Because HDMI is signal-compatible with DVI, and a cable from a computer's DVI output to a TV's HDMI input is under $10 on Amazon.
Oh! I didn't know that! Thanks for that information... Gotta get one of those cables for my sister. Her graphics card only has DVI, and she uses a DVI-VGA converter to attach the computer to the VGA input of the HDTV.
Again, many thanks for filling up my ignorance.:-)
IANAL obviously.... Assume you buy OS X, I also assume you need to read the license agreement which contains the little bit about "Apple Branded Hardware". I do not think this machine applies. You are already in violation with the license. I'm pretty sure that in good old Europe we're safe because I expect EULAs to be severely slammed when evaluated by the courts. However my hopes for the US aren't that bright. (I might be optimistic about Europe... So, I won't hold my breath)
Now, second, let's just assume for the sake of it that you are a US citizen and that for some reason you can safely ignore the EULA because "you never signed anything". There is still that little matter that Apple effectively blocks you from running OS X of non-Apple hardware, which means you have to (and now come the magical words)... circumvent digital protection measures. That, my friend is illegal in the US under DMCA.
Is it enforcable? Probably not... It is as much enforcable as some random IT guy using the VLK of his employer on the machines of his family and friends. Nobody is going to notice, but it is 100% illegal.
Yes, I know... My sister has her computer hooked up to her HDTV that way. Still, I wonder why it's VGA input. Why not DVI? VGA is analog AFAIK, and DVI is digital... Connectig a computer to HDTV using VGA implies digital-analog-digital, where the simple path would be digital-digital which both DVI and HDMI provide.
HDMI seems to be present on all HDTVs, but not DVI... I wonder why...
Intel's 64-bit quad-core microprocessors [...] 500GB of hard drive storage and 4GB of RAM. Also included are a DVD-RW drive, a touchpad, four USB ports, a Gigabit Ethernet port and a DVI
and
The PC will run the Linux, Windows and Mac OS X operating systems.
So, it's laptop computer without a screen intended to be attached to a normal computer screen. Apart from form factor (an even then - many computers of the C64 era had this form factor) this has nothing to do with Commodore 64. It's just a PC like an other one on the market. At least if it had come with a HDMI port to be by default attached to a HDTV, then it would be closer to the Commodre 64 legacy.
Also... "Will run Mac OS X"... Definitely not legally....
WinCE?!? You must be confusing what I said: I have Windows XP MCE, which has nothing to do with WinCE.
I need the space for VMs
So do I on my work laptop... However, I was talking typical users, not computer enthousiasts and/or professionals.
I think the article is right to assume that the majority of the laptop market can live inside 120GB.
Of course it is, because it's major overkill. Even most Netbooks come with 160Gig HDs these days. I don't even think you can buy disks much smaller than that these days
Well, people should at least back up their pictures on a NAS and/or USB/eSATA disks. If you don't have any you're playing with fire. Loss or theft of laptop means loss of all your precious data.
Also, if I get to repair a computer (laptop or desktop) the first thing I usually get asked to do is to save their precious digital pictures of their kids/vacation/whatever... because they have no backup at all.
My motto is: carry around what you need, keep on the NAS what you want to store and backup everything on external disks. (Which I don't do is have offsite backups, but technically, that would be the wise thing to do)
Best of all worlds and it won't set you back much financially these days...
The article seems to assume that a typcial laptop user needs a 120Gig harddisk. I don't think that's true. I can most certainly live with a 20Gig to 40Gig harddisk in a laptop. As a matter of fact, my current laptop (3 year old AMD Turion with "120Gig" HD) has two parts: about 16Gig fro WinXP MCE and the remaining 100Gig for Ubuntu. The 16Gig has all the productivity apps I need + 1 game (Portal), which still leaves me 2Gig free for data. If I didn't have the game, I'd have ~8Gig free for data. For typcial data like word processing documents and the like that is more than enough. It is perfectly usable for day to day tasks. (The Ubuntu part is my playground, but it could live just as wel on a 16Gig partition)
If you enter digital pictures into the landscape, it does change a bit. Still, that's still a lot of pictures. Besides, you don't want all your pictures on the move. They're much safer at home on server and/or NAS.
Music you say? We're talking about "needing"... You don't "need" music on your laptop, unless that's your profession, but that doesn't make you a typcial user.
