# Computer cards - what is worth harvesting?



## carasoph (Oct 26, 2007)

Hi again,

Just because I cannot see any of Steve's guides, which is MOST unfortunate    

I have a very large quantity of computer cards at hand, and wanted to know just one thing:
Does only the finger is worth harvesting, or is there anything else in there?
The cards I have are:
Sound cards, Display cards, Network cards, Modems, Floppy/CD/HDD cards (the printed circuit underneath with the gold pins) and MoBo.

Again - is there anything ELSE, other then gold pins and fingers that is worth harvesting from them? I just wanna know that I'm not throwing away any GPs and I just wanna shorten my invested time in them... :lol: 

Sorry again for been a Noob - its just because I AM 1.. :lol:


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## Redders (Oct 26, 2007)

'Flatpack' chips on a lot of video cards and two or three on a motherboard. They have the gold flash in one corner. Put a wood chisel against the edge, give it a few taps with a hammer. It will come off easily. There are two distinct parts to these chips, the fibre base which has the gold flash and is soldered to the board and the black top which looks like it could have been dropped on hot like the wax seal on a letter from the middle ages.

Get one of these chips, start at a corner and you can peel apart the two different parts. You will see some gold foil in between the two parts. I've heard that they will yield six grams of gold from a kilogram of these chips. Buggered if know how to process this gold...... Steve'll know..


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## lazersteve (Oct 27, 2007)

Carasoph,

The standard approach for flatpaks is to crush, shred, or grind the components into a fine powder. Once the material is pulverized you should strip the base metals using nitric acid. 

The remaining material contains the gold and can be leached using any solvent for gold (HCl-Cl, AR, etc.). 

Process the resulting auric chloride solution as usual for the method you select.

Steve


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## jov13 (Mar 30, 2008)

Hi im a newbie in this forum and learned lots and lots of information and techniques
Regarding gold recovery from computer boards and peripherals and still learning, thanks a lot to you guys for sharing.

My question is what is the best way to shred or pulverize the flat packs, is there any tool or techniques used? Is the top black ceramic like be included or just the part with the gold flash?

when flatpacks & pins are harvested from computer motherboards, is that all and computer motherboard is already rendered useless or still some people buy it even the pins and chips with PMs have been harvested?

Thankx a lot


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## lazersteve (Mar 30, 2008)

Jov,

The flatpaks can be crushed in a grinder, pipe crusher, or ball mill.

There are buyers for the harvested boards, but don't expect much.

Steve


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## Eric (Jun 23, 2008)

From my recent experience, the majority of the gold is in the motherboards. The average yield on the gold pins are around 5 grams. How much of that is solid gold, I will have to get back to you on a later date.


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## banjags (Jun 23, 2008)

You may get 5 grams of pins but those are plated you generally need a couple pounds of pins to process to make it worth while. I wouldnt process less than 5 pounds. Motherboards in general will contain very little gold at all. But you may or may not also have palladium/platinum in the monolithic caps and silver in the solder.

I have been trying to sell a large lot of motherboards on ebay for a while now. And finally after a couple weeks I have a bid on them... around .30 cents per pound plus shipping.


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## Anonymous (Aug 25, 2008)

Hi all, This is a great forum and I'm learning plenty, almost too much..

I am getting $.50 a pound right no for mother boards and $20 a pound for processors. Now the mother boards are stripped of any alum. or copper.

Also on occassion I can get $.10 a pound for all other circuit boards. 

If this is a deal or not I have no idea, but that is why I'm here trying to learn how to recover the precious metals and to see if it is worth it to me.


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## teabone (Aug 25, 2008)

It's a great deal , for your buyer !! :wink:


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## Anonymous (Aug 26, 2008)

teabone said:


> It's a great deal , for your buyer !! :wink:




I kind of figured that...  But who knows maybe I'll learn enough and be able to do it myself. Now from what I'm gathering you need a lot of these to make it worth while... But that is at first blush, I may change my mind on that after I get more invovled and figure out what is what.. :? 
I already scrap out most other metals, so I figure it I can learn how to do the precious metals all the better...

Keep your powder dry 
Mike


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## Rag and Bone (Aug 26, 2008)

The worst deal I found so far is $1.50/lb. for boards and cards. The best deal is someone who will refine on an assay basis. Then you can harvest the easily refined pieces and send the rest to the big man. The trouble is finding someone honest.


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## theroots (Sep 24, 2008)

Question - Redders said - 

"'Flatpack' chips on a lot of video cards and two or three on a motherboard. They have the gold flash in one corner. "

Are these the only ones considered flatpacks or are all the flat basically square chips considered to be flatpacks? 

I watched Steve's video on flatpacks and he wasn't removing the ones with the gold flash in the corner.


Scott


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## lazersteve (Sep 24, 2008)

Scott,

I consider a flatpak any surface mounted (legs do not go through the board) integrated circuit with more than 20 legs. Quad flatpaks are the ones with legs on four sides of the chip and the ones with a gold corner are BGA (ball grid array) types. The surface mounted chips with less than 20 legs may also contain traces of precious metals.

Steve


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## theroots (Sep 24, 2008)

Thanks Steve.


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