best cheap/free scores 1.1

[etnietering]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

A couple years ago I found a fully working Pioneer SX-950, that had had the plug cut off. So I bought a 2 dollar plug and attached it and it worked just fine. Also at the same place was a fully working (including the plug) Sansui QS-500. Within a week or two I had found 2 sets of speakers, and so for the price of a plug and some cables I had a huge working sound system.

[sLowEnd]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

i found an Edifier subwoofer a few weeks ago

[ratdude747]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

my grandpa once found a lazy-boy by the curb. nice walnut base. some wood screws later and it was good as new

[Marshillboy]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

This past weekend my friend gave me his family's "old" Dell Inspiron 530S, because it was sketchily working. I suspect it was merely a bad SATA HDD, and now I have a great media center PC running hulu to my projector. It has 1GB DDR2 ram, a 1.8ghz pentium dual core processor, integrated Intel GMA 3100 (I'm considering upgrading to a dedicated video card), and it's running linux off a USB drive until I can find a cheap SATA HDD replacement.

Earlier this week, my school happened to be throwing out two cosmetically immaculate dell LCD monitors (15" each). While one of them had a cracked lcd panel (I'm keeping it for parts), I've figured out that the other merely has a blown fuse in the inverter board.

In order to test the fuses, however, to be sure I needed a multimeter. It also turns out that my school was throwing out this old multimeter (that works great) from the 80s because it "didn't work". Upon opening it up, an ancient battery had popped and leaked/corroded one battery terminal. Using some sandpaper and white vinegar, I attempted to rescue the solder connection, but it was too far gone. Then, I just clipped/stripped and re-soldered the connection, and now I have a multimeter that works great (and looks like it's never been used).

[Junk Parts]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

I just got a 42 inch cut Lawn Tractor for my yard for nothing. It was used two seasons then parked in the barn because the owner died. It has sat for five years. The carb on the 14.5 hp briggs & Stratton I/C OHV motor was all gummed up. Its clean as new now. Changed out the oil, and did a complete grease job. Got one new tire, and a battery today. I'll be using it to cut my grass tomorrow. I have about $50.00 tied up in it and its sweet!
"Green Acres is the place to be. Farm living is the life for me..."

[Wizard]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

Just today, was at value village and snagged 3 smart battery nicd/nimh chargers for 3 bucks. That's excellent deal.

Usually you get 4 batteries along with batteries for about 50-80 retail. I do not buy dumb or timer-based chargers.

Cheers, Wizard

[kc8adu]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

got a craftsman 14.4v drill free from a neighbor who found it while cleaning out a house.i have another that takes the same packs so i not only have another battery i have a spare drill.last week he gave me a nice petzl headlamp.just needed a battery leak cleaned up.
nobody around here tosses stuff like this.they save it for me.or bring it for repair.so lets say the dumpster comes to me and i dont have to dive!
garage sales are common here and i find lots of nice stuff.one sale last week was loaded with electronics.
the guy told me to load a box and he would make me a deal i couldnt pass up.i did.
a big box of stuff for $20.
2 of the items were a myhd atsc tuner/capture card and a panasonic rf-2200.
a dual core toshiba laptop with a busted screen too.

[geep6]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

i found a dell optiplex gx620 with dual 3.0ghz possessor with 512 ram it has a few problems the hard drive was dead it was apparently in a flood do you think the caps need replacing does not boot all the time battery was also damaged leaked acid replaced the battery and the battery holder and cleaned up the acid it had a layer of dried dirt all in in cleaned it all up with a tooth brush and a air compressor i am using it too post on this forum i also found a 42 inch sharp aquos plasma or lcd not sure which it is The screen is damaged but it does come on any one know were i can get a replacement screen for it that would make a nice pc monitor i also found several xbox 360s with red ring of death i returned them to Microsoft for the warranty repair i found two nights ago a dell optiplex gx280 with a dead power supply it has a 40 gig sata hard 256 ram and a dvd rom drive i found this afternoon a Compaq pressario computer complete with key board and mouse haven't messed with it yet i know its a slow pc probably a 700mhz job i dive on a regular basis about every two nights and usually i hit about 30 or so dumpsters a night on the average i have a two door caviler crammed with stuff and then i have a nice big yard sell about two to three times a year i usually make $300 to $400 at each sell and its kinda fun cause you never know what you will find

[DixiePenguin]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

Latest computer scores from dumpsters and such:

1 - Tower with P4 2.4, 80gb hdd, 512mb ram, XP pro with COA, 52X CDRW. Marked as DEAD. Problem? Loose ribbon cable.

1 - eMachines eOne 433, needed cleaning, nothing else. Cleaned and did fresh Win98 install. Now delighting a 4 year old young lady with her own pc.

1 - Gateway Pro "alien type" pc, 1.8 P4, dirty with a few scratches, running XP with COA, now waiting for motherboard transplant.

1 - Dell Inspiron 1000, 2ghs celeron, 60 bg hdd, 512mb ram. "Doesn't work, turns on and shuts down, don't know what's wrong, you can have it". My son had it up and running in car by the time we got home. Combination of bad ac adapter and low battery.

3 - lcd monitors, 2 with bad caps, and one with plug short. Waiting for repairs

Best non-computer find? One antique oil company service station sign. Sold for $1500 to petroliana collector.