While I don't think I'm going to shell out 100€ for a 32Gig SDD, because I'm a cheap bastard and what I have works, I could most certainly live with a 32Gig disk in my laptop.
What's the point? It just exploits the hope of those guys to get a real date, without the actual hope of getting a real one.. Wait, scratch that... It will probably be hugely popular... *sigh*.
Do the girls get paid to do it, just like camgirls? Ah, yes, it's right there in the article... Well, guess there is more dignity in doing that than undressing yourself before a cam. Perhaps they can combine it and make even more money: for each time you frag her, she has to remove one piece of clothing..../ME runs to patent the idea;-)
Where are my modpoints when I need them? When I was in last year of University, I bought an 11 year old Audi 80. One of the best cars I ever had, reliable and no expensive repairs.
My current car is 10 years old (bought new 02/2000) and I'm not planning to replace it. I estimate it to be worth around 5000€, given it cost 35000€ new. Sacrifying it to any of the programs would be perfectly wasteful.
Checking on a second-hand car website (AutoScout24), typical asking price seems to be between 10000€ and 15000€ for similar build/age... That can't be right... People are out of their mind asking that much for a 10 year old car.
I actually wondered what kind of car I could get for 1000€ or a bit more... Seems that it mostly is 25 year old cars.... A bit longer and they qualify for the "oldtimer" status;-)
First, it might be economic for someone with a lot lower work rate.
True...
if it wasn't for the computers you were putting together? Work rate doesn't count, if you weren't going to work anyway.
Hey, it was in my spare time. Of course I wasn't going to work. I said I did it for fun. I wouldn't ever charge anyone anything close to my hourly rate for computer repairs. That's insane and unfair.
That said, saying that my spare time isn't worth my working rate is completely dependent on your view of life. In my opinion my spare time is worth a thousand times my working rate. Just saying...
Now, I just checked and I could get those same RAM sticks for around 40$ each.
Actually, it's just 22$.... I looked in the wrong column ("Regular
Price" vs "Web Price"... Regular price was 32$, which still is way lower than 40$ ) Next time, I'll cite the website appropriately;-)
the RAM I needed is so rare now it costs 4 times as much as the server.
Have you tried Kahlon? (Not affiliated, just a happy customer) A few years ago I had a multiprocessor system that required Registred ECC RAM. It could hold a total of 4GB RAM, but only had 1GB. When I wanted to upgrade the system to 4GB (so I needed 3x1GB), the stores in Europe asked around 300€ per stick. At Kahlon, I got three sticks of that price even after the horribly high import taxes. Now, I just checked and I could get those same RAM sticks for around 40$ each.
I do admit it was a pain to get them to trust me because they didn't take a credit card from my country (which is very small). I called them, said I would do a wire transfer and send them proof. A bit of a hassle, but it worked and I had my RAM.
I also used them ever longer ago when I needed 256Meg SIMMS (not DIMMS) for an old Pentium Pro 200 System.
It's the first place I go and look if I need "weird RAM".
I should check their RD-Ram prices.. I have a nice P-IV with 512Meg RAM with RD-Ram. Upping it to 1GB or more might make it desktop-usable again.
First you get it from eBay, probably second hand. If you go to a repair shop, it won't be and you pay new... If they have second hand stuff, it's unlikely the part you need will be there unless it's very generic. Those 30€ ain't going to cut it in the "normal user goes to repair shop" case. Let's be nice and count "only" 50€ for the part. For a new LCD screen very unlikely.
Second, you did that yourself... You have the skills to do so and you estimate the repair 50€. I agree, sounds like a fair price for the labour done. Just hope that you find a fair repair shop if you're a normal user.
Now the "normal user goes to repair shop scenario" spent around 100€ to get his 300€ netbook repaired. Presumably this netbook already is at least a year old and no equivalent is sold anymore. Netbooks, including Windows XP start at a frigging 229€ (not affiliated, I'm just a happy customer. For about the double of the price the customer gets a better, new, under warranty netbook.
In certain technological sectors repairing makes no sense. I remember when buying a new battery for a cellphone made sense. Years later, the battery of my trusted Siemens S35i (a great phone for its time) died. I wanted to buy a new battery. 60€ they asked... For 120€ I had a brand new cellphone with more features.... What would you have done? The netbook example, from the viewpoint of the non-technical user who cannot do repairs himself, is exactly the same.
