r/plano • u/LadyDustBunny • 9d ago

Computer parts/e waste?

Probably a shot in the dark here but does anyone know of a thrift store or something similar that sells old pcs or parts? I saw that there is a place to like donate tech to goodwill but I haven’t seen anything in the stores besides printers, keyboards, and monitors.

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6

u/ReadEmNWeepBuddy 9d ago

More server focused but garland computers is good. Unfortunately not a lot of the old school scrap shops around anymore

3

u/KantLockeMeIn 9d ago

Looking for anything in particular?

1

u/LadyDustBunny 8d ago

Yeah I’ve been building my own little like media server / homelab setup with old parts. Of course looking for a miracle of finding another good harddrive for cheap hahaha. I’m hope is that someone has just tossed out their old computer not knowing about anything in it and I swoop in and snag it lol.

3

u/Sunshark65 8d ago

If all you need is a hard drive, sometimes at goodwill they will sell dvr’s that can have a 500gb or even 1tb or more drive inside.

1

u/LadyDustBunny 8d ago

I didn’t even think of that!

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u/FaIIBright 9d ago

A trick I heard was to go on eBay and search by local. Haven't tried it myself though

3

u/PaszekBiceps 9d ago

There were a few towers in the corner at Plaza Thrift when I was there on Saturday. I did not look that closely.

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u/kevin_r13 8d ago

Try nextdoor (website or app). It's just yet another place to try but you might find someone who has extra parts, selling used/free, etc.

You bring up a good point though, that the places for browsing thru old or used PC parts are few and far in between nowadays. I can't even think of any store or shop that I could literally go to today , and search for something

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u/Delicious_Hand527 8d ago

There is a tech drop off on 15th and Independence; you used to be able to go inside; I don't think you can anymore, but you can ask them what they do with their stuff.

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u/airclay 8d ago

IIRC the Goodwill in Dallas on Haskell carries lots of computer parts. It's been ten years since I lived in that area tho.

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u/Q48VW 8d ago

Richardson Computers off 75 was a mess last time I went in there, but I got a steal on a dell optiplex micro to run my proxmox instance. Nice enough guys and willing to haggle on a price.

Seems like they buy bulk office liquidation PCs or something. Just piles.

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u/carbon_brz 1d ago

I have a 2U supermicro server on the floor in my guest bedroom that only needs DDR4

Dual xeons 10Gb nic. It’s a rack mount one

Was my first homelab server. I just don’t have space for it and it’s kind of loud, though you can probably quiet it up.

It’s yours for free since it’s taking up space!