best cheap/free scores 1.1

[tom66]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

42" LG LCD

Cost me £20 from the local dump and £5 in caps to fix.

Only 720p but I can't tell the difference between 1080p and 720p at a 10 ft distance.

Works great!

Also, a 19" Xerox LCD given to me in a not working condition, for free. Seven caps replaced and it works great.

[ratdude747]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

lucky!

my only stuff on that caliber i got free was not from dumpsters but people who had no use for stuff and told me to take it and find a use for it.

One tiem a guy gave me a whole vanload of stuff (there is a thread about it somewhere). incuded:

1 box of audio/ video cables and adapters (some fancy with gold connectors)
1 box of old computer cables (40pin IDE, floppy, serial) and old cards (modems and 10 mb network cards). also had an old cable modem, a wired router (metal clad netgear, now a switch), and a 10m switch with coaxial
1 dell dimension 2400 with dell edition SB LIVE! 5.1 channel audio card. virused up with an 80gb WD drive. now used by family friend who needed a computer.
1 dell dimension 300, bad MB and hdd. had a toshiba dvd -rw drive and a prescott p4. parted out, cpu and copper cooler went to my mom's dimesion 4600, dvd drive went to an emac.
3 old computers. one had an abit bp6 (moron here broke it before he could recap it), one had an abit bh6, one had an MSI s462 board (didn't survive one of my early recaps). all had junk PSU's
3 CRT monitors. a 20" samsung (slight burn in), an envision 17" (actually a nice unit), and an ancient 800x600 provision.
1 new in box flimsy side-saddle case. too thin to save. junked out. psu was a joke too.
and for the GOOD stuff:

1 asus k8n32-sli with a 3800+ athlon64x2. cpu had a bent pin. also had 4x corsair 512mb ddr 3200. sadly, yours truly messed it up and after fixing that it randomly died.

1 athlon64 x2 5600+ socket AM2 cpu. lost it, if i ever find it again it will be sold.

4 brand new in packaging ddr 3200 1gb modules. currently used in a rig that only sees 3.5gb of it... waiting for a better use.

not bad for one trip?

forgot to add- I also got 2 sets of computer speakers- a set of sun 115H and a compaq premiere sound set with a large 5 cone subwoofer. both are better than average, the latter kicking a**.

[kc8adu]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

well another lucky strike!
i fixed a cb for a trucker down the road from me.solder joints and a meter light replaced with a led.called him up this afternoon with the news.he said i have something you might be able to use for parts.ought to be a good trade for the repair.i dont think it works and its too damm complex for me to care anyway.turned out to be a yaesu ft-8900.and it works fine.running it on the skywarn net right now.big storms forming up north.

[ratdude747]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

well another lucky strike!
i fixed a cb for a trucker down the road from me.solder joints and a meter light replaced with a led.called him up this afternoon with the news.he said i have something you might be able to use for parts.ought to be a good trade for the repair.i dont think it works and its too damm complex for me to care anyway.turned out to be a yaesu ft-8900.and it works fine.running it on the skywarn net right now.big storms forming up north.

nice... I never really got into CB and radio stuff like that... Although I do have my grandpa's old police scanner somewhere (I could pick up EMS helicopter transmissions on it..)

[B757]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

-Pair of Altec Lansing ACS 40 computer speakers. Missing subwoofer, but decent sound quality.
-6 pin -> 4 pin Firewire cable. Only literal dumpster find. I was photographing near the school dumpsters when some C++ books caught my eye, and I saw that there were also a bunch of these cables. These appeared brand new. So well, I reached in and grabbed one.
-IBM 5291-2 keyboard. Old school clicky keyboard, except it won't interface with a PC. Cool to have lying around though.
-Bottom half of an IBM Thinkpad T41p - missing a ton of parts though.
-Dell GX 270 SFF. Typical blown caps. I eventually just gave the CPU and RAM away and harvested the motherboard for parts, and threw out the case.
-Ancient black PowerBook of some sort. Took it apart out of curiosity and threw the parts away.
-Inspiron with a Pentium II. Did the same thing as above.
-Several desktop computers. I usually just part them out for interesting parts. I've gotten a decent Creative SB0350 card, and a card reader out of a thrown out Gateway. Other than that, I've gotten numerous heatsinks and fans out of them, along with numerous 40GB hard drives.

[Howie]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

Couple of cool stories here.

* Friend scored me ten P4 computers and miles of network cable at the tax place she works. *
* Rich family down the street threw out P4 computer, looked to be mid 2000's.
I asked if I could take it and they actually told me no lol ..grabbed it from trash after dark*

My best find was at 16 years old.

My best friend talked me into going to a guys house with him who did tattoo's. While there, I noticed a guitar in the corner with no bridge pickup, but everything else. I asked him what was wrong with it and he said that the pickup went bad and if I wanted it to take it because he just bought a new guitar. It was a 1972 Gibson SG. He then said, " Oh, wait, I have the case for it too".