I know that from your perspective you did the right thing and from an environmental point of view too. So, more power to you. I'd have done the same.
pirated software, homework essays/term papers, music, and possibly homemade pr0n
We're talking a bit alongs each other. I wasn't listing exhaustively what I found. My "letters and recipes" includes homework, essay, and term papers. I really meant "self-written stuff by the user", perhaps I should have said "letters, recipes and similar".
I agree with the Warez. Completely forgot how many Warez are to be found there.
My "pirated videos" implicity included "music". I should have said "pirated media".
I never encountered home made p0rn though.... Perhaps I didn't look hard enough. So, yes, except for the homemade p0rn, I found all of those. Basically we talked about the same crap, but I wasn't exhaustive enough to your tastes.
External USB hard drive enclosure. Plugged into a machine not running that O/S to prevent any contagion.
Yeah, I can do that. Frankly, I'm usually not curious at all. To me the most important is that the hardware works.
Walk into a typical operation and you'll see a large warehouse with pallets upon pallets of computers and peripherals, and a few guys doing repairs. Picture a Mexican labourer doing things like POST tests and swapping RAM and used hard drives, and you'll get the picture.
The difference here is scale... The way I interpreted the article, it is the customer who goes to a repair shop to let fix the computer. There won't be piles and piles of computers being able to supply work to the few "Mexican" workers. (Why the fuck "Mexican workes", may I ask? Say "low wage workers" if that's what you mean... Could be College Students for all you know...)
Look, I'll try to make a parallel to past experiences: When I was a kid and the TV was broken, my parents called a repairman. He fixed it and the TV was good for another few years. (TVs back then counted as an investment, and I'm still thinking that way... My 2004 CRT is not as hell going to be replaced unless it breaks). At a certain point, the labour costs of getting the repairman home exceeded the price of a new TV. During a transition period, it was still economical to bring the TV to the repairman, but after a while even that wasn't true anymore. Now "TV is broken" means "TV gets replaced". No attempt is made to repair it, unless still under warranty.
You see where I'm getting at: Computers have already passed to the point where "replace" is cheaper than "repair".
My personal interpretation of "recycling" is that if it can go in the garden, then it should be plowed under.
Landfills are not a good idea, and there is plenty of stuff (raw materials) that can be recovered quite successfully from technology. However, I'll take your statement a bit further: if you really mean what you said, then metallic cans (from drinks) should be plowed under because you can't but them in the garden. However, metallic cans are the singlemost recyclable packaging we have.
The use case you give, will work very fine if you make sure said P-IV has 1GB RAM and run XP together with for example Office 2003. (Or OpenOffice 3.x for the matter!)
Three years ago, I ran a P-III 600MHz laptop with 512Meg RAM, using Windows XP Pro SP2, AVG Free, iTunes, Thunderbird, Firefox and OpenOffice *at* *the* *same* time. Yes, starting up the programs was a bit of waiting but once in memory, there was no problem. Windows XP runs typically uses around 200Meg RAM with all drivers and an AV installed. With 1GB RAM you've got plenty to spare.
These days, computers are NOT restricted by CPU anymore. A typical P-IV does classic office work + casual games (the ones you described) perfectly well. The problem most often is simply memory size. A typical P-IV came with 512Meg RAM, which is not enough for your use-case. However, as a dumpster diver, I know: two "finds" typically make one good computer.
Also, for the record: Ubuntu 9.10 works just fine on exactly the same kind of hardware XP runs fine on.
Oh and before the naysayers come that XP Is outdated and I should get a newer operating system: I have news for you... Those computer typcially come with a license sticker, which means, I can use the operating system legally. Heck, even my three year old laptop has a XP license and I do not see why I'd need to upgrade it at all. Why would I spend money to have less performance? I really don't get it. Buying Windows 7 for outdated hardware is equally as uneconomical as repairing it.
However, many older hardware does the job just fine together with said older software. Computing for the typical end-user has come at a plateau. Most computer sales in the future (and I think now) will be driven by replacement and not the need for new hardware and/or software.
LOL... I once found a computer that was clearly previously owned by a lawyer. I noticed, and formatted the disk. I also met my doctor once at the recycling centre. He was ditching a perfectly functional AMD64. I showed my interest and he gave it to me. First thing I did when coming home was wiping the disk. I don't know what was on it, nor do I want to know.
