Got issues passing up broken electronics that have been thrown outside?

[rollerskate]

It is SO hard for me to walk by any broken electronics that people have placed outside as trash. I just came across a TV someone tossed by the garbage and it was awfully tempting to drag it back home. My gut instinct is always "Yay! Something to take apart and do something with!" Sometimes I may fix them, sometimes I may just gut them to figure out how they work and/or collect parts that may come in handy later down the road, other times they call victim to some mad science experiment or art project. It's not just mere curiosity or interest, I really feel strongly compelled to grab them and gut them and find a use for them, I imagine much like an alcoholic feels strongly compelled to drink a beer set in front of them. I used to have parts and broken electronics stacked everywhere in my living quarters, and even some stashed away in friends garages who shared my same fascination for electronic rejects, but in recent years I've been making a huge effort not to give in to the urge with that or any of my other hoarding tendencies when it comes to hobbies. Recently though the urge to re-engage in my hobbies has became almost unbearable, and I simply don't have the money right now to participate in them even on a small scale. So I suppose that explains the sudden urge to return to my roots - taking apart and hoarding old electronics.

Anyhow, I'm just wondering if anyone else here shares in that urge to pick up electronic rejects. I've had it ever since I was a kid, and got disciplined many times over for taking apart family electronics until I learned it was better to wait for them to break then spare them from the trash, LOL.

 

[GoofKing]

It might not be such a bad thing if you could fix them up You could get free stuff out of them lol If you get the chance, look up "The secret life of machines" on Youtube. It's an old U.K. educational television show about how things like VCR's, Digital watches, Televisions, and radios work ....

Yeah, I have this issue as well. I used to beg teachers to take home old computers that didn't work anymore because I wanted to take them and have a look inside of them and/or fix them up. I almost caused a fire because I didn't check the IDE cable running to the hard-disk drive lol

 

[Judge]

My father used to bring me stuff like that from construction sites he'd have to inspect. Never knew what he might bring home. Of course this was long before the personal computer era. But I loved dismantling and attempting to reuse some of that stuff.

 

[rollerskate]

It might not be such a bad thing if you could fix them up You could get free stuff out of them lol If you get the chance, look up "The secret life of machines" on Youtube. It's an old U.K. educational television show about how things like VCR's, Digital watches, Televisions, and radios work ....

Yeah, I have this issue as well. I used to beg teachers to take home old computers that didn't work anymore because I wanted to take them and have a look inside of them and/or fix them up. I almost caused a fire because I didn't check the IDE cable running to the hard-disk drive lol

It's definitely a bad thing when you have so many old PCs you have to enlist a buddy's help in storing them, none of which you really have any use for or can sell. A common argument for me was "But it's in perfect working condition! And it's a Pentium II! Throwing it away would be such a waste of a good machine!" As if a machine with 128mb of RAM was solid gold... And very useful, LOL. At one point my buddy and I had an entire shed in his back yard filled to the top with old PCs. And at that age, one cannot even argue many of the parts are very useful.

Buy there's a certain thrill in getting one up and running again, throwing a lightweight Linux distro or old version of Windows on the hard drive, and being able to declare it useful again. Plus the love of having a piece of history working. It didn't stop with PCs. I even had a Betamax and front projection TV at one point. The TV I actually used because it was awesome, like having a portable movie theater in my home, and it was a HUGE bragging point for me due to its extreme rarity. The Betamax stayed hooked up mainly for looks, especially since the remote looked like something out of a sci fi novel. Never managed to get any movies for it though, LOL.

Sigh. I miss it! But I know now I would probably be constantly chasing my six year old away from my "collection", LOL!

 

[rollerskate]

Though I do still have an old Mac laptop and an IBM Thinkpad (To this day I still love the red button "mouse" they sported).

 

[LittleTigger]

YES O man. I am dincking around with an Odroid here and
there, trying to make it into a tablet some day.
I already got a Raspberry Pi to use as a backup PBX server.

I like to salvage electronics and get them working again,
especially 1970s vintage commercial video equipment. or old
Unix mainframe machines.

 

[klikmaus]

Electronics, computers, appliances... and especially mechanical CLOCKS! To be honest... vacuums are beginning to become more of an annoyance than anything else-- easy fixers (generally they are tossed for broken belts or they're clogged up) but there isn't really much of a market for used vacuums--- they pile up last!
Old IDE era computers are becoming as common as vacuums too, though they can still make you money. Format the hard drives for extra storage, strip down the rest of the machine for recycling the parts. Sometimes the older towers have decent PCI cards that can bring a few bucks online like Linksys wireless cards, upgraded sound and video cards etc.... Record players are always a good find (even the console cabinet units) if you can get them fixed up good. Vinyl has always had the best audio quality.
Rollerskate I see your betamax and raise you a laser disk player!

 

[rollerskate]

Electronics, computers, appliances... and especially mechanical CLOCKS! To be honest... vacuums are beginning to become more of an annoyance than anything else-- easy fixers (generally they are tossed for broken belts or they're clogged up) but there isn't really much of a market for used vacuums--- they pile up last!
Old IDE era computers are becoming as common as vacuums too, though they can still make you money. Format the hard drives for extra storage, strip down the rest of the machine for recycling the parts. Sometimes the older towers have decent PCI cards that can bring a few bucks online like Linksys wireless cards, upgraded sound and video cards etc.... Record players are always a good find (even the console cabinet units) if you can get them fixed up good. Vinyl has always had the best audio quality.
Rollerskate I see your betamax and raise you a laser disk player!

