Recycling used PCs
Computer technology is improving every day that computers get outdated very quickly. As a result we have the problem of what to do with the old machines. Besides owners giving them away or selling them very cheap, some manufacturers are finding ways to recycle used machines.
EVERY year, thousands of outdated computers are relegated to the closet, usually by frustrated owners who don’t know what to do with them. There they sit, gathering dust and becoming more obsolete by the second. To computer enthusiasts, they’ve become known as closetware.
And the problem is growing. A 1991 study by Carnegie-Mellon University predicts that by 2005, the United States will have discarded approximately 150 million computers.
Not surprisingly, the guest for a computer made from recyclable materials that are easily dismantled has been undertaken by manufacturers both in the US and abroad. In Germany, computer makers are already required by law to take back old machines owners no longer want. And American manufacturers, including IBM and Hewlett-Packard, are currently working on ways to reclaim and recycle used computers.
For now, computer owners eager to clean out their closets have three basic options. They can donate old computers to non-profit organisations for a tax deduction (usually the machine’s current market value). They can sell them — assuming they can find a buyer — for a fraction of the original purchase price. And a growing number of vendors, like Micro Exchange in Nutley, New Jersey, and Crocodile Computers in Manhattan, accept old computers as trade-ins.
In any case, the task may require a little initiative. Unless you’re getting rid of a lot of computers, Salvation Army-style pickup trucks are rare. Donors an sellers with only one or two computers are usually responsible for packing and transportation costs. When the recipient is a charitable organisation, however, documented transportation costs are tax deductible, said Rubin Gorewitz, a certified public accountant in Manhattan.
Old software and computers are often accepted by churches, schools and other local non-profit organisations. But too frequently, the well meaning give recipients equipment they don’t know how to use or that doesn’t do what they need.. One way to insure that computers find the right home is to donate them through a placement service, like the National Cristina Foundation.
Cristina, which matches computers with donors, has a national network of recipients, from the National Easter Seal Society to countless schools and job-training programmes.
"When technology is no longer of use in its first place, it should be transferred to a second place of use," said Yvette Marrin, the organisation’s president. The 11-year-old foundation accepts working computers — any Macintoshes and IBM’s from the XT model on. As with all placement services mentioned here, donors receive documentation for tax deductions.
"Placement agencies have lots of requests and plenty of places for these old computers," said John L. German the director and founder of Non-Profit Computing, a national service. The trick is getting the right raw material. Though his organisation accepts almost any used computer, German prefers donations in good shape. But he recently found a home for broken machines with a school that trains women to repair computers.
Unlike most other placement services, the nonprofit East West Education Development Foundation in Boston accepts computers in any condition. At its warehouse, technicians make any necessary repairs, produce rehabilitated machines complete with mice, modems, software and adapters, and send them to those who need them throughout the world. Recipients have included Sarajevo’s remaining newspaper, Oslobodjenje, and Hands Across Watts in Los Angeles. Multicomputer donors can choose their nonprofit recipients.
Randall, who accepts any Mac’s and IBM’s from the XT on, believes even obsolete models offer years of service. "Only three per cent of the people on the planet have ever touched a computer," he said.
"In the right hands, they are mind-enhancing tools."
Since 1991, the Student Human Rights Exchange has sent used computers to human rights organisations in Nepal and Mongolia, among other places. It accepts all Mac' s and IBMs from the XT on.
The Robin Hood Foundation distributes used computers to 85 New York City poverty-fighting organisations, including youth groups and job-training programs. It accepts Mac’s and the IBM 286 and up.
Sellers get the best deal if they can find a buyer directly, from a classified advertisement, for example, whether through a large online service, like America Online, or in computer magazines like the Mac Street Journal, published by the Mac Users’ Group in New York.
PC owners can seek out buyers at the monthly meetings of the New York Personal Computer User’s Group.
Secondhand computer vendors also buy equipment; their advertisements run in publications like Computer Shopper.
"You get a quick sale," said Bob Cook, the president of Sun Remarketing, a mail-order concern specialising in used Mac’s. "But you get a wholesale rate."
Sellers must ship computers at their own expense, about US$25 (about RM65) by UPS, Cook said. He buys Mac SE’s, originally US$2,495, for about US$180, and sells them for US$279.
Tom Buechel, the owner of Rockaway Recycling in Rockaway, New Jersey, gives sellers two choices. Marketable computers, like the 286, can be placed on consignment at A Second Byte, a store in nearby Dover. There, a working 386 with printer sells for US$300 to US$500 with a 15 per cent commission for the company. Unsaleable dinosaurs, like original PC’s, can be dropped off at Rockaway Recycling, which cannibalises half a million pounds of computers a month.
Crocodile Computers and Micro Exchange, which sell new and used computers, also accept trade-ins. Each buys secondhand Mac’s and used 386’s and so on. — NYT
Source : New Straits Times 10 April 1995
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