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Finding a Tech Museum For Your Beloved Retired Computer (s)
First time accepted submitter Daniel Dern writes "There may be a better home than your basement or recycling for those beloved computers you once built and/or used — like one of the many tech-collecting/displaying museums. My ComputerWorld article, '9 museums that want your legacy tech,' looks at nine institutions that might — be sure to ask, don't just drop on their doorsteps after hours — want some of them. (Probably not everything you've got, alack.)" Look soon for a Slashdot video visit to the Goodwill Computer Museum, one of the collections mentioned.
Unless you have something singularly unique, like a Cray or something, I very much doubt your old computer gear is of value to anybody.
I don't imagine a lot of these places want to be contacted to dump off your old PC, no matter how cool you think it is.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
They are interested in mostly telecommunications gear, but these people have a great collection. If you're in Seattle, spend half a day there:
http://museumofcommunications.org/
Really worth the trip...
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A person's emotional attachment to some long-beloved piece of technology may not be in proportion to its rarity. I have fond memories of my Atari 400, C64, and Amiga 500s. They were at times wonderful, frustrating, and enthralling. The thing is, though, that these are some of the best-selling computers of the 8-bit and 16-bit eras.
Where was this info 25 years ago when I had to toss out a truck load of old tech?
Um... how is recycling a computer wasteful?
No, wrong. You parsed that wrong. Try again, please.
I mean, they can have my Digi-Comp I when they drag it from my cold, dead fingers.
Same for my slide rule.
https://app.box.com/WitthoftResume Code: https://github.com/cellocgw
Time to dig up that old monochrome sparc station.
Brought to you by Carl's Junior.
They can take my Coleco Adam when they pry it from my cold, dead fingers! I'm still waiting for Tunnels & Trolls to come out.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
About 2002, i tried to find a museum to take a VaxStation II with a serial number of WFPROTO001 and still no takers. Unless it fits with with they're looking for and particularly rare, it's unlikely a museum wants what you might have on offer.
It's not his fault he misunderstood your off-topic hippie rant.
They probably don't want unopened boxes of 5.25" floppies.
They obviously want the uber rare stuff that fetch a few hundred bucks on eBay to give some stupid curator bragging rights.
Sorry, my hardware, my profit. Now flame away.
I found someone on UseNew to take all my old TRS-80s, Apples, etc. His wife was NOT happy.
My in-laws have a Control Data Cyber 180 system that has been sitting in a barn for probably almost 10 years. They would really love to get rid of it but we have no idea where to send it. It includes a bunch of other heavy manufacturing equipment. Also what appears to be a CO2 laser head by GTE Sylvania. Klischograph K181. Magnetic tape stuff. I can't remember what else.
It has been in a barn so at least kept out of rain and snow but not so much the -40C weather and the few pigeons that like to sit in the rafters above it.
It is located in western Canada. Does anybody know of a place that would want something like this or should we just sell it for metal recycling?
Printers and scanners are good sources of free precision chromed rod, stepper motors with pulleys, belts and idler wheels. The older they are, the better.
As an example, the Apple ImageWriter II has a 10mm chromed rod and a NEMA23 stepper motor. It's completely overkill for a printer but it's a good source of parts for a small CNC machine or 3D printer.
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Yeah, I think it is, since the nominal meaning is the correct one.
I did put a lot of effort into modding that case.
If anyone has any old non-PC compatible Heathkit / Zenith Data Systems computers, software, manuals, etc.. Things like the H8, H11, H89.... HDOS & CP/M operating systems and related software... H10 Paper Tape... etc... I'm always looking for more. You can find more info on my site: http://heathkit.garlanger.com/
Looking for any old 8-bit Heathkit/Zenith software/hardware - http://heathkit.garlanger.com
The National Museum of Computing at Bletchley Park (England) might be interested as well -- they have a section for personal computers.
Also, if you ever get a chance to visit, plan for at least half a day -- it's fascinating!
