There were recently some posts discussing how fast one could completely take apart desktops. It occurred to me that what it means to do it completely might be different for different people. So here's my checklist:
1. Clean out the tower:
- take out the motherboard with everything on it
- take out any drives (floppy, CD, HDD)
- take out any PCI cards, the power supply, all wires, any fans
2. Clean the motherboard:
- take out RAM
- take out the CPU and its heatsink
- remove the battery and anything that is big and made of steel (like those brackets some MBs have on the bottom)
3. Separate wires:
- cut off any gold connectors
- cut off the wires from the power supply
4. HDD
- remove its board and whack the drive with a hammer a few times

I used to take apart CD-ROMS and floppy drives but I don't do it anymore, not worth the time for me.