The few times I had computers from unknown origin at which I actually looked at the content of the disk, it was usually pirated movies, personal documents like letters and recipes.... Most of the time, I don't bother, because it's usually the operating system that's hosed and not the hardware. I don't have the patience to wait for a borked OS to load (if it ever loads).
Slashdot Mirror
Bookmarked. Thanks again!
Well, then we're two... I just, by default, assume slashdot commenters to be US American citizens.
Oh! I didn't know that! Thanks for that information... Gotta get one of those cables for my sister. Her graphics card only has DVI, and she uses a DVI-VGA converter to attach the computer to the VGA input of the HDTV.
Again, many thanks for filling up my ignorance. :-)
IANAL obviously.... Assume you buy OS X, I also assume you need to read the license agreement which contains the little bit about "Apple Branded Hardware". I do not think this machine applies. You are already in violation with the license. I'm pretty sure that in good old Europe we're safe because I expect EULAs to be severely slammed when evaluated by the courts. However my hopes for the US aren't that bright. (I might be optimistic about Europe... So, I won't hold my breath)
Now, second, let's just assume for the sake of it that you are a US citizen and that for some reason you can safely ignore the EULA because "you never signed anything". There is still that little matter that Apple effectively blocks you from running OS X of non-Apple hardware, which means you have to (and now come the magical words)... circumvent digital protection measures. That, my friend is illegal in the US under DMCA.
Is it enforcable? Probably not... It is as much enforcable as some random IT guy using the VLK of his employer on the machines of his family and friends. Nobody is going to notice, but it is 100% illegal.
Yes, I know... My sister has her computer hooked up to her HDTV that way. Still, I wonder why it's VGA input. Why not DVI? VGA is analog AFAIK, and DVI is digital... Connectig a computer to HDTV using VGA implies digital-analog-digital, where the simple path would be digital-digital which both DVI and HDMI provide.
HDMI seems to be present on all HDTVs, but not DVI... I wonder why...
and
So, it's laptop computer without a screen intended to be attached to a normal computer screen. Apart from form factor (an even then - many computers of the C64 era had this form factor) this has nothing to do with Commodore 64. It's just a PC like an other one on the market. At least if it had come with a HDMI port to be by default attached to a HDTV, then it would be closer to the Commodre 64 legacy.
Also... "Will run Mac OS X"... Definitely not legally....
All in all: Meh!
No problems :-)
WinCE?!? You must be confusing what I said: I have Windows XP MCE, which has nothing to do with WinCE.
So do I on my work laptop... However, I was talking typical users, not computer enthousiasts and/or professionals.
Of course it is, because it's major overkill. Even most Netbooks come with 160Gig HDs these days. I don't even think you can buy disks much smaller than that these days
True... How much space does it use up? I once ripped my whole CD collection to MP3. Total was 9GB, half of which I never listen to. So your point is?
Well, people should at least back up their pictures on a NAS and/or USB/eSATA disks. If you don't have any you're playing with fire. Loss or theft of laptop means loss of all your precious data.
Also, if I get to repair a computer (laptop or desktop) the first thing I usually get asked to do is to save their precious digital pictures of their kids/vacation/whatever... because they have no backup at all.
My motto is: carry around what you need, keep on the NAS what you want to store and backup everything on external disks. (Which I don't do is have offsite backups, but technically, that would be the wise thing to do)
Best of all worlds and it won't set you back much financially these days...
Oops, looked it up, I meant "wary"... English is not my mother tongue. Sorry, I'll try to remember to look up words, which I do not completely master.
The article seems to assume that a typcial laptop user needs a 120Gig harddisk. I don't think that's true. I can most certainly live with a 20Gig to 40Gig harddisk in a laptop. As a matter of fact, my current laptop (3 year old AMD Turion with "120Gig" HD) has two parts: about 16Gig fro WinXP MCE and the remaining 100Gig for Ubuntu. The 16Gig has all the productivity apps I need + 1 game (Portal), which still leaves me 2Gig free for data. If I didn't have the game, I'd have ~8Gig free for data. For typcial data like word processing documents and the like that is more than enough. It is perfectly usable for day to day tasks. (The Ubuntu part is my playground, but it could live just as wel on a 16Gig partition)
If you enter digital pictures into the landscape, it does change a bit. Still, that's still a lot of pictures. Besides, you don't want all your pictures on the move. They're much safer at home on server and/or NAS.
