Thread

IIgs in Trash

68kMLA Hardware 16 posts Apr 21, 2008 to Apr 23, 2008

#1 Mon, 21 Apr 2008 - 21:10 68kMLA

A local city had it's annual spring cleanup trash pickup this week and as I was driving through I saw a IIgs on the side of the road. I already have a IIgs Woz so a spare could come in handy. I pulled over and got it. It had a monitor and a 3.5 inch as well as a 5.25 inch floppy with but all the cables were cut off them. Very sad. I could have used the drives. I noticed that this seems to be a common practice.

At another stop I picked up a HP Pavilion mini tower with a 466mhz Celeron in it. I pulled a matched pair of 128 PC100 ram sticks out of it and threw in a lesser amount to run Windows 98. It went up on Freecycle and someone took it in less than five minutes.

#2 Mon, 21 Apr 2008 - 21:52 68kMLA

Freakin' hell... Where is this mythical land where people quite literally put computers out on the side of the road?!

#3 Mon, 21 Apr 2008 - 21:55 68kMLA

One of those mythical lands is Toronto. About the only thing I haven't found at the curb (yet) is a Cray.

Alas, I'm leaving the city just as computer dumping season begins. (I'm in the University district, and the kiddies are out.)

#4 Mon, 21 Apr 2008 - 22:17 68kMLA

Nice find! I really don't understand why people cut cables off electricals as it renders them immediately useless- it's very stupid. At least at a push you could somehow get new cables and wire them in yourself, but it would be quite labourious.

#5 Mon, 21 Apr 2008 - 22:37 68kMLA

People cut cable off electricals if they are known bad so others don't try to fure them up and cause a fire.

Some probably do it to deny any use of it to anyone else (yea some people are like that).

#6 Tue, 22 Apr 2008 - 00:00 68kMLA

People cut cable off electricals if they are known bad so others don't try to fure them up and cause a fire.

I thought that was the issue myself, but no-one cares about anyone else bar themselves; the primary reason for people cutting the cables is for the copper inside. The older the electrical item, the more copper there is.

JB

Click to expand...

#7 Tue, 22 Apr 2008 - 00:44 68kMLA

the primary reason for people cutting the cables is for the copper inside.

Good point.

#8 Tue, 22 Apr 2008 - 03:36 68kMLA

the primary reason for people cutting the cables is for the copper inside.

Click to expand...

Good point.

But most of the old apple data cables I've cut open for modding seem to be aluminum, rather than copper.....aluminum is valuable too I guess....

#9 Tue, 22 Apr 2008 - 03:51 68kMLA

Aluminum is very hard to mine as well as copper.

#10 Tue, 22 Apr 2008 - 04:07 68kMLA

I think there's some urban legend that you're required to cut cables off any electrical equipment you leave out for trash. The amount of copper involved is so tiny that I really doubt that's the reason.

#11 Tue, 22 Apr 2008 - 04:38 68kMLA

One of those mythical lands is Toronto. About the only thing I haven't found at the curb (yet) is a Cray. Alas, I'm leaving the city just as computer dumping season begins. (I'm in the University district, and the kiddies are out.)

I'm closer to Cabbagetown and I've never seen good stuff out in the trash. What I've got was an Atari ST and LC 575. But the LC was UofT territory (Bloor) and on a snowbank.

#12 Tue, 22 Apr 2008 - 05:11 68kMLA

Little Italy here, and I've found stuff like a IIfx and a DEC server, even a Pentium III a couple of years back. Usually though, I haul back PCs for whatever parts are left in them. This year has been a bit more scant than usual though.

As for cutting the cables, I've never seen that. I've seen CRTs with the yoke snapped off lately, which is disgusting since it's pretty much people (vagrants) saying that they will take the good stuff but let someone else deal with the toxic waste.

#13 Tue, 22 Apr 2008 - 05:43 68kMLA

I have gotten some CRT monitors from the side of the road. I think I've gotten three 17" and a 19". I kept only the 19" and the rest I have given away over time.

#14 Tue, 22 Apr 2008 - 06:15 68kMLA

If I find a decent Sony crt I will snag it, buy I have too many monitors now.

#15 Tue, 22 Apr 2008 - 20:18 68kMLA

I cut cables off of anything that I know is dead, minus computers. It's not a lot of copper, but it begins to add up after awhile. I've got a pretty good heap of metal in my closet simply from ripping cords and motors out of things on my way out to the dumpster.

#16 Wed, 23 Apr 2008 - 14:08 68kMLA

I've started to carry a little multi-tool around with me for field stripping. Saves hauling 486es home just to get at the 72 pin RAM.