# What are various computer parts worth?



## amosfella (Feb 5, 2008)

I see some salvage auctions for computers and such, and I'm wondering what are various processors, ram, motherboards, video cards, and drives are worth for scrap