Music you say? We're talking about "needing"... You don't "need" music on your laptop, unless that's your profession, but that doesn't make you a typcial user.
While I don't think I'm going to shell out 100€ for a 32Gig SDD, because I'm a cheap bastard and what I have works, I could most certainly live with a 32Gig disk in my laptop.
I would be very weary of "girls" being able to "teabag" you... At least in real life :-P
May I be the first to say... WTF?!?
No seriously? WTF?!?
What's the point? It just exploits the hope of those guys to get a real date, without the actual hope of getting a real one.. Wait, scratch that... It will probably be hugely popular... *sigh*.
Do the girls get paid to do it, just like camgirls? Ah, yes, it's right there in the article... Well, guess there is more dignity in doing that than undressing yourself before a cam. Perhaps they can combine it and make even more money: for each time you frag her, she has to remove one piece of clothing.... /ME runs to patent the idea ;-)
Where are my modpoints when I need them? When I was in last year of University, I bought an 11 year old Audi 80. One of the best cars I ever had, reliable and no expensive repairs.
My current car is 10 years old (bought new 02/2000) and I'm not planning to replace it. I estimate it to be worth around 5000€, given it cost 35000€ new. Sacrifying it to any of the programs would be perfectly wasteful.
Checking on a second-hand car website (AutoScout24), typical asking price seems to be between 10000€ and 15000€ for similar build/age... That can't be right... People are out of their mind asking that much for a 10 year old car.
I actually wondered what kind of car I could get for 1000€ or a bit more... Seems that it mostly is 25 year old cars.... A bit longer and they qualify for the "oldtimer" status ;-)
Damnit, did I really need to fall on the only sociology geek on slashdot? ;-P Just kidding, your post is Insightful and I agree. :-)
True...
Hey, it was in my spare time. Of course I wasn't going to work. I said I did it for fun. I wouldn't ever charge anyone anything close to my hourly rate for computer repairs. That's insane and unfair.
That said, saying that my spare time isn't worth my working rate is completely dependent on your view of life. In my opinion my spare time is worth a thousand times my working rate. Just saying...
Actually, it's just 22$.... I looked in the wrong column ("Regular Price" vs "Web Price"... Regular price was 32$, which still is way lower than 40$ ) Next time, I'll cite the website appropriately ;-)
SATA PCI cards are readily available and not expensive. Just saying... Bought two of them in the supermarket recently.
Have you tried Kahlon? (Not affiliated, just a happy customer) A few years ago I had a multiprocessor system that required Registred ECC RAM. It could hold a total of 4GB RAM, but only had 1GB. When I wanted to upgrade the system to 4GB (so I needed 3x1GB), the stores in Europe asked around 300€ per stick. At Kahlon, I got three sticks of that price even after the horribly high import taxes. Now, I just checked and I could get those same RAM sticks for around 40$ each.
I do admit it was a pain to get them to trust me because they didn't take a credit card from my country (which is very small). I called them, said I would do a wire transfer and send them proof. A bit of a hassle, but it worked and I had my RAM.
I also used them ever longer ago when I needed 256Meg SIMMS (not DIMMS) for an old Pentium Pro 200 System.
It's the first place I go and look if I need "weird RAM".
I should check their RD-Ram prices.. I have a nice P-IV with 512Meg RAM with RD-Ram. Upping it to 1GB or more might make it desktop-usable again.
I see what you're trying to do there.
First you get it from eBay, probably second hand. If you go to a repair shop, it won't be and you pay new... If they have second hand stuff, it's unlikely the part you need will be there unless it's very generic. Those 30€ ain't going to cut it in the "normal user goes to repair shop" case. Let's be nice and count "only" 50€ for the part. For a new LCD screen very unlikely.
Second, you did that yourself... You have the skills to do so and you estimate the repair 50€. I agree, sounds like a fair price for the labour done. Just hope that you find a fair repair shop if you're a normal user.
Now the "normal user goes to repair shop scenario" spent around 100€ to get his 300€ netbook repaired. Presumably this netbook already is at least a year old and no equivalent is sold anymore. Netbooks, including Windows XP start at a frigging 229€ (not affiliated, I'm just a happy customer. For about the double of the price the customer gets a better, new, under warranty netbook.
