to be frank, we'd wipe the machine and put XP Pro and then set them up to suit our network - which is Microsoft based, obviously.
Even charities have minimum needs/standars for computers.
Nonsense. Those Goodwill boxes will take anything. I regularly put my old broken appliances, worn out VHS tapes, empty soda cans, used toilet paper, etc. in them late at night and I've never once heard them complain about it.
Your political party doesn't care about your rights and only represents corporate interests.
Donate them to your local electronic recycling facility.
who otherwise don't have PCs. They usually use them to just browse the web and other basic tasks. Firefox is better on older hardware than Chrome in my opinion. Especially if you are memory limited or if you want to watch Flash videos. Chrome is actually laggy in those situations.
It's slow going giving them away, though. Most people think that a newer PC will work better for them, but usually because of crapware it never does. And for a novice user re-installing Windows is hugely more difficult then installing Ubuntu (or Fedora, or OpenSuse, Mint, etc). I should note, I have no direct experience with Windows 8 yet.. so maybe it's much better...
They'll just want Windows or Apple.
What's that, is that on Google or Facebook?
Firefox OS and Chromebooks kind of prove the point. The browser IS the computer, to most people. It used to be nobody cared about the process scheduler, anything below the level of the desktop didn't concern 99% of users. These days the browser is the desktop and few care what's beneath. (But some of those who care do care a lot.)
Post them for free on Criagslist. It's possible someone might want them, but I wouldn't count on it. If no one claims them in a week, take them in for recycling. Right now, there's a glut of crappy old single core CPUs out there that no one wants. I've got a few in my basement that I haven't recycled yet.
Join a local Freecycle group (www.freecycle.org) and post an offer. Someone in your community might have a use for them.
No sig? Sigh...
As for the hardware, a 2006 processor could be a Intel Core 2 running at 2.6 Ghz - 2.6 TRILLION operations per second. I sure did a lot of productive work on with a 500 MHz machine, so one five times as fast seems fine to me, for office work.
If it wasn't waiting on IO, a new processor might be 50% "faster" for a single threaded application, but in reality they are both sitting idle waiting for a disk drive that peaks at 38 MB/s. A new green drive does about 38 MB/s. The 2006 processor does 10,000 MBs / second. Assuming both have SATA drives, then, an old computer and a new computer will both take the same number of seconds to load the word processor from disk and launch it. For that type of thing, there's practically zero difference in new vs. 2006 - computers were already "fast enough" in 2006. (Except for hard drives, if they are switched for SSD.)
Yup, our county dump stations have sheds with tables for "i don't want this anymore, it isn't junk, it shouldn't just be tossed, if you can use it please take it" stuff. I've taken old computers, wiped drives, put Linux on 'em, and put a sheet of instructions along with a re-install disk with them. They last about 10 minutes before being taken by someone.
Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos
Look for non-profit schools in your area and offer these systems for teaching keyboarding and intro to programming. These functions don't require much horse power or graphics and free (as in Beer) software and courseware is readily available.
Ask your local clubs (e.g, Lions, Rotary, Exchange, Optimists) whether they have a need for free office automation.
Invenio via vel creo
Recycle your old junk, then donate cash and let the charity decide what hardware suits their needs.
1) Find a charity you despise
2) Throw computer through window
The Literacy Connection has a computer tutor program. Maybe some of the students could use them since only about half own computers when they start classes.
Contact the Wounded Warrior Project. They have taken several donated P4 Dell boxes off my hands.
Like the OP, I have found it very difficult to find donors for older desktops. Craigslist may be useful in that respect, as individuals and small nonprofits sometimes ask for computer donations.
Personally, I have given up on reconditioning and donating desktops. Very few people want them. As others have mentioned, it really is better to recycle them, even if it goes against your grain to toss out a working piece of hardware.
As others have mentioned, there are a number of local entities that recycle/ refurbish / re-purpose old computers. All you have to do is a little looking. In Arizona, a very popular program is Arizona StRUT ( Students Recycling Used Technology) - http://www.azstrut.org/ - look at their website, it might be able to point you in a direction that applies to those in need in your area.
