best cheap/free scores 1.1

[Curious.George]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Awesome!!

Email telling me a donor was impressed with my disk sanitizers and has asked if he could buy one (i.e., make one for him)! Amusing as its possible that he donated the equipment to us in the first place! (and now wants to BUY it back??!) Even moreso when you consider that his use of one would actually save us the trouble of sanitizing/certifying his future equipment (disk) donations. A deal too good to pass up...

So, I'll have to bring one home to lock down the software against duplication (the hardware belongs to the organization but I own the design for the software). She-who-can-make-one's-life-miserable has stated that if I'm going to bring 60 disks into the house, then I've got to be rid of 60 disks (or equivalent) to make space for it!

(smart move on her part as the 60-disk sanitizer will only be here temporarily but the purged disks will be gone forever! <frown>)

Bottom line, I'll put the existing packed box in the mail Monday (I can't recall what's inside as it was packed a while ago). And, hold onto a few of the SCSI68 drives in the hope of finding another box "soon". The rest of the drives I'll just scrap to keep her happy.

(sigh) I can see how "living alone" it would be so easy to surround myself with more "stuff" than I could ever use! <frown> I'll have to make a point of finishing up the yard this Fall so I can scrap the electric wheelbarrow.

[Topcat]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Bottom line, I'll put the existing packed box in the mail Monday (I can't recall what's inside as it was packed a while ago).

You're the best!! If a few of those 16gb SSD's made it, I have a NVR and a couple HTPC's excited for those!!

[ratdude747]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Went to a GW on my way home from a trip yesterday. Mostly Overpriced junk, but I did score a NOS (Still in shrinkwrap) for $10.

I think it's one of these:

https://www.trendnet.com/products/pr...d=515_TEG-S80G

I don't need it... but my parents might. Too cheap to pass up. They go on Amazon for about $23...

[ratdude747]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Bottom line, I'll put the existing packed box in the mail Monday (I can't recall what's inside as it was packed a while ago). And, hold onto a few of the SCSI68 drives in the hope of finding another box "soon". The rest of the drives I'll just scrap to keep her happy.

(sigh) I can see how "living alone" it would be so easy to surround myself with more "stuff" than I could ever use! <frown> I'll have to make a point of finishing up the yard this Fall so I can scrap the electric wheelbarrow.

Sounds like I'm not the only person who "owes" BCN members freebies. One I owe a vintage PSU and GPU (and some other fun stuff), the other I owe an old CPU I left for dead.

Those of you who I owe stuff (you know who you are): Sorry, I'm drowning at work. I didn't forget... at least not permanently!

[Topcat]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Nah, nobody 'owes' BCN anything....its just our usual junk trade merry-go-round!

[Curious.George]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

If a few of those 16gb SSD's made it, I have a NVR and a couple HTPC's excited for those!!

Box went out today -- no idea how long it takes in transit. Bogus return address, of course.

Managed to find 60 drives to pitch. Sorely tempted to rescue a box of ~100 128GB SSDs but they came from "computers" so too hard to ensure "wiped". (I think the 16G DoMs come out of network appliances so no risk of "personal" data, there)

I worked in The Yard, today (only a few of us are certified to operate the fork lift so I got drafted), so didn't get a chance to dig through the "board bin" for the DoMs. I will put it on the list for next week.

And, managed to rescue a pair of SmartUPS 750s. I'll have to find a convenient time to smuggle them into the house...

[Curious.George]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Sounds like I'm not the only person who "owes" BCN members freebies

"Owe" suggests indebtedness. I'm just finding homes for things that don't cost me too much out-of-pocket to ship!

[Dan81]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Scored these things now that I'm in Arad:

PC stuff:
Delux MG760 case w/ craptacular 400W PSU
ECS KT600-A
AMD Sempron (didn't check the speed)
various AGP card ranging between TNT2 M64 and FX5200
Brand new boxed S3 Trio 764 PCI card
V-Stream PCI Tv Tuner
ASRock ALiveNF5SLI-1394
Seagate Expansion external HDD board (USB to SATA adapter)
Western Digital WD5000AAKX 500GB SATA3
Seagate 7200.10 250GB SATA2
2x DVDRW drives (PATA)
Excelstor 80GB HDD (Hitachi)
NEC PC with Skt 939 Athlon64.