The University of Michigan has a video game archive - where virtually any computer or video game ever made can be played (slight exageration) on original hardware. They accepted my donation of a working TI-99/4a (bought new by me) along with cartrigdes and accessories. http://www.lib.umich.edu/computer-video-game-archive
If anyone has "vintage" computers or software they want to know more about they should hop over to the Vintage Computing forum http://www.vintage-computer.com/vcforum/ . Just be upfront if your intent is to sell it.
There are lots of people interested in "retro" computing for various reasons. And it is not always nostalgia. Personally I like to lean about early machines and software that I never heard of or used before.
One aspect of it is history. Each machine has it's own story. For example the other day I saw a complete IBM 5150 original IBM PC on craigslist crammed next to all the entries for iPhones and Dells. It even had a huge monitor, printer and the software - some ledger accounting software - with it. You could tell that was not used for games or looking at pictures of cats. It served a real business purpose - the kind that people spent huge sums of money on, and was what helped bring about the personal computing revolution.
I know the folks at MARCH (MidAtlantic Retro Computing Hobbyists at InfoAge, in NJ). They do a good job. I've donated a few devices. They can use extras as they need spare parts. Let's face it, there are fewer serviceable replacements available. They're very much aware of keeping these displays true to the time when they sold. The InfoAge displays are actual working displays and they are hands on (very important). They have everything from single board computers to Mainframes & Super computers and the supporting software.
Neil Cherry - Linux Smart Homes For Dummies
www.cpushack.com takes most any processors and microcontrollers (and can recycle any old system if not collectible)
In the modern context of computers "recycling" often means shipping to trash dumps in third world countries where they burn them down for gold.
Anything pre-VLSI can be truly recycled as parts or repaired to a functional condition in the right hands. Or even extended to do new things.
Unfortunately, since software doesn't contain gold or other valuable metals those always seem to wind up in the trash, yet can also be valuable to those operating vintage systems. (database software and manuals can go for quite a bit sometimes)
I don't know if the Goodwill or any of its customers were happy when I donated 3 boxes of inCider and 2600 magazines, but my wife was. :)
Laughter is the Spackle of the Soul.
A Swiss computer museum located in a a leading European university. They have a pretty eclectic collection of early computers in Europe. They accept all kind of donations. My dad's old 1982 IMS 5000 with CP/M and 1986 Olivetti M24 both went there.
http://www.bolo.ch/
I still have my Interact (produced in AnnArbor MI) and about 30 tapes - including Microsoft Basic for it. It also has an extra ROM written by a W. Hendrikson (sp?) and I just might be able to locate a binder with nearly all issues of "Interaction" which was a newsletter put out by IIRC Steve Cook. I had considered donating this, but the computer history museum already has one.
Later in life I also worked directly under the guy who wrote most of the original ROM code for this machine. I believe he'd want to get his hands on it for a bit prior to donation. We're connected on Linked-In.
There were only a few thousand of these things built, so I suspect few remain and doubt all the listed places would have one.
On another note, even back then MS disabled the Peek and Poke commands in basic. I suspect this was at the request of the computer company. Poke in particular does not give a SN (syntax error) but rather actually executes the command and then gives a different error. "Poke XXXXX,YY" will permanently disable the error. More poking can disable some bounds checks on the Peek command - the ROM range was protected and the BASIC interpreter area was also protected. It's all a bit fuzzy but I still remember the values of XXXXX and YY to enable poking. The others were all documented in said newsletter.
Last I checked it still worked and a MESS developer down the street from me dumped the ROM.
Or at least that's what the guy I sold it to said in an e-mail after a brief discussion of my buying it back.
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If you're in the North East here is another good one http://www.ricomputermuseum.org/
They have a lot of minicomputer systems like DEC, IBM, Wang, Data General...and the usual collection of micro computers.
If you've got old video games these guys probably want it. They generally don't have space for large items like arcade cabinets though.