Other ideas: Church-affiliated thrift stores are popular in rural areas. Homeless shelters need computers so their customers can look for jobs / housing resources and stay in contact with family. Boys and Girls Clubs and YMCAs still exist in many urban areas, and may be in need of some equipment. Retirement housing and elderly care facilities may be interested. Look around and ask how you can help.
There is a non-profit company in many North American cities that takes old computers, puts them through a testing cycle, recycles all the parts that can't be used, and then builds workstations running linux for either donation to non-profits or cheap resale. They are great and always looking for help. http://www.freegeek.org/ According to the Wikipedia site, they have locations in: Portland, OR; Fayetteville, AR; Central FL; Chicago, IL; Columbus, OH; South Bend, IN (Michiana); Vancouver, BC (Canada); Seattle, WA; Minneapolis-Saint Paul, MN (Twin Cities); Toronto, ON (Canada); Providence, RI; Ferndale, MI (Greater Detroit area); Ephrata, PA (South East Pennsylvania); Athens, GA (Free I.T. Athens)
As for the hardware, a 2006 processor could be a Intel Core 2 running at 2.6 Ghz - 2.6 TRILLION operations per second. ...
You must be on the other side of the Pond. Over here in the USA, a 2.6GHz machine can only do 2.6 Billion OPS.
All ideas^H^H^H^H^Hprocesses in this post are Patent Pending. (as well as the process of patenting all postings)
it will only burden them with work and clunky things taking up space. ***every*** used computer I got had something missing (memory board, DLL files, or whatever) which rendered the system basically useless and a huge timepit. Except for a couple old computers I got, one from non-techie friend abandoned their XP for a Mac. And the other (Mac G3 and it still works great and has lots of programs) from a flea market which was a good seller of used computers but he no longer can be found. So these other useless old computers I had to dispose which can be a real pain. Unless you are the kind that always does recycling, such places can be hard to find. No, no, no... don't give me the suggestion 'google' to find sites because such usually charge you recycle fees or they are on other side of the city. Since then I only buy new computers because used systems there is always something missing from them (I don't know why they delete all the programs, remove memory boards, and also delete js, DLL and other such files in the system folder).
Therefore, giving old computers to charities is like dropping them a "time" bomb that will cause them to waste resources.
mfwright@batnet.com
You can also try freecycle. While not a "charity" it's a good way to pass on stuff you don't want/need to someone who will actually use it. Of course you don't get a write off...
It isn't worth bothering trying to give away an old PC.
:P ) but after a few years, its disposable. Wipe the HD while its still alive and put the thing out with the trash.
The local Salvation Army store doesn't want it unless it is 100% working condition, flat screen (no CRTs), Windows OS CD & Windows serial number sticker still intact. Since most off-the-shelf systems don't even have the CD now, they don't take many these days. (they don't take CRT TV's anymore either; any TV donated must be a newer/digital-broadcast one)
If you go to the trouble of wiping and reinstalling it just to offer it for free on Craigslist or whatever the only replies you get is kids wanting to play games on it, that it won't do very well.
"It would run a stripped-down Linux distro pretty well..." -yea, if you knew anyone who wanted to run Linux. Nobody who knows nothing about PCs wants Linux, not even a tiny bit. You might as well brag about how fast it can run Win95.
The concept seems odd (especially knowing what you paid for it
Here's what I have done a few times with old computers. After installing Linux on them, I have used them to teach the Computer Merit Badge to boy scouts at the summer science camp run by our local council. At the end of it, scouts who did not have their own PCs took the machines home. By the end, scouts did not just have machines they knew how to use - they had machines they knew how to program - even though the programming requirements for the Computer Merit Badge are rudimentary, the longest journey is the one that's never begun and the badge took them the first few steps down the path.
