Scrap Value from Computers

FinancialDisaster

I was recently told by a friend that there is value to be had in old computers in terms of scrap value, now I know that scrap is worth more these days but what exactly can be stripped from the computers themselves? Does it need separating out (say the hard drive bits etc)?

Any help appreciated as I have access to a quantity of old computers via work that they simply want rid of and if I can move them I can have them

totalsolutions

tis gold on them contacts. Dump them in Africa, then we all get food poisioning.

amcluesent

Yep, there's more gold in a tonne of old mobis than in a tonne of ore taken from a gold mine.

vansboy

FinancialDisaster wrote: »

Any help appreciated as I have access to a quantity of old computers via work that they simply want rid of and if I can move them I can have them

Hope that the company have done the required steps to make sure the info, on the computers is deleted - looking at your Nik, makes me think of potential problems, if they haven't - that is to destroy the hard drive with an axe or similar!!

VB

evilgoose

You have to be aware of WEEE regs when disposing of equipment. We used to use a company called PMI, but they've gone under. We now use

http://www.wastetechnique.co.uk/

Computers are full of goodies - aluminium, steel, copper, gold and other precious metals - but also some nasties - cadmium, mercury, lead solder etc

Firstly your company will be opening themselves up to possible problems unless the HDD have their data completely removed - and I dont just mean formatting, the data need to be physically overwritten many times before it becomes unrecoverable. Or as said above - you can just smack the drive several times with a hammer. Would your company require a certificate of data destruction?

If you can get the drives apart the platters make nice coasters.

Depending on the age, parts can be separated and sold, memory, CPU, PSU, the HDD - (taking into account the above).

Cases are steel and could be weighted in once the parts are removed.

Monitors - well to be honest CRT's are a right albatross, you can't even give them away.

(if your council takes computer parts - like the motherboards)
Possible suggestion for you could be - remove the parts from the case, psu, motherboard, disc drives, HDD. Remove the plastic fascia. Smack the HDD with a hammer several times, remove the circuit board from the bottom of the drive, most of the rest of the drive is then aluminium, magnesium and copper, then weigh the steel cases and the drives in for scrap.
Then take the circuitboards to the council recycling center - if they accept them.

The precious metals need to be seperated by special processes. (The solder etc is often removed by 3rd world people in terrible conditions)

Are you able to make working computers from them? You can buy HDD erasing programs quite cheaply. Its a shame really, We've thrown literally 100's of computers away, because the amount of work involved in making them 'safe' from a data standpoint is just to costly.
We have given some to charity, but it just took to long for the tech's to do.

Hope that makes sence.

phill99

mwff1gp wrote: »

Hi all, may i add we are a registerd weee handler and have just started recycling weee (Laptops and power supplies) with free collection and data removal quantities preffered,
gfwholesale.co.uk many thanks.

Promotion is not allowed on this forum. Spam.