TV:
Samsung SyncMaster P2270HD - only 2 badcaps in the PSU, planning recap once I can source some caps here in Arad (anyone on this forum that is from Arad, feel free to PM me with info about that)

Other:
Samsung Galaxy Ace 4 SM-G357FZ

[mikay786]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Carboot this morning. Got some decent scores

4x Lenovo X240 i5 laptops - £120

no chargers / only 2 have RAM and no HDDs but all working apart from 1 with a broken screen. Should have left that but didn’t look carefully enough.

4Tb WD My cloud - £5 - working fine. Has a WD Red drive inside which was a nice bonus.

Blue Yeti mic - £10 - working

2 x Audi steering wheels with shifters and controls on them. Not sure what I bought these but thought they were worth a punt at £20 each.

PS4 controller - £10 - working

Xbox one Kinect - £5 - untested

PS2 slim - £10 untested

[Dan81]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Same here:

Club3D pack - Radeon HD5970 (at least dead, chips heat up but it isn't recognized) and Radeon HD7950 (posts but none of the outputs I have (DVI and HDMI) work, though has 2x DP ports)

Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3R - not sure if dead - without CPU it will stay longer (~2.5 seconds) but with CPU I get a fan twitch and nothing else.

Core 2 Quad Q6600 - works

4x1GB Geil DDR2 800 - works

Samsung J3 2016 Duos - smashed LCD, board works. Originally bought for a J3 (non-duos, boards are compatible) that was dropped in a toilet, but it didn't work in the end. While the board boots into Android, the LCD stays black all times.

Seagate (IBM oem) ST31000340NS - spins up fine.

[Topcat]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

2 goodie boxes in one week...one from a nifty source in the southwest with a fake return address, so add some SCSI HDD's to the fleet and one from the infamous 'supermicro tree' (which has been VERY dormant the last year) with a X6DAL in it and another of those goofy X7DCA-L mATX Xeon boards. this one was the audio version....I don't have a case that will fit one of these, so I'll shelf it for later....but I did test it....as a matter of fact, this post created from it with Mint Live 19.1.

[ratdude747]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

... and another of those goofy X7DCA-L mATX Xeon boards. this one was the audio version....I don't have a case that will fit one of these, so I'll shelf it for later....but I did test it....as a matter of fact, this post created from it with Mint Live 19.1.

Oh c'mon, you can probably find a case for it. Remember, they kick ass when built right. Mine is "showcased" in the living room and sees daily use, often times for gaming... it holds its own. Granted, this is with a GTX 970, but still, not bad for 2008(ish) hardware and "low power" CPUs...

[Topcat]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Oh c'mon, you can probably find a case for it. Remember, they kick ass when built right. Mine is "showcased" in the living room and sees daily use, often times for gaming... it holds its own. Granted, this is with a GTX 970, but still, not bad for 2008(ish) hardware and "low power" CPUs...

I think I found one today. HP case I stripped out (bad motherboard). The motherboard mounts upside down, and there's about 1/16th clearance on that 'bottom edge' of the motherboard. I'll just have to modify a couple mounts and one piece of metal that protrudes into where the board will rest along the bottom.

I can get a couple x5450's (4x core @ 3GHz) for ~$20. 32gb RAM is about $30. I'll have to rummage through my GPU collection, not sure what I've got. The board didn't come with an IO shield, but I had one that fit. So yea, too cool of a board to not use.

[ratdude747]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

I think I found one today. HP case I stripped out (bad motherboard). The motherboard mounts upside down, and there's about 1/16th clearance on that 'bottom edge' of the motherboard. I'll just have to modify a couple mounts and one piece of metal that protrudes into where the board will rest along the bottom.

I can get a couple x5450's (4x core @ 3GHz) for ~$20. 32gb RAM is about $30. I'll have to rummage through my GPU collection, not sure what I've got. The board didn't come with an IO shield, but I had one that fit. So yea, too cool of a board to not use.

I shouldn't have poked you... Now you'll have THREE of these. THREE!!!