[ratdude747]

best cheap/free scores 1.1

since the original thread fell apart, lets start off again in hopes of a better thread...

without further ado:

since TC made it clear that discussing best socre on his "good score" thread was an act of terrorism (hijacking), i will solve the problem here.

please post:
best scores
recent good scores
quick questions about the scores
comments on scores.

to start, today i scored a palm IIIc for 15 bux at goodwill. it was half-off. had all of original stuff but the battery appears to not work at all. i found that to get a 1600mah on buy.com (includes screen protector) for $8 or $20-$30 for an 1800mah. ill get the 1600 figuring it is less of a gamble. luckily the unit is held together with screws and clips. and the battery cable has a plastic clip.

note, i edited the quote form the original thread because i left something out

[ratdude747]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

bump for keeping the good thread of the 2 ahead of the other

[Junk Parts]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

I didn't get anything for free today...

[kc8adu]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

all i got this morning was a bite from a green head horse fly.
but yesterday a neighbor was moving and gave me 2 32" lcd tv's and a box of harddrives.most of the drives i have tested are good.
the tv's are polaroids with bad megmeet power supplies.
easy fix!

[pentium]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Picked up a TRS-80 Model II with the external floppy box (so I now have two 8" drives) for FREE.

[ratdude747]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

somebody that shal not be named unless she chimes in on this thread sent me more free crap:

2 more 775 coolers- one is a zalman CNPS7000C-AlCu:



the other was an intel 3 wire aluminum w/o copper core:

like this one only with intel logo:




i also got the fan, heatsink, and hs mount clips for a zalman CNPS6500B-Cu (missing fan bracket):



i also got an intel DP35DP board.



it has 6 usb ports in back, 6 via header, high def sound w/ optical out, 1 firewire in back, one via header, 1 16x pci-e, 3 pci-e, 3 pci. no floppy, 1 ide, 1 internal eSATA, 5 SATA, support for up to 8gb of ddr2 ram (2gb x4). socket 775. doesnt like my p4 presscot 630. i only had 512mb for it anyway. i got it because some of the lands around the screw holes had a small amount of corrosion. i need to find a cpu to borrow so i can test it. more on that in a later post...

also, i got some POS msi uAtx board. had a celeron s478 and 1gb od pc133 ram inside. what is odd is that my compaq board is supposedly only good for 768mb of ram but the chipset is good for 1.5gb but when i put the 2 512mb stix in with one of my 256 chips. it accepted it. Compaq lied... they said the bios only was good for 768. maybe it will take a tualatin too since the chipset will...

also, i got a sound blaster audigy2 sound card:



has gameport/midi via external cable... my compaq's case ad a spot to bold ton a db15 plug so i did... perfect fit!

i also got the 5.25 bay adapter:



thank god the compaq 7000 case has 3 5.25 bays...


last, i got a biostar GeForce 8400 PCIe 256mb vid card to go with the mobo:




on my stuff!

[Junk Parts]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Its another day and I still have not gotten anymore free stuff.

[KeriJane]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Hi ratdude

I'm in Wisconsin today! Just helping some friends move up here.

But anyhow, all that junk was pulls from upgrades or repairs.

The DP35DP was in a business-critical system that was unstable. It had to be fixed in a hurry.
Solution:
Replaced everything but the optical drive.
The board "seems OK" but with the corrosion it wasn't going back in.
It requires a Core-based CPU such as a 4xx Celeron, or the e1xx Celeron or exxx "Pentium" or any Core2Duo or any Core2Quad
The vidcard was actually inferior to the G45 integrated video on the replacement board so it didn't go in.

That "pos msi" board isn't actually all that bad. MSI is generally regarded as somewhat decent and that board has somewhat decent caps on it.
The soundcard and panel came from the same system as the MSI. The beige case had fallen apart and the owner didn't want beige/black mix. (and thought modern onboard HD audio sounded better than Audigy)


Have fun,
Keri

PS. more useless junk that didn't go in the dumpster!

[ratdude747]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Hi ratdude

I'm in Wisconsin today! Just helping some friends move up here.

But anyhow, all that junk was pulls from upgrades or repairs.

The DP35DP was in a business-critical system that was unstable. It had to be fixed in a hurry.
Solution:
Replaced everything but the optical drive.
The board "seems OK" but with the corrosion it wasn't going back in.
It requires a Core-based CPU such as a 4xx Celeron, or the e1xx Celeron or exxx "Pentium" or any Core2Duo or any Core2Quad
The vidcard was actually inferior to the G45 integrated video on the replacement board so it didn't go in.

That "pos msi" board isn't actually all that bad. MSI is generally regarded as somewhat decent and that board has somewhat decent caps on it.
The soundcard and panel came from the same system as the MSI. The beige case had fallen apart and the owner didn't want beige/black mix. (and thought modern onboard HD audio sounded better than Audigy)


Have fun,
Keri

PS. more useless junk that didn't go in the dumpster!

sorry, but the msi had only 2 slots of slow ram (for a p4), no vid expansion, etc. sorry to put it that way. don't worry, the ram and sound went into my compaq presario 700, witha recapped board. it was not supposed to be happy with 512mb stix, but i popped them in and it saw all of the ram. like i said, compaq said it maxed at 768mb, via says 1.5gb, via was right. via also says it will do tulatin even though it came with a p3 800 coppermine. is it worth trying a tulatin in there (the local shop will probably let me bring it in to test).

[Newbie2]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

If ratdude needs a cheap processor for his Intel DP35DP motherboard the Celeron 430 1.8GHz processor is at a good price on Newegg, $39.99 with free shipping: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819116039

About the good free stuff that I have gotten in the past, one was an Intel Pentium 4 2.8GHz 533FSB Northwood S478 processor pulled from a dead Dell motherboard (it had a burnt southbridge) and the other was a VIA P4PA-UL motherboard from the trash with bad GSC capacitors (the bad capacitors were replaced and the motherboard works perfectly).

[ratdude747]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

no money for cpu right now. btw, im in souther indiana getting ready to drive over to holiday world for fun at the waterpark.