What's The Safest Way To Dispose Of An Old PC?

[Spamalot]

Before anyone gets too clever.... No I don't mean an old Police Constable..

 

I have an old Packard Bell PC and I wish to get shot of it but I'm worried about the safest way to do it.... should I try and remove the hard drive first?

 

It's an old Windows ME and it's died a death a few times but I worry about any data that can be extracted from it if it fell into the wrong hands!!

 

I know...I'm paranoid...

 

but any advice would be welcome.

 

Thanks Spam.

[sarajulldin]

remove the hard drive and ring your council up, there may offer to pick it up for you, or take it to the local dumps.

 

then get a sledge hammer, a chisel, gloves, and safety glasses and have some fun with the HD

[Spamalot]

Thanks... I just have to locate the hard drive then... I'm guessing it'll be obvious?

 

The one in my old laptop was easy to find... It fell out when my daughter dropped it..

 

Spam.

[PGH7447]

its the brick shaped thing that say Hard Drive on it:)

[sarajulldin]

haha thats funny about the laptop,

 

yh open it up, i assume you know how it looks as you seen one in a laptop, it will be bigger and thicker then the laptop one, pull it out (obviously no need to worry about damaging anything) quite litterally rip it out (ok a screwdriver maybe needed, or if you feeling in a fun mood use the sledge hammer again)

[Rooster-UK]

Hard-drive looks something like this......

 

[Spamalot]

its the brick shaped thing that say Hard Drive on it:)

 

Ah...thank you.

 

I've never disemboweled a PC before.. wouldn't like to be smashing up the wrong organ..

[Spamalot]

Thanks everybody... I shall get my toolbox out and set to asap.

[PGH7447]

enjoy:D

[Bookworm]

Spammy, my technically-challenged friend, here's a tip:

 

Locate you nearest friendly PC repairer, and ask them if they need spares for free, and ask them if they could erase/dispose of the HD at no cost to yourself in exchange for the rest of it.

 

My local one is always happy to collect scrap ones because they can always scavenge some parts. ;-)

[jailbird]

Send it over to Gizmo and then he can pretend it is his neighbour !

[Spamalot]

Aaaarrrgh.... too many options now!! You're trying to confuse me... I'd just got my screwdriver and sledgehammer out...

 

I don't do decision making..

[locutus]

Generally the harddrive is located below the floppy drive. Black 3.5 inches wide and about 4 to 5 inches long I think. Dispose of that as you wish, Some have silly shaped screws to prevent people from opening them, so big hammer on that, others you can unscrew and get the actual "disk" bit out and smash that with a hammer.

 

 

May I sugest you look for a local charity that sometimes take old computers to pass on to less fortunate households for the rest?

[Spamalot]

That does sound like fun.... I'll see how I get on with it... if I have any trouble I'll try Bookies approach..

 

Although I'm still smarting from the 'tecnically- challenged' remark.

 

Spam.

[pompeyfaith]

COMPUTER DONATING - Google Search

 

PF

[Spamalot]

Thanks PF... I shall look at that option too.

[pompeyfaith]

Pleasure because with this places even if the PC is no good as a unit they can use the parts to build others.

 

Im sure there will be somewhere local to you.

 

PF

[andydd]

Pleasure because with this places even if the PC is no good as a unit they can use the parts to build others.

 

Im sure there will be somewhere local to you.

 

PF

 

I agree..Id never dream of throwing away/destroying a whole PC. I always dismantle it, maybe bits in there could be handy in future or flog on ebay, Hard Drive, Ram, CPU, etc or as suggested Im sure someone/a charity would take it off your hands. If you are worried about whats on the HD its quite simple to connect up the HD to another PC and make sure it is completely wiped clean.

 

Andy

[Tezcatlipoca]

As others have said, always, always, always get rid of an old PC - if working - by either donating it, stripping it for spare parts, or you could try simply waiting for a sunny day then leaving it outside your house with a sign saying it's free to a good home. We do the latter in Brighton all the time for pretty much anything, and there will always be people who appreciate it.

 

For the hard drive you can either format it, or just remove it completely. To do the latter, just remove the phillips screws that hold the side panels on (they'll be at the rear) and remove both panels.

 

Locate the hard drive. It will have two cables plugged into the back, one power (probably a white transluscent plug with three or four coloured canbles going into it) and one data cable (if the PC is old, this will almost certainly be a large flat grey ribbon cable). Pull both out.

 

The hard drive is sitting inside a metal carriage, fixed to it by a number (normally 4) of phillips screws in its sides (two on the left, two on the right, which is why we removed both side panels).

 

Take out all those screws, then simply slide the whole hard drive out of the case. Pop the side panels back on, screw them in, and you're done.

[Beck1968]

Donate your PC

 

 

1, Power up.....check CD tray / Floppy drive for media

 

2, Remove the Hard drive and smash to bits with hammer

 

3, Put PC in a good cardboard box

 

4, Goto post office

 

5, Mail to your DCA.......

 

 

COST ?? ....... a lot less than you think

 

Giving to a "worthy" charity ...... is better than throwing away

 

 

Just imagine how pleased they would be.........Kids opening Crissie prezzi's :lol:

[andydd]

Why has everyone got an obseesion with smashing the hard drive to bits !.

 

Just pop it out and keep it, its always usefull, use it as a backup drive or pop it into another PC or build a whole new computer, flog it on ebay, donate it, the list is endless.

 

Destroying a HD so the data can never be retrieved is in fact very difficult, I saw a tv prog where they were run over, dropped off building etc but the data was still recoverable, yes the actuall 'disc' inside can be removed and destroyed but its quite hard work and fiddly to get that far, save your energy and use it for something else, doorstop maybe ?

 

Andy

[locutus]

You can always get an external hard drive enclosure (cost about £5 - £10), plug the old hard drive in, and get access to your old files. It's also very good for backing up your data, and you can use it if you upgrade to a new computer to transfer your files.

[Bookworm]

Although I'm still smarting from the 'tecnically- challenged' remark.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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[Spamalot]

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Forgiven..

 

Now... I like the idea of being able to use the old hard drive again as it has software on there that I can no longer get, but I don't know whether it is irrecoverably damaged..

 

I know Bookie will call me tecnically challenged again, but everytime I have used 'scandisk to check the drive for errors it has never completed the scan because it says something is trying to write to the disk and a similar sort of thing happens on defrag... it gets as far as about 10% and then goes back to the beginning again...

 

Would it really be worth keeping the drive for further use or do you think it's well and truly had it?

 

Thanks,

 

Spam.

[SteveH2508]

... but everytime I have used 'scandisk to check the drive for errors it has never completed the scan because it says something is trying to write to the disk and a similar sort of thing happens on defrag... it gets as far as about 10% and then goes back to the beginning again...

 

Would it really be worth keeping the drive for further use or do you think it's well and truly had it?

 

Thanks,

 

Spam.

 

That is sometimes caused by a screensaver or similar kicking in - if you disable all of that type of stuff you might get scandisk to run through to the end.

 

You also said something about having some software in the disk. If it is the installation files that may be OK but stuff for Windows ME and the like is often hard to get runnning on XP/Vista. (Don't even think about keeping Windows ME!)