Ideas on getting Tubes, Eproms etc Free

Gaetznes

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Donor 2012, 2020
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Well Free being a relative term. Be warned I tell/explain things in story format. It all started yesterday when I went down to a local computer shop, as I was looking for a multimeter. As I was talking to the owner about arcades, as he owns a few pins himself. It came to mind that perhaps he would have some eproms. I was in luck, he had a few. Just gave them to me, bonus. This got me thinking. Perhaps I could get more chips. So I spent a few hours today driving to all the computer/electronic shops in my city. Knowing being in person is always better then dealing with a person on the phone. This caused mixed results. I didn't end up with any more chips. But one of the shops is in the process of prepping to opening up a computer museum in his shop. He told me that when he does finish pulling everything out of storage that he has several large boxes full of 70/80's ICs, including eproms. So another woo hoo for me.

In the process of talking to all these shops, I explained what I was doing. One shop told me to come in once a month and I can go through as many of their tv's as I want. As they give away/trash CRT's all the time. At another shop, I got a number of two people that may still work on CRT's as a side business. One of the shops started asking me questions, like do you have a route. Do I resell them.. the list goes on. I don't believe, that they believe that Im just a collected and not a coin-op. Sorta weird, if you ask me.

I also contacted a recycling company, that forward me to the city dump. Which forward me to the Diabetic society (a international non for profit organization). They get mass donations, then sell them to local and international outfits like Value Village. I'm currently waiting on a call back to see if I can get into their warehouse and buy by the pound old circuit boards and pull the chips off.

I bet their are other people on here that have done the same thing. I just figured that this may be an avenue that some people may not have thought of. Its better be proactive, then to just wait for something to happen.
 
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Thanks for the tips! I only have a few suggestions:

- Always look out for curbside discards. I've found quite a few TVs and old computers this way. Tell all your friends to keep an eye out, too, that'll cover lots of ground. One of the nearby towns has an annual bulk pickup trash day, tons to pick from.

- I went to a town dump with a friend recently. They had a section just for TVs and they let me take whatever I wanted. I'm going to check out my town dump next week.

- I went to a Goodwill Outlet store not too long ago. (They're basically cheaper and less-organized than the regular stores.) They had lots of TVs there for $0.99 each, about as close to free as you can get.

I wish I knew more, hopefully some one else can add to the list.
 
Hell, theres hundreds of components lying around your average house. Just gotta take it apart.

Invest in a good desoldering iron, wait for something to break beyond repair and scavenge whatever you need. I keep a bin of old VCRs, modems, camcorders, remotes etc for just this reason. Hell I got bored and built night vision goggles made from 98% salvaged shit, only had to buy a plastic enclosure box from work and a cheap ass CCD camera from eBay, everything else was scavanged

you won't find any EEPROMs or anything fancy like that, but its nice not to go component shopping/wait for shipping
 
I've got a deal with our town dump/recycle yard.. I'm allowed to take as many tvs as I want and can bring back any I can't use free of charge. As they hit residents for $25 a tv! So they are thrilled when I pull out 10 at a time :)

Plus they even put the 19" ones aside for me :)
 
So I got the call back today for the Non for profit organization. I'm to go over this Tuesday coming. He currently has two tractor trailers full of old computer parts. Mainly they are computer towers. That they have yet to go through. I was told, that they only pull out hard drives, Ram and sometimes cpu's. So they can be resold, everything else gets disposed of. So its going to be alot of time and basically a free for all. I know the chance of me finding many eproms are going to be slim. When I get there, what I'll do is see if they accept some free labor. I do a few hours removing what they need, while I look for what I need.
 
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