In certain technological sectors repairing makes no sense. I remember when buying a new battery for a cellphone made sense. Years later, the battery of my trusted Siemens S35i (a great phone for its time) died. I wanted to buy a new battery. 60€ they asked... For 120€ I had a brand new cellphone with more features.... What would you have done? The netbook example, from the viewpoint of the non-technical user who cannot do repairs himself, is exactly the same.
I know that from your perspective you did the right thing and from an environmental point of view too. So, more power to you. I'd have done the same.
We're talking a bit alongs each other. I wasn't listing exhaustively what I found. My "letters and recipes" includes homework, essay, and term papers. I really meant "self-written stuff by the user", perhaps I should have said "letters, recipes and similar".
I agree with the Warez. Completely forgot how many Warez are to be found there.
My "pirated videos" implicity included "music". I should have said "pirated media".
I never encountered home made p0rn though.... Perhaps I didn't look hard enough. So, yes, except for the homemade p0rn, I found all of those. Basically we talked about the same crap, but I wasn't exhaustive enough to your tastes.
Yeah, I can do that. Frankly, I'm usually not curious at all. To me the most important is that the hardware works.
The difference here is scale... The way I interpreted the article, it is the customer who goes to a repair shop to let fix the computer. There won't be piles and piles of computers being able to supply work to the few "Mexican" workers. (Why the fuck "Mexican workes", may I ask? Say "low wage workers" if that's what you mean... Could be College Students for all you know...)
Look, I'll try to make a parallel to past experiences: When I was a kid and the TV was broken, my parents called a repairman. He fixed it and the TV was good for another few years. (TVs back then counted as an investment, and I'm still thinking that way... My 2004 CRT is not as hell going to be replaced unless it breaks). At a certain point, the labour costs of getting the repairman home exceeded the price of a new TV. During a transition period, it was still economical to bring the TV to the repairman, but after a while even that wasn't true anymore. Now "TV is broken" means "TV gets replaced". No attempt is made to repair it, unless still under warranty.
You see where I'm getting at: Computers have already passed to the point where "replace" is cheaper than "repair".
Landfills are not a good idea, and there is plenty of stuff (raw materials) that can be recovered quite successfully from technology. However, I'll take your statement a bit further: if you really mean what you said, then metallic cans (from drinks) should be plowed under because you can't but them in the garden. However, metallic cans are the singlemost recyclable packaging we have.
The use case you give, will work very fine if you make sure said P-IV has 1GB RAM and run XP together with for example Office 2003. (Or OpenOffice 3.x for the matter!)
Three years ago, I ran a P-III 600MHz laptop with 512Meg RAM, using Windows XP Pro SP2, AVG Free, iTunes, Thunderbird, Firefox and OpenOffice *at* *the* *same* time. Yes, starting up the programs was a bit of waiting but once in memory, there was no problem. Windows XP runs typically uses around 200Meg RAM with all drivers and an AV installed. With 1GB RAM you've got plenty to spare.
These days, computers are NOT restricted by CPU anymore. A typical P-IV does classic office work + casual games (the ones you described) perfectly well. The problem most often is simply memory size. A typical P-IV came with 512Meg RAM, which is not enough for your use-case. However, as a dumpster diver, I know: two "finds" typically make one good computer.
Also, for the record: Ubuntu 9.10 works just fine on exactly the same kind of hardware XP runs fine on.
Oh and before the naysayers come that XP Is outdated and I should get a newer operating system: I have news for you... Those computer typcially come with a license sticker, which means, I can use the operating system legally. Heck, even my three year old laptop has a XP license and I do not see why I'd need to upgrade it at all. Why would I spend money to have less performance? I really don't get it. Buying Windows 7 for outdated hardware is equally as uneconomical as repairing it.
However, many older hardware does the job just fine together with said older software. Computing for the typical end-user has come at a plateau. Most computer sales in the future (and I think now) will be driven by replacement and not the need for new hardware and/or software.
LOL... I once found a computer that was clearly previously owned by a lawyer. I noticed, and formatted the disk. I also met my doctor once at the recycling centre. He was ditching a perfectly functional AMD64. I showed my interest and he gave it to me. First thing I did when coming home was wiping the disk. I don't know what was on it, nor do I want to know.
The few times I had computers from unknown origin at which I actually looked at the content of the disk, it was usually pirated movies, personal documents like letters and recipes.... Most of the time, I don't bother, because it's usually the operating system that's hosed and not the hardware. I don't have the patience to wait for a borked OS to load (if it ever loads).