Sledge Learning the E-waste ropes.. have some compliments and questions!

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Ok well did some searching tonight.. I thought Green on One Side/Brown on the other boards were mid-grade
Brown/Brown were low grade

Bummer.. Just got a bucket of Brown/Green Boards.. thought I did OK.. guess I'll get to stripping them for all their goodies?

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Just glance over the board while stripping and be on the lookout for gold bits or pins. I have found 2 different styles of transistors with gold legs and occasionally a gold pin plug-in. (If there's any brown on it, it's usually low-grade.)

Thank you Mechanic.
Today I garnished a Torx Set to take down those hard drives!
I'm saving all the insides (Got some platters started for YOU!)

I was able to get out the arms too without damaging them.

Also two of the HD's had what I instantly called "Rubbers" on them. Not sure if there is a market for those or not?

Need More Practice!

Newbie Note: Was surprised to open 2 different 40GB hard drives and found 2 platters in the first.. The Second one: Only had One Platter. I was like "Dude.. where is the second one?"
Learning curve is SHARP
:)

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Originally Posted by sledge

Thank you Mechanic.
Today I garnished a Torx Set to take down those hard drives!
I'm saving all the insides (Got some platters started for YOU!)

I was able to get out the arms too without damaging them.

Also two of the HD's had what I instantly called "Rubbers" on them. Not sure if there is a market for those or not?

Need More Practice!

Newbie Note: Was surprised to open 2 different 40GB hard drives and found 2 platters in the first.. The Second one: Only had One Platter. I was like "Dude.. where is the second one?"
Learning curve is SHARP
:)

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Also don't pry on the platters as a few will be glass and will shatter like a mirror. EVERYWHERE

I worked it like this:
Took the board off 1st
Then Took off the Cover with the Platters
Moved the Arm back away from the platters
Undid the screws on the magnets/arms and ribbon cable connector and took out
Then undid the 3 or in some cases 6 screws holding down the platters
Took the top set of rings off
Turned the drive over and viola they slide out real nice
Got all my platters without fingerprinting a 1 of em
Then held them by the edges like a CD.

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Originally Posted by sledge

Thank you Mechanic.
Today I garnished a Torx Set to take down those hard drives!
I'm saving all the insides (Got some platters started for YOU!)

I was able to get out the arms too without damaging them.

Also two of the HD's had what I instantly called "Rubbers" on them. Not sure if there is a market for those or not?

Need More Practice!

Newbie Note: Was surprised to open 2 different 40GB hard drives and found 2 platters in the first.. The Second one: Only had One Platter. I was like "Dude.. where is the second one?"
Learning curve is SHARP
:)

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About the only ones i've seen with the rubber jacket are the Seagates. The rubbers might have been used for sound attenuation as some of the older drives were a bit noisy. Those ones seemed to have a higher than normal failure rate. Maybe the rubber acted as an insulator and the drives were running hotter than they should have been ?

I don't know of any re-sale market for them. A lot of times there's a date -or-date code on the hard drive.

It's better if a hard drive intended for re-sale has a SATA connector, at least a 250 GB capacity, and isn't too old. Maybe year 2010 or newer ?

Those hard drives do vary. The basic idea hasn't changed all that much, but sometimes a large capacity one will only have one platter and one with lesser capacity will have four.

Check out some of the older Western Digitals. The voice coil on the arm looks to be a gold plated wire instead of the usual copper. :)

Yes Sir.. Both Were Seagate Drives
One was a 40 GB and the Other was a 20.4 GB.
All 4 drives I took apart tonight were 40 GB or Lower.

I did go through my pile of RAM and found (4) Samsung HP 1 GB RAM Sticks. Might have to go Ebaying!

Question about Floppy Drive Boards:
I ran across one this weekend that is a green/green board.. 1st one I have ever seen being new to this.

I have been saving all of the brown/green boards.. thinking all Floppy boards were brown/green.. are these to the shred pile after taking gold connectors off then?

Floppy drive boards can go with the CD drive boards even though they are brown. But if you took the connectors off then yes,shred pile.

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Originally Posted by scrapping4ever

Floppy drive boards can go with the CD drive boards even though they are brown. But if you took the connectors off then yes,shred pile.

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I have NOT taken the connectors off. Right now they are just as they should be.. I figured it was best to ask.
I know "brown boards" are the literal "poopy" of e-scrap.. so I wasn't sure if the various e-waste buyers graded them as low (and thus not worth shipping.. best left for shred barrel)
or were they some small exception.

The best I can gather this would make it such that these are the ONLY green/brown boards that e-waste buyers have an interest in yes?

Yes, exactly.

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Originally Posted by scrapping4ever

Yes, exactly.

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Thank you kindly!!
:)

Find any goodies in my pile of randomness I gave you?

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Originally Posted by ElectricLiquidators

Find any goodies in my pile of randomness I gave you?

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Still working on breaking down the 90+ hard drives :)
Got all done except for those.
And still sifting and sorting though.

I'll bring you more when I get a chance. My wife reminded my yesterday that I had actually been storing my old computers and hard drives in the laundry room.

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Originally Posted by ElectricLiquidators

I'll bring you more when I get a chance. My wife reminded my yesterday that I had actually been storing my old computers and hard drives in the laundry room.

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Cool my man.. Text me or give me a buzz if you want also!

Well I have learned an invaluable lesson in the last 2 days.
Have had contact with 3 different local "buyers" of e-scrap.
Reason being is I have a couple things that just don't seem to warrant the shipping:
Full Laptops
Batteries (which are a pain.. can't go by USPS at all)

In those conversations they went as follows:
#1 Buyer never even responded to my call or VM
#2 Buyer seemed to want to hold all my stuff until HE got a gaylord and sold it upstream to pay me (Could be 6 months- Really??)
#3 Buyer prices were so ridiculously low that I laughed when I got the email of his prices. Looks to be at about a 50% margin if they were to take a trip from here to deliver to one of our close by e-waste buyers.

So When I get my 60+ Lbs.. I know where they are shipping too. Now to find somewhere local to take those silly laptops and batteries off my hands and I'll be A-OK!

Still standing in the water.. just waiting to get wet!
I will say this:
Breaking down approx 100 hard drives was a hugely time consuming and sometimes frustrating process.. hoping the payout vs my labor will make me smile once I get the check!

Question for all of you more well versed e-waste dudes and dudettes:
If you get Rambus:
Can you Remove the metal casing and send the sticks in as RAM? Or are they completely different animals?

Since RAM pays more than Rambus.. I figured I'd ask!

I only have 2 sticks right now.. but best to be knowledgeable about the process!
Thanks!

That's what I've done in the past Sledge and had no complaints but I'm more of a low tech dude so hopefully someone else will verify.

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Originally Posted by sledge

Question for all of you more well versed e-waste dudes and dudettes:
If you get Rambus:
Can you Remove the metal casing and send the sticks in as RAM? Or are they completely different animals?

Since RAM pays more than Rambus.. I figured I'd ask!

I only have 2 sticks right now.. but best to be knowledgeable about the process!
Thanks!

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Yes, but remember that the rambus memory weighs 2 or 3 times more than plain old memory. If you do strip it the outer part is alum.

Best to ask your buyer Fudge, but here is my opinion. Ramus works the same way as ram. The difference is the flat packs on the ram. Rambus will have glass flatpacks instead of ceramic. Therefore buyers downgrade rambus and most will not accept it with ram sticks even after the al cover is removed. I call BS but that is just me.

Tip of the day- the majority of gold is found in the flatpacks on ram.