My dad passed a few days ago, he owned a computer/laptop repair shop and has a decades worth hoard of old computers. What’s shown is probably 30% of the entire collection. What steps do I need to take to start processing all of this?
My dad passed a few days ago, he owned a computer/laptop repair shop and has a decades worth hoard of old computers. What’s shown is probably 30% of the entire collection. What steps do I need to take to start processing all of this?
38 Comments
Sorry for your loss…
You could probably call an electronics recycling store. A repair shop might take a bunch of it off your hands. Putting it up on fb marketplace would definitely get some people interested. That’s all I can really think of.
You could sort through some of it and see if anything catches your eye. The case at the bottom of the first pic seems nice and the beige box in the middle of the second pic could make for a cool little retro build..
Unfortunately unless you’re planning to carry on the repair business or are *really* motivated to make a hobby out of it, most of this is probably going to be relegated to e-waste recycling.
Bulk recycling is pretty common, but you will need to call around a bit to get someone who’s willing to take so much stuff. May need to schedule a pickup or use a truck/trailer to haul it over to the collection point. And… don’t wear your good shoes when you go. Some of those recycling plants are disgusting. But I digress.
If you DO want to keep it, it may be worthwhile to pick up a couple universal chargers for the laptops just to see how many of them are bricked or are worth salvaging. Monitors less than 1080p aren’t going to have much reciprocal value, but it’s nice to keep a couple on hand for troubleshooting purposes. Keep the stuff that works, recycle the stuff that doesn’t.
If you find some REALLY old tech, like 00’s and older, do a little research and maybe post some of it on eBay or the like. Some of it is worth a pretty penny to hobbyists or collectors, though this can be hit or miss.
I know this isn’t much, but I hope it helps.
Other responses are solid. Your options are pretty much get into repair, ewaste, or ebay.
If there are any other mom-and-pop repair shops in the area, they may be interested in some of the parts.
Maybe donate to a school with a computer technology class?
If you’re in the US, and around the Mid-West states, and if you’re wanting to recycle it via ewaste. Look into a company called Green Wave. If you have enough stuff, they come to you and pay you $1 per item. Most places charge you for this service.
I wound up getting a TON of old stuff from my work and then having to move. I called a repair shop and told them I had bulk I wanted to sell them cheap. Sold laptops in bulk for $10 each, giant printers for $20. They took about 75% and I made $2k in two days.
I would post online and sell as much as possible at a random price. Say “$20 for any computer you want” then make bundle deals or something. After a few months of people weeding through pay to have the remainder recycled.
Sell it all as parts to another repair shop or 10 and you’ll make a killing if you know what you’re doing
If you lived close to me, I take old laptops/PCs and repair them and set them up for vets for free. I’m in Ohio. If your not near me, you could always find a group in your area that does the same kind of thing. Maybe go to your local VA. Or if all else fails go to a school, maybe just a thrift store and donate them.
Hard part is giving them away not knowing if their may be personal data on them.
Anything decent that you’d sell for 2-300 bucks?
Good to use for home business and play WoW?
Could you create a MEGA with all the vintage porn you find? Lots of stuff got lost in the Pornhub Purge.
Your local high school or community college may like some of these machines for labs and such.
I put my company in touch with our local CC here and we donated a couple pallets worth of laptops, PCs, and networking gear to the place and the instructors were ecstatic.
Are you trying to dispose of or get information from the computers?
Where are you located?
There may be value if it’s over 25 or under 7 years old. In the middle is probably ewaste.
You might want to consider talking to an estate sale company to sell off whatever has value, and then recycle the rest.
From what I see in the photos there are a handful of laptops that either look Apple or new enough to be worth something. Rest looks like random collection of bits and bobs that someone did not have a heart to throw away over the years (I do the same).
Hard truth on those is that after 1990 PCs were a commodity and mass produced. Technology on the other hand devalued exponentially (double performance at the same-ish price every generation for 30 years).
Especially big boxes on the later photos are worth micrograms of gold and platinum they have in them and that costs money to extract. Depending where you live you’ll either have to pay for clearing the shop or they will do it for free. Get in touch with recycling companies that do computers.
There may be an off chance that some of parts are valuable on their own like a sample from very limited run of last 3dfx card or maybe there are rare cult Macs hiding from the camera somewhere. But in general everything was made in millions of units so collector value is low. But if you find something that does not look like a beige box or modern-ish laptop maybe, who knows.
Condolences buddy
Crosspost at r/LGR I think u/raiderofawesome would want in on this.
Depending on the age of the gear some folks at r/vintagecomputing might be interested. Also for cases r/retrobattlestations
some Retro PC case people might be interested in some of those towers.
My condolences. Check the hard drives for bitcoin.
Sorry for your loss, I would definitely check every single hard drive for BTC wallets hate to throw away a million dollars or more.
https://preview.redd.it/dwlyjt3ii4gc1.png?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=772cfc6d41a435a43a1fe1734b2a9481c09a9921
Could we get a closeup of this?
Take over the shop and continue his legacy.
I’m sorry for your loss, and I really hate that I’m suggesting this, but if you’re able to put a catalog of what you have together, I would like to see if I could purchase anything from your father’s shop.
I really feel like it’s akin to blood money, but if it helps you offload anything and puts some cash in your pocket, at least there is that.
Other than that, many responses here are solid. You might be able to get a tax write off for donations as well. Whatever you choose, make sure you prioritize protecting your data first. My sincerest condolences.
Contact your local auction house and sell it all that way, they will go through the pain of estimating the value for you.
Search for “ewaste recyclers” in your area. I just saw a clip the other day about how local recyclers are helping increase the percentage of ewaste recycling in the US.
If some of the not-old-as-dirt systems work, you could look into donating working systems (especially laptops) to those in need.
Sorry to hear about your Dad. I can relate.
Good luck with which ever direction you find yourself going.
Load Linux on all of them, network together, enjoy your supercomputer. 🤓
That is really tough, sorry to hear about your fathers passing. You can maybe do a whole sale to someone? Might be a good way to declutter everything and get something out of it. Probably some stuff there that is worth a decent amount of money but I imagine a lot of it is ewaste. Hopefully you can figure something out, best of luck in this hard time.
This would be when I finally sat down and cried.
I’m not going to pretend to know the answer to that. I’m sure it varies quite a bit depending on whether you’re trying to sell or recycle/scrap. I just wanted to say that I’m sorry for your loss and your dad sounds awesome.
Sorry for your loss mate, It’s hard AF and hope that you and your family stay strong and united on this difficult moment.
Now for the humorous relief moment, follow your father steps and get the business going!
You got this <3
https://preview.redd.it/8mjzxlv8p5gc1.png?width=944&format=png&auto=webp&s=0e18fa05096dddd92b71c878f665a836c98842ab
Cashforcomputerscrap com is in Solon, OH. They pay pretty well and that’s only an hour away.
Or DM me, I might buy it all from you
Open muzeum.
my first question would be, did your dad ever talk about investing in bitcoin?
my 2nd would be whether or not any of these are personal computers and not jsut projects and say to go through those first to save any potential memories, but to tread lightly. you never know what kinda feeaks people really are til theyre gone and you go through their stuff :-).
3rd i would say im very saddened for your loss and say that most if not all of this is ewaste unless you happen to find another electronics hoarder whos looking for these
Build a super computer
I’m sorry for your loss: my condolences.