Kitz Forum
Computers & Hardware => PC Hardware => Topic started by: sheddyian on August 01, 2012, 01:19:13 PM
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If you keep your eyes open, and actually want to (!), it's surprising what computer (and other) equipment you can find, just dumped by the road, usually near a bin. Pretty much all of the computers I use at home are from such places, some had no faults, others had minor problems that didn't take much effort to repair. Some of them I've upgraded a little, with 2nd hand parts from ebay.
Anyhow, the other week I found another computer in the street, next to a 1980's midi hifi unit with one speaker. I took the PC home, and had a quick look at it. It fails to start up - just beeps an error code I've not looked up yet. What amused me more was the impressive bodged repair. Have a look at the attached picture.
Clearly at some point the original smaller-than-standard power supply has failed. Someone has bought a new bog standard PSU, but - oh - it won't fit in the hole. What to do?
Well, why not hack a hole in the back of the PC case, and make it fit? I admire the way they've lined the PC case secondary fan holes with the fan holes in the PSU case! Though I think they lose points for failing to block up the hole for the original PSU.
Considering the amount of dirt inside this old PC, but the cleanliness of the PSU, I'd say it's pretty much new, so at the very least, I've got a spare ATX PSU for some future project. :D
Ian
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haha I love the innovative replacement for the PSU :D
Ive had a quick google around and from what Ive found on the emachine 350, I dont think there will be much else worth salvaging aside from the PSU.
You'll probably end up at the same places as me, and of course you'll be able to visibly see some of the parts, but that model apparently had an Intel 810 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_810) chipset which possibly gives an idea of its age.
Going back about 10-12 years ago, me and a few friends used to keep old parts and build machines for other friends who at the time couldnt afford how much they cost in the likes of PCWorld. Although I could be wrong, I seem to recall somewhere that my first PC cost about £1200 in the very early 90's, and was pretty basic for those days.
Sigh - who else remembers CD Writers being about £500 in about 1998 on top of a £1000+ machine. One of the reasons why I first started dipping inside the machine myself. ???
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Seem to remember my first home PC, a very modest Gateway with 166 MHz Pentium, cost about £1700 all in, including a printer.
I suspect that's equivalent to circa £2500 today, adjusted for RPI. We had it tough in those days. :)
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Talking of the cost of pc's from years back.My first one was from a company called Dan Technology(remember them).W95 had just come out.
It was a pentium 75, with 8MB (yes MB)of ram, 1MB graphics card,can't remember the HD size,came with a 15" crt monitor,cost around £1400 :o ;D
I think to have an extra 8MB of ram installed was an extra £200 :o
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haha I love the innovative replacement for the PSU :D
Ive had a quick google around and from what Ive found on the emachine 350, I dont think there will be much else worth salvaging aside from the PSU.
I've not even checked what CPU it has yet, excepting that the sticker on the front says "Celeron", so it's hardly going to be speedy. It's got 128Mb of RAM :)
That said, I currently have an old Compaq Pentium II 700Mhz (256Mb RAM) running XP that I use as an occasional FTP server. Haven't got it connected to a screen or keyboard, just the LAN - Once it's booted (takes a while) it's fast enough to do it's FTP server thing, and I can remote desktop into it if I need to do any maintenance, and power it up remotely with a Wake on Lan packet.
Almost anything can be useful :)
Though I may have get rid of the box of 486 boards I've still got... ;D
Ian
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It was a pentium 75, with 8MB (yes MB)of ram
Pah! Modern high-powered stuff. My first computer was a Microtan 65 with 1 kilobyte of RAM. ;D
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tangerine_Microtan_65
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Pah! Modern high-powered stuff. My first computer was a Microtan 65 with 1 kilobyte of RAM. ;D
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tangerine_Microtan_65
Drat! Beaten in my own thread, before I'd played my ZX81 1K card :o
Ian
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It was a pentium 75, with 8MB (yes MB)of ram
Pah! Modern high-powered stuff. My first computer was a Microtan 65 with 1 kilobyte of RAM. ;D
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tangerine_Microtan_65
In my ideal world, modern programmers would always be asked to produce a version of their product that runs on such machines. It is surprisingly do-able, and IMHO fosters a healthy attitude. And such an attitude might help to stem the tide of ridiculously greedy (for footprint and CPU) software that abounds these days. :D
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Pah! Modern high-powered stuff.
Indeed.
It wasn't "mine" as such but this is the first computer I programmed, while still at school.
http://users.tpg.com.au/eedeuce/
(http://users.tpg.com.au/eedeuce/deuce_brochure.jpg)
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Active elements 1,450 Thermionic Valves
Nice and cosy in the winter then. :)