You said you gave a couple to the church? Ask the pastor. Church pastors, even if they don't know anything about technology, are very connected to the community and will know who needs them the most. In my hometown the computer giveaway charity is run through the Methodist church and the rest of the pastors know to ask there if they have a family in need. Alternatively, if you're in Eastern WA I'll take them for the above charity.
Please put some pants on before you post again.
My PC's are both from 2006 and they seem like new to me!
I killed da wabbit -Elmer Fudd
I've always given cars and computers to the local Mental Health department. They have found folks that really needed them.
I will echo what others have said about it not being worth while, but let me also explain why. It is an economic problem:
There is a point where the replacement cost of a piece of electronics exceeds the cost of refurbishing them. Even if you do it yourself, you have to think about what other things you could have done with that time. If it took you 2 hours per PC, then you are obviously a capable PC repair tech. At $25/hr that's $50 you could have made. That's half way toward a cheap tablet which is probably more useful than the PC you refurbished.
Similarly, the cost to maintain them often exceeds the total value gained. Those old machines are likely to be flaky or fail entirely. The lost productivity spent working around unreliable hardware. And then people aren't using the current OSs so there are limitations to what you can do with it anyway.
Geeks Without Borders in Eugene, OR rebuilds and redistributes old computers to those who need them. Maintains them too. They operate mostly in North America.
The web site seems to be down at the moment.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geeks_Without_Borders
Every charity is different and has different guidelines for donations. Your best bet is to find a local non-profit [501(c)3] agency that does work in your community that you support and contact them directly. They often have minimum specs much lower then most people would consider usable as many non-profits do not even have technology budgets. Some of the smaller non-profits would be thrilled for receiving a donation of even single core 2+ Ghz machines. This is especially true of organizations that deal with the homeless populations in any area. I work for a medium to large non-profit in NH that provides services to the homeless, mentally ill, as well as provide transitional housing for veterans and we routinely donate our older machines that we take out of circulation to our clients. Lastly if you donate them to a 501(c)3 you will receive a receipt that you can use for tax purposes, because your donation tax deductible.
The Man in Black
Step 1) Drive to Charity
Step 2) Give.
I haven't thought of anything clever to put here, but then again most of you haven't either.
Ah yeah. On the other hand, a Core 2 can run up to 18 instructions per clock, so it's 48 billion instructions per second. Anyway, it's friggin fast. Further, a 2.6 GHz processor running a lightweight environment like LXDE could well be more responsive than a 3.2 GHz machine running WIndows 8.
i can think of a thousand things that can be done without needing to exceed the max speed of a hdd. for instance your computer can check every letter you type and offer a list of possible words. my phone does that everywhere i type. windows and linux both can do that too, and a dictionary isn't a huge set and it's the RAM throughput that limits the operations that can be done. since the dictionary library is loaded into ram on boot up.
the nice thing about modern computers is you can buy one that theoretically would require 1000 watts of pull, and yet by not powering everything and underclocking the cpu can idle at as low as 13 to 200 watts, depending which speed you chose. mine idles at 125 watts which also happens to be the voltage draw of the cpu at maximum power. only real math problems and bitcoin mining really push this machine to it's limits, and i don't bitcoin mine and am not a seti at home user. i do video game, but i find that only a certain subset of games are truly worth playing. so i don't push the system to it's limits gaming either. i mainly bought the fast computer because i don't trust cheaply built machines, and the price/performance angle was just right for me.
https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html
Big white building in Washington. It's got a sign identifying it as "U.S. Capital." I think "Capital" might be the technical term for "cross."
No need to thank me.
PS -- you'll need several computers.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
In the real, non-geek world there are many folks with almost no money who benefit greatly from having a usable computer. Filing unemployment claims and mandatory job searches are some examples of tasks you can do using a slow 'puter on a dialup connection. Driving to use a public computer is expensive, especially in rural areas.
I have several friends who still use P4s for their primary and "kidsputer" needs. There is not money for anything else, which is also why working XP machines promptly disappear from thrift stores.
Hand a thrift store a turnkey system and someone will put it to use.
