Digital Bling? Gold Inside PC's?
As it were my neighbors put a few old PC's and monitors out to the curb for trash pick up, and I scavenged them up. I had nothing to do late last night so I started disassembling these antiquated machines. I ended up with 3 original Pentiums, and 1 Pentium MMX. I completely took apart the computers looking for parts I could scavenge from ATX cases to screws and drive mounts. As I was taking them apart, I unseated the Intel CPU's and upon close inspection, I noticed that the pins on the bottom appeared to be gold, they were also a lot more plyable than standard alluminum pins, which also lent me to believe they were either pure gold or an alloy perhaps 18k or 20k? As well some old EDO Ram was lined with Gold Interconnects while some of the other RAM was standard Alluminum. It appears that the oldest Pentium processor had these thicker gold wires on the bottom and the RAM was also lined with gold. Now this got me to thinking, ah, suppose you could get oh, maybe 12 of these defunct machines and strip the Pentiums out of them, how much gold could be stripped from them? Now I searched around on the internet and had a hard time finding out what percentage or weights of gold were in a Pentium 90, or 120 Mhz Processor, but just that yes, the pins are Gold. Anyone like maybe Old Man Toby who works with Semiconductors know about this? I imagine if I heated up the Pentium Processor on a Bunsen Burner I might melt off the gold, but I'm wondering if I had say 20 of them would it be worth it? Gold is worth about $400 an ounce, so it just might be.
Re: Digital Bling? Gold Inside PC's?
I know this may sound silly, but I swear I'll bet someday someone will want to collect these. People collect all sorts of weird things, why not have basically the Icon of the early PC Boom, an original Gold Pinned Intel Pentium 1. If there is at least 1/10th an ounce of Gold in these I'm going to collect up as many as I can and just store them somewhere rather than melt down, I could always melt down if I needed to, but I figure they may be worth more as collectable value someday.
All the other defunct PC parts from, old CD-ROMs, to antiquated Socket7 and 5 Motherboards, EDO RAM and SoundBlaster 16 cards, 4/16 Ethernet, I'm going to just toss those in a box and tape it up, and store it in the attic, never know, maybe someone will need an old Mobo for something someday. I ended up with 2 ATX style Cases, but a Dell Was kind of Non Standard and had a lot of extra mounts, and 2 desk top cases, which I might throw out unless they are Alluminum and I might salvage that for scrap. I might see if I can strip the copper from the Monitors if they are broken, haven't tested those out yet.
Re: Digital Bling? Gold Inside PC's?
depending on how fast you can get the gold out of the computer and how quick you can melt it, i'd do it. time is a valuable thing though don't spend to much time on it, it may not be worth it
Let me walk on high wire of rusty nails
While barefoot shedding the flesh of our existance
Re: Digital Bling? Gold Inside PC's?
My boyfriend says that his dad's friend does this. Apparently he goes to junkyards and finds old comps, melts the gold, and sells it. Lord only knows if it's profitable. Who knows, VGX? You may have a new business on your hands.
Re: Digital Bling? Gold Inside PC's?
Well it takes about 5 seconds and some degree of muscle to take out the processor, and you're done. The RAM just pops out, as well on one MOBO the RAM was clipped in with golden clips, but I didn't check to see if they were plated gold yet or solid but they bend real easy.
Re: Digital Bling? Gold Inside PC's?
i suppose it wouldn't be a bad side hobby, pick up an old computer when you see it but don't go running around looking for them. when you get a big chunk of gold either sell it or send it to me
Let me walk on high wire of rusty nails
While barefoot shedding the flesh of our existance
Re: Digital Bling? Gold Inside PC's?
Well, The Salvation Army has these Auctions, where you can buy like an entire Bin full of old PC's for $20 on Wednesdays. I might consider it if i can find out if it's worth it to scrap them out when I'm bored.
Re: Digital Bling? Gold Inside PC's?
I've known people who have melted the gold off CPUs before...unfortenetly, you need a lot of them to actually make a profit.
there's only 50u thinkness and it's a nickel alloy.
Not jewelrs quality. chances are you will spend more on energy costs for recovery than you will yield.
There's more gold in the print cartridge heads.
I used to make the HP deskjet heads when I lived in Dallas. The machine that coated the silicon wafers in gold used these PVD sputtering targets made of very pure gold. They were very heavy and worth about $500K. We DID work very hard to recover as much from that machine as possible.
I had a pretty decent little stockpile of platinum based metal from R and S type thermocouples. Many users of these don't realize the reclaim value. I usually funded my music projects from platinum scrap but you have to have access to a supply.
There's really only enough gold on those pins to stop corrosion.
Re: Digital Bling? Gold Inside PC's?
Well, that deflates that Balloon.
But I swear, man, the oldest Pentium (Non MMX) seems like those pins are more pure, they are thicker and look more gold like. The Pins on the Newer Processors are thinner and less plyable than the old one, maybe I'm pissing up a rope, but what the hell.
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