It had some great mods like Grover tuners and a $75 aftermarket bridge. Played that guitar 25 years till the frets were really worn out and sold it on Ebay 3 months ago for $550. The listing lasted 30 seconds before it sold lol.

[Junk Parts]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

I think that you let the guitar go on the cheap side.

[RJARRRPCGP]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

* Rich family down the street threw out P4 computer, looked to be mid 2000's.
I asked if I could take it and they actually told me no lol

What an ass they were. That wouldn't be theft.

[PCBONEZ]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

* Rich family down the street threw out P4 computer, looked to be mid 2000's.
I asked if I could take it and they actually told me no lol ..grabbed it from trash after dark*

Should have left them an old tire in compensation.
.

[deckart]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

I was drinking at a pub in the city part of London with a friend,came out,walked up the road to catch tube home and in a skip(UK term for dumpster) saw two 3m x 1m x 55 mm lengths of honey Maple being chucked to make way for a new bar.
Friend and I got drove back in my old VW Polo somehow got both lengths on the roof bars and drove gingerly home as the weight turned the car into the height of a go kart.
Turned the lengths into benches and table to sit 10 people.
Wood itself was worth hundreds of pounds.
That is my best and only find.

[momaka]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

* Rich family down the street threw out P4 computer, looked to be mid 2000's.
I asked if I could take it and they actually told me no lol

I've seen similar things on craigslist too. One time, a guy put a posting for a P4 computer for $15 and said if no one buys it by the end of that day, it's going to the trash.... I mean WTF, can't he just set it on the curb and put a curb alert posting?

[Howie]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

I think that you let the guitar go on the cheap side.

Yeah, somewhat, but a professional re-fret was near 200-300 and I needed the money so priced it to sell.

[aftonr]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

cobra ltd 29 classic easy fix too!

[goodpsusearch]

Intel SE440BX - More Free Caps!!

I got lucky again and picked an old Intel 440BX motherboard that has 9 (!) United Chemicon 2200uF 16V LXZ capacitors!

They have 0.03 esr 1950 ripple, 7000hrs endurance and look fine. I could use them in applications like switching power supplies.

[Perineum]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

I found a:

Liebert GXT2 700VA 2U Rackmount single phase on-line UPS
AND! extra 2U optional extended battery cabinet

When first powered on it was screaming unholy hell. Batteries inside the unit were shorted and dead. Swapped new batteries in it and it's currently running fine.

This thing has a double conversion On-Line design and true sine wave output so I'm pretty happy. 700VA is a bit low but it will just be powering a home server that houses 16 2TB HDs - and I don't expect it'll ever pull more than 500W at full out from it's 850W 80 Plus gold rated PSU.

At 700VA load it's supposed to last 3+ hours with the battery pack attached

Picture of it in it's tower configuration:

[musjim]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

This years best dumpster find for me was a 47" Westinghouse 1080P LCD TV - On curb for trash, boxed up like the day it came from the store. First time I powered it up, only had the amber light and would not boot. Thought I might have to start to troubleshoot but found a forum that recommended updating to a custom firmware. I gave it a try, and its been sitting in my living room ever since, no problems at all. Easiest fix ever.

[ratdude747]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

This years best dumpster find for me was a 47" Westinghouse 1080P LCD TV - On curb for trash, boxed up like the day it came from the store. First time I powered it up, only had the amber light and would not boot. Thought I might have to start to troubleshoot but found a forum that recommended updating to a custom firmware. I gave it a try, and its been sitting in my living room ever since, no problems at all. Easiest fix ever.

you might want to open it up... historically Westinghouse+LCD=Bad caps.

Polaroid units had the same problem... rebadged chinese junk. luckily a recap would fix them 99% of the time (so for the cost of caps you get a nice LCD)

[B757]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

Just got a pretty decent scanner. Guy down the road threw out an Epson 3490 Photo, so I asked him if it works and he said it did, so I took it.

I have some film I want to scan so I'm pretty thankful for this.

[TBoneit]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

you might want to open it up... historically Westinghouse+LCD=Bad caps.

Polaroid units had the same problem... rebadged chinese junk. luckily a recap would fix them 99% of the time (so for the cost of caps you get a nice LCD)

shhh.... My TV resembles that remark.

Since it is the center of my Media center + computer display.....

[ratdude747]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

shhh.... My TV resembles that remark.

Since it is the center of my Media center + computer display.....

... you better check it and recap if you find crap brands. don't desolder caps until new ones come in. (you can continue to use it while you wait for the caps).


if it has crap, if it hasn't broken yet it probably will soon. if it goes out, then look where you are... if its broke you can't use it while you wait for shipping.