Oh well... unless you pony up on a GPU, mine's faster

[Topcat]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

I shouldn't have poked you... Now you'll have THREE of these. THREE!!!

Oh well... unless you pony up on a GPU, mine's faster

The fastest one I've got laying around is a GTX460....so you'll get me on the GPU.....but there's strength in numbers, 3 of these awesome systems!

[ratdude747]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Scored a "For parts" Latitude E6430 for $25 at a yard sale:

Good: Near clone of my personal E6430 (nicest laptop I own). Good specs:

-i5 CPU (same as mine was stock, I swapped for a quad i7)
-1600x900 display (high res option)
-180GB SSD (older intel, probably stock)
-Webcam and Fingerprint options installed
-8GB RAM (same as what mine has after upgrades)
-Intel 4000 graphics (or whichever one the i5 has, not the nvidia option that sucks for general use)

Oh, and it totally runs. They were selling the power cord separately (some 65W chinese knockoff, no thanks, I have a box of 90W PA-10's to throw at it) so I suspect the issue may have been the POS power cord.

Bad news:

-Keyboard is toast. Not backlit, missing one key cap, and multiple columns out. I was going to upgrade to the backlit option anyway
-Missing SD slot filler (who gives a crap?)
-Has lame broadcom wifi (but the centrino 6300 chips these run best with are a dime a dozen any more)
-Has a partially messed up aftermarket lid cover adhered on (Meh).

I bought one in similar condition (less RAM, and somewhat worse specs) for $100 6 months ago... so for $25 across the street, Score???

It has windows 10 (was refurbed at some point, has both a 7 COA and a 10 COA ) but I don't know what I'll run on it. I don't even know what I'll do with it (upgrade for my dad or my wife most likely). But I wasn't going to let that one go. Hell no.

[Dan81]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Scored these:

Matsonic MS9367E SiS650GX mobo
generic LC-B350ATX PSU
512MB DDR400
Celeron 2.4GHz Northwood
Maxtor 6E040L0 40GB
Maxtor Fireball 3 40GB
Maxtor 40GB (5D something, don't know the model exactly)
some Dremel that needs fixing
ASRock ALiveNF5SLi-1394 w/ Athlon 64 X2 BE (don't remember the model exactly)
ECS KT600-A
Sapphire Radeon HD4870 1GB VaporX - small artefacting dots randomly scattered over picture, otherwise card is 98% functional, as in image is nearly clean!
Seagate 250GB 7200.10

[Topcat]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

-1600x900 display (high res option)

Real men run their laptops in no less than 1920x1200!

[Curious.George]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Real men run their laptops in no less than 1920x1200!

Real men don't run laptops (?)

Seriously, though, I have several 17" laptops ("aircraft carriers") and can't bear to use them. The keyboards all feel small/cramped (the numeric keypad should be set off to the side more) and keys lack sufficient travel.

And the displays feel tiny. Even the 24" display on this "email/WWW computer" (used relatively infrequently) feels cramped!

I use a pair of 30's on each of my "normal" workstations and three 24's on the CAD/EDA workstations (I used to run 6x24" but it's too far up to look at the top set of displays -- I'd need younger eyes -- and 3x30" would be too much side-to-side motion to take in all three screens).

I guess a lot depends on what you're using the machine for; I can tolerate a 14" laptop for email (only!) while traveling -- the extra size and weight of the 17" isn't justified. And, begrudgingly, use this 24" AiO for surfing web and email at home. But, any "serious" work usually requires too many windows to be open and you spend forever pulling overlaid windows back to the top as they get covered by whatever you were looking at recently. (maybe I need to port uwm to windows?)

I don't know how folks can live with phones as their "Internet interface"!

[Topcat]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Real men don't run laptops (?)

I'm not overly fond of them.....but laying in bed browsing, reading, looking for cool stuff, a laptop can't be beat (I can't stand tablets). Dell precision no less. High res, high quality display.....and short battery life.....I know I've got about 2hrs to get it done....which is good, keeps me from staying up all night and/or spending too much money. Limited KB use, save for some search terms....and the Precision's touchpad is fine for basic browsing.

I think my wife would be rather upset if I dragged my desktop into bed with us...