LOL oh man laser discs...

 

[DylanKP]

I used to pick up everything I found on the street, if it looked even relatively useful. After several years of 'don't do that,' I've quit my habit; however, until last week I had an old '90's typewriter that I was planning on fixing. I got rid of it because my grandma was making a big deal out of it.

 

[Axeman52]

Not only do I feel the urge to collect discarded electronics (usually I am able to force myself to resist), I also hate to throw away stuff that's broken, I always want to try to find a way to fix it, because it just really bothers me if something repairable gets thrown into landfill. It's wasteful, and people are too keen to chuck things away and buy a replacement these days, which really, really worries me.

 

[Nitro]

I am a guy that uses a 53 foot semi box trailer for a shed...I could fill a dumptruck with all the electronics I save and salvage from my surroundings...I still have most of the cellphones I bought over the past 20+ years and my second computer...my first one got torn apart to fix another one... I used to salvage VCR players from the trash and fix them for my pick the one you want,but leave me your broken one days...there were usually 50 to choose from...my favorite VCR I got on exchange was filled to the brim by a child with everything in the junk drawer that would fit in it including her peanut butter and jelly sandwich...I got that player work again...I am not a hoarder...hoarders never get rid of anything...laughs

 

[doordoctor]

I feel bad as well for some electronics, have a few times plucked out a perfectly working computer from the dumpsters, once plucked one out and it was ONCE OWNED BY A LAWYER (you would think they would clear out the private info or keep their harddisks!) nope, this one (I tossed it about 6 months after finding) the owner's son even had his well umm, private moments with it (the browsing history, eeks!)

other times I have taken apart rear projection Tv's.

TIP: the rear projection unit is filled with mineral oil (not harmful)the oil is there for clarity of the picture when light passes through the lenses, but if not careful, dis-assembly can be messy.

but they do have something useful, the lenses, they are like 3 inches around and really thick, can use them as magnifying globes (or desk paperweights) scavenged like 6 or 8 of them out of TV's when I helped my dad with the local convenience center bulk waste drop-off site.

this same thing is how I got a few screen door closers, and my first LCN door closer.

with anything, electronic or all mechanical, I am totally for rebuilding, if you have the skill or know someone who knows alot about the product or part, have them fix it, many times the part it needs is cheaper then the new device, with the closer, that was the result of a custodian taking down old so they can put in new, NOTHING WAS WRONG WITH OLD ONE!!! ohh well, their loss, my gain

I no longer help with the convenience center due to politics and in case if I got hurt helping my dad, (at first they didn't know i was helping, more less kinda "took over" (mayor seen me on CCTV screen helping and sorting people out to dump their stuff, he almost gave me a raise (thinking I was an employee of the center)

they didn't want to be held liable if I hurt myself (like I would turn around and file a lawsuit over something I did?) but its because of risk management, they didn't want to run that risk, so had to stop.

 

[LgndKllr24]

I haven't ever really been like that, but my dad, that is a different story. It wasn't just electronics, he would take just about anything he saw in front of somebody's house that was heading for the garbage truck. One time there is a bicycle that was in the river across the street, and he recruited me to help him build a contraption to fish it out of the river. Why he wanted this bike so bad, I have no idea. He almost ended up falling into the river trying to get it out. And then we got it out, and he gave it to our neighbor...

 

[GoofKing]

I feel bad as well for some electronics, have a few times plucked out a perfectly working computer from the dumpsters, once plucked one out and it was ONCE OWNED BY A LAWYER (you would think they would clear out the private info or keep their harddisks!) nope, this one (I tossed it about 6 months after finding) the owner's son even had his well umm, private moments with it (the browsing history, eeks!)

It didn't have private files or documents about the lawyer's clients or work did it ? :/ He didn't sound like a person with much common sense if he's not going to bother to wipe the hard-disk clean before tossing it and that's liable to come back and bite him in the ass ...

 

[GoofKing]

I'm tempted (and thinking about) getting some old projection screens from a school dumpster, you know the ones which they use for projecting notes unto a screen ? I should ask the principle first of course if I could have a couple of the projection screens ...

I always wanted one of those and think they would come in handy lol

 

[doordoctor]

It didn't have private files or documents about the lawyer's clients or work did it ? :/ He didn't sound like a person with much common sense if he's not going to bother to wipe the hard-disk clean before tossing it and that's liable to come back and bite him in the ass ...

it had the kid's homework and his well, web browsing history as well as his social networks, I of course could not visit the networks since I did not have the computer hooked up to the internet, I don't remember seeing his work stuff, was just his personal stuff, vacation and pool party/birthday pics.

hey, could be worse, once came across a HDD that was owned by a fitness class instructor at a gym, well, she well, NSFW from what I seen on the AIM/Yahoo! chat logs... (she flirted with a client of her's and was more then just a "hey, your cute" type of flirt!)

another was a laptop that belonged to a teacher from the school board, teacher only used it once to type out a flyer for back-to-school night for her student's parents (old Macintosh computer)

some people just dont understand that if the computer is "dead" (motherboard fried) they think the whole thing is bad, (harddrive too) and not know that there is NOTHING wrong with HDD but all you need to do is hook up the harddrive to the SATA or IDE cable as a slave and see if it shows up in the "computer" as a secondary/storage drive, then boom, everything that person did is available to all to see, (and depends on the path you use to look at the files on it)

so yea, be safe and keep your old hard drives or properly destroy them (break platter inside by drilling holes into it, or dissect it and keep the glass platters and magnets (strong magnets, some aspies LOVE magnets!)