phreakindee
Experienced Member
I'm pretty angry at Goodwill right about now. I usually stop by there on my way home from work, because they're usually quite fair. I've noticed in the past few months that they've had less and less "good" stuff on offer. I mostly look for retro computer stuff.
I found a great little computer there today, but it had no price. It was from the late 80's, 5.25" floppy drives, possibly a 386, the whole deal and it looked new. I took it up front to ask how much it was and the lady said she had to take it to the manager. The dude finally comes back and says he won't sell me the machine. It should have never left the back room.
After going back and forth not getting any straight answers, he finally said that it's going to be sent to be DESTROYED at Dell. Freaking DELL. It's called Dell/Goodwill Reconnect (reconnectpartnership.com), and it's a recycling program. He said anything looking older than 5 years gets sent to them and then "taken care of", whether it means parting out and selling the parts, destroying (melting down) the metals, landfilling the non-toxic bits, etc. Wow.
Why not let people have a chance on these things, THEN if they don't sell, recycle them?
Instead, they get more cash from Dell, Dell gets some "good press" (and a little something on the side?), and Goodwill gets to selling Dell refurbed newer P4-era computers for $125 for just a tower. Apparently they also just throw away all floppy disks and many hard drives, due to... who knows what, in the name of "privacy" perhaps. Yet I still find them randomly, I guess when they "slip through" like the computer today. I should have just placed or wrote a price on it and been done with it. Punks.
I know it's better than shipping piles of technocrap to Africa or Hong Kong, but seriously. A lot of these things are still in working order, and in my area I know there are other collectors besides me who will give them a loving home. I know this kind of thing has been going on since the 80's, but the fact that so many vintage machines are dying a cruel death when they still work just fine is just a crime.
There have been so many times I've seen a TON of peripherals, empty disk containers and boxed software for a single machine (TRS-80s, Macintosh/Lisa, Apple II, IBM PC, etc) but no computer in sight. I wondered why.
Now I know the truth.
I found a great little computer there today, but it had no price. It was from the late 80's, 5.25" floppy drives, possibly a 386, the whole deal and it looked new. I took it up front to ask how much it was and the lady said she had to take it to the manager. The dude finally comes back and says he won't sell me the machine. It should have never left the back room.
After going back and forth not getting any straight answers, he finally said that it's going to be sent to be DESTROYED at Dell. Freaking DELL. It's called Dell/Goodwill Reconnect (reconnectpartnership.com), and it's a recycling program. He said anything looking older than 5 years gets sent to them and then "taken care of", whether it means parting out and selling the parts, destroying (melting down) the metals, landfilling the non-toxic bits, etc. Wow.
Why not let people have a chance on these things, THEN if they don't sell, recycle them?
Instead, they get more cash from Dell, Dell gets some "good press" (and a little something on the side?), and Goodwill gets to selling Dell refurbed newer P4-era computers for $125 for just a tower. Apparently they also just throw away all floppy disks and many hard drives, due to... who knows what, in the name of "privacy" perhaps. Yet I still find them randomly, I guess when they "slip through" like the computer today. I should have just placed or wrote a price on it and been done with it. Punks.
I know it's better than shipping piles of technocrap to Africa or Hong Kong, but seriously. A lot of these things are still in working order, and in my area I know there are other collectors besides me who will give them a loving home. I know this kind of thing has been going on since the 80's, but the fact that so many vintage machines are dying a cruel death when they still work just fine is just a crime.
There have been so many times I've seen a TON of peripherals, empty disk containers and boxed software for a single machine (TRS-80s, Macintosh/Lisa, Apple II, IBM PC, etc) but no computer in sight. I wondered why.
Now I know the truth.