$20,000 in 32GB RAM sticks saved from the dumpster are now worth a fortune — seventy-two DDR4-2666 ECC RDIMMs were about to turn into e-waste

$20,000 in 32GB RAM sticks saved from the dumpster are now worth a fortune — seventy-two DDR4-2666 ECC RDIMMs were about to turn into e-waste

Jowi Morales is a tech enthusiast with years of experience working in the industry. He\u2019s been writing with several tech publications since 2021, where he\u2019s been interested in tech hardware and consumer electronics. ","collapsible":{"enabled":true,"maxHeight":250,"readMoreText":"Read more","readLessText":"Read less"}}), "https://slice.vanilla.futurecdn.net/13-4-20/js/authorBio.js"); } else { console.error('%c FTE ','background: #9306F9; color: #ffffff','no lazy slice hydration function available'); } Jowi Morales Social Links Navigation Contributing Writer Jowi Morales is a tech enthusiast with years of experience working in the industry. He’s been writing with several tech publications since 2021, where he’s been interested in tech hardware and consumer electronics.

ezst036 A lot of companies have that "write it off" mentality. They know they are not going to look backwards and know they shouldn't save shelf space for certain things so the trash is the inevitable answer to questions. But most companies don't have a designated ebay employee either. The manager doesn't want to sell these in his spare time and it would be viewed as a waste of "on the clock"/productive time. And the manager isn't going to tell employee x to go ebay these either. It's just an area that is simply unaccounted for, and it does have some negative impact for us all because the news story is a one-off, this situation does happen on occasion. Reply

TKPizze ezst036 said: The manager doesn't want to sell these in his spare time and it would be viewed as a waste of "on the clock"/productive time. And the manager isn't going to tell employee x to go ebay these either. I also really hate this wasteful procedure. They'd rather destroy hard drives and get it certified instead of giving working hardware away. You can argue that hard drives are not worth the time because a proper wipe can take a few days. Just don't risk anything, right? But there's another problem: Laws. They call it non-cash benefit or other bureaucracy. My company refuses to sell the "outdated" or no longer supported hardware to the employees. They'd rather sell it to some used-hardware company or turn it into e-waste because selling it to employees would cause more trouble with warranty and cash handling. These office people really don't know how much valuable stuff is thrown into these e-waste bins. I went dumpster diving when I got the chance, and saved some cables, power supplies and even docking stations. Not worth the hassle of selling it for a few bucks if there are companies buying such stuff based on weight I guess. Sure there's a lot of junk but hey, free stuff! But the really interesting parts would be whole servers and stuff. A few years ago, before it became more common, I could buy a used 12 TB hard drive with "just" 40k operating hours for 115 Euro on ebay. At that time, you could buy maybe a brand new 4 TB drive for that price. The shop looked like one of these recyclers. And if that's the price they charge, I'd be really interested what they paid for the whole container of "junk". I also had the chance to take a look at some used mini PC. I really have no clue HOW these people did that, but they ripped out the m.2 SSD and broke the whole m.2 slot. Like: Oh it's easier to break the slot than removing the screw. That breaks my heart. Really sad, that the world has to work like this. Reply

Air2004 Talk about click bait… This site is really starting to go down hill. Maybe time to move on. Reply

ezst036 TKPizze said: I also really hate this wasteful procedure. I do think the throwing away of this valuable RAM is wasteful and companies should try to avoid this, I do recognize the wastefulness on the other side. Do employees sell this hardware on the side? Like on Amazon? Ebay? Or do they do it on company time? Are you selling spare memory while making $xx.00 per hour at a loss on labor time? If a manager sells the memory, that is even more wasteful. What is waste? Who's waste? Which book does the waste reside? It is ugly, unfortunately. There is no clean answer. TKPizze said: They'd rather destroy hard drives and get it certified instead of giving working hardware away. You can argue that hard drives are not worth the time because a proper wipe can take a few days. Just don't risk anything, right? This one I actually agree with because I ask the first question: Is my PII on that hard drive? All of us, every last person, would initiate a lawsuit if our PII was on that drive. You know you would. Every one would. The wasting of memory, CPUs, GPUs, motherboards and more that don't persist data sure that all is worth getting upset over. Where data persists, the hardware itself is not the focus. It's the data. And I'm only getting at personal people's data. There's also company data, and it can get even more sensitive than that in regard to data. Those drives ought to be destroyed and certified. PII alone justifies that. TKPizze said: But there's another problem: Laws. They call it non-cash benefit or other bureaucracy. My company refuses to sell the "outdated" or no longer supported hardware to the employees. They'd rather sell it to some used-hardware company or turn it into e-waste because selling it to employees would cause more trouble with warranty and cash handling. These office people really don't know how much valuable stuff is thrown into these e-waste bins. I went dumpster diving when I got the chance, and saved some cables, power supplies and even docking stations. Not worth the hassle of selling it for a few bucks if there are companies buying such stuff based on weight I guess. Sure there's a lot of junk but hey, free stuff! But the really interesting parts would be whole servers and stuff. A few years ago, before it became more common, I could buy a used 12 TB hard drive with "just" 40k operating hours for 115 Euro on ebay. At that time, you could buy maybe a brand new 4 TB drive for that price. The shop looked like one of these recyclers. And if that's the price they charge, I'd be really interested what they paid for the whole container of "junk". I also had the chance to take a look at some used mini PC. I really have no clue HOW these people did that, but they ripped out the m.2 SSD and broke the whole m.2 slot. Like: Oh it's easier to break the slot than removing the screw. That breaks my heart. Really sad, that the world has to work like this. Thank you for sharing your thoughts. I agree with most of the rest of this, It is frustrating for sure. I try to separate myself in these instances and ask what I would do if I ran the company. Unfortunately rationally I would do the same thing. I'm not going to pay someone thousands of dollars over the course of days worth of work to recoup hundreds of dollars . The most efficient method is what you had mentioned here, putting hardware on pallets and selling it bulk to someone paid less than my theoretical employees who its worth their time to scavenge. I do recognize that depending on the industry, it may even be too expensive to palletize. Once various contracts are up or once its time to upgrade, no more cost justifications exist. It is just junk. I don't employ anybody in my fake organization who is paid "less enough" to justify the time to palletize the old computers. So they go in the trash. We could resolve this though. Paycuts! Which nobody would support. In the trash the old computers go. Reply

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