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
Non-profits can get Microsoft software relatively inexpensively. Something like $8 for an OS license and $24 for office. There are restrictions on the licenses though.
They are also much more difficult (or at least time consuming) to maintain, cost more for the same specs, and have shorter lifespans. Once the motherboard or screen is gone, the laptop is as good as gone. Not the case with a desktop.
i mean i hate to say this, but i know people who have been using a p4 to write open sores software for the past two years and have had dozens of patches accepted to a pretty mainstream project. the project has tens of thousands of downloads so... uhm. yeah.
the only problem they have is lack of RAM , but the clang compiler has helped fix that .
The GNU compile farm provides free build machines for a lot of open source projects. They might be interested.
http://gcc.gnu.org/wiki/CompileFarm
your computer can check every letter you type and offer a list of possible words. my phone does that
Perfect example. Phones with 800 MHz processors do that. I'm using one now that does that. It has 128 MB of RAM, I think. That suggests that 2.6 GHz is overkill for mundane office tasks.
In your example, the person typing does maybe four operations per second while the CPU can do billions. Most office tasks are like that - human-bound or network-bound, not CPU bound.
Yeah I just gave away ten half-computers, mostly P4s, on craigslist. They were gone within a hours.
I donate older computers I have refurbished to the local food bank, because at least in my town, they are most in-tune with who would a computer the most.
It's perfectly reasonable for charity workers to be paid reasonable salaries. It's unreasonable for them to be paid unreasonable ones. The American Red Cross got a lot of flack a few years ago because of the high salary it paid Marsha Evans. Other charities were unfairly accused of doing the same thing but it turned out those claims were exaggerated.
http://www.snopes.com/politics/business/charities.asp
http://urbanlegends.about.com/library/bl_charities_salaries.htm
If you do donate to a charity, make sure it's an efficient one that serves the cause and not the office holders:
http://www.forbes.com/2009/11/23/charities-most-efficient-personal-finance-charity-09-efficiency_slide_2.html
My 2c on old PCs: Yes, I have lots, but really they are practically worthless. Recipients would do better with a cheap modern netbook than they would a hulking power-guzzling iron monster. Like a story I read about how people donating their old books to libraries: "People can't bare to throw out their old books, so they donate them to us (libraries), and we throw them out for them."
A small town library can often use an additional computer. Put office software on it, photo processing and drawing software, good browsers, and make sure it can work on a network where all the other computers run a Microsoft OS. Also make sure it can talk to networked printers. A page of instructions on how to use the computer would be helpful.
Contribute to civilization: ari.aynrand.org/donate
There are a couple of different things to do, but one of the challenges you're going to run into is that most non-profits are kind of too short handed (or short of time) to be able to go, "yes, of course, that'd be awesome!" (That's how many volunteers get turned away as well, actually). A lot of time when volunteers (or donations) turn up, the random employee being offered them is going to be searching their brain for a way to put them to good use, and if one doesn't immediately come to mind, there more likely to turn it down, because they've got more than enough on their plate with everything else. I've been in this position myself. I was working for a collaboration of 60ish non-profits, and someone wanted to donate an old copy machine to a non-profit. They didn't care which, just any one that needed a copier. And it was a pretty good copier, but still. The actually collaboration office couldn't use it, didn't have the room for it, certainly didn't have the money to get rid of it or move it if that became necessary. I sent out many, many calls to every agency I could think of, seeing if they needed a printer. And I'm sure, somewhere, one of them did. But if they had the need, they hadn't yet realized it, or weren't talking about it. And few of the newer ones, that were more desperate for resources, were willing to take the risk of it needing repair work or finding a way to move it from the donor's place to their office.
So here's what I'd suggest. If you have a few good non-profits in mind, ones that you know something about their operations, and there's something *specific* they could use those computers to address....I would offer it to them like that. "Hey, I know you were looking for a way to get the kids in the shelter a way to get on the internet for their homework, I've got some computers for you..." Especially if you can volunteer to provide support. That will actually probably be pretty welcomed.
Second, if you don't have any specific charities in mind, you could see if there's a local non-profit dedicated to fixing up old computers and giving them away. There's usually one in every county, and they'll have the relationships and connections to know who could use it and how to get it to them. I'm sure they wouldn't complain about having the work already done for them.
Third, you could try just contacting various groups and seeing if any are looking for computers. Good groups to start with would be shelters, churches that run shelters/food kitchens/that sort of thing, *domestic* shelters (especially if they have a safe house, but don't be offended if they turn down an offer to help set them up. They guard the locations fiercely, because they must). You could also try the local Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts groups (though I'd recommend avoiding the nearest council, and just seeing about getting in touch with the local volunteers in charge). After school programs might be good, as well as any programs dedicated to helping the elderly and disabled be more self-sufficient. Start by explaining that you've refurbished them (so they're not just "old" computers that need repair) and also, if you're willing to help set them up etc. And there you go.
You probably won't read this, as it'll be at the very bottom, but if you do, I hope it helps.
Even the new Pope wants to sanction Prenda's lawyers. Oh wait....
You can run it stand alone (I have it on some old 512MB Thinkpads) or in a client/server configuration (I have iBooks and eMacs using this running Chrome with Flash and sound). All it does is boot into a full screen Chrome session, so it depends on what you want to do on how useful it is.
In our public school system this has allowed us to repurpose any machine that comes our way. The limiting factor now is space.
(BTW, there are several security issues with it since the private key for the user browser is publically available in the Github project. It also downloads the configuration from Github everytime the machine is started, which means you have to trust me... Or fork the project and trust yourself!)
What, me worry?
Find a nonprofit org to donate to that will rebuild them and give them away to needy skoolkids. That's what I help out with on a weekly basis. The high-end machines are rebuilt and sold to help with costs of rebuilding the older models. People saying a 2006 era machine is useless obviously don't know what they are talking about. This nonprofit is still giving single-core computers away. They will take anything except CRTs and what cannot or will not be used is disassembled and sold to scrappers so nothing goes to waste. A PC does NOT have to be less than a year old to be useful!
-- After all is said and done, more is said than done.
You see i have this old 286 machine i found in the loft. I can't be bothered to take it down the tip so i thought a charity might like it. ;)
Certainly where I live, the charity shops (of which there are a lot) won't touch hardware. Full stop. They are mostly run by old ladies who wouldn't know a top end PC from a hole in the ground. If they started accepting PCs, old printers, scanners (remember them), etc their shops would soon be full of them.
I have excellent Karma and I am not afraid to Troll it.
Talk to someone in your local chamber of commerce, or a non-profit like United Way. They can probably put you in touch with the right people.
www.bakermountain.org would welcome used machines to use for educational initiatives.
You may wish to contact some senior homes and explain your situation. You have working machines, circa 20xx and you would like to donate them for a cause. They have xxxx and the only requirement would be to provide an internet connection.
Some churches know of senior homes where these boxes could be welcome
Leslie Satenstein Montreal Quebec Canada
The point is - you have to be dirt poor to not be able to save up $250 to buy a desktop computer or used laptop from the pawn shop. If you can't afford that, then you can't afford internet access or electricity or backup storage media to use a computer, of any kind, and you would get more done by simply getting a smartphone. If the donation thing just makes you feel good about yourself, buy a new computer and donate that.
You... don't really understand poverty much, do you? There are discount Internet connectivity programs (Comcast Internet Essentials) that can get you online for $10 if you are below certain income criteria. Even if you're having trouble paying your electric bill, you can get help with that too from most utility companies.
I've found that GNU/Linux can save educational institutions a LOT of money. Especially when they are able to obtain computers that businesses are throwing out because they can no longer run Windows. GNU/Linux has a huge array of education software, and a lot of schools are using the online games which makes it a very good platform for all of the above. It is amazing at the waste from corporate America where the thought process is to "upgrade the PC to support the new version of Windows", where they should instead be saying "install GNU/Linux to allow us to continue using these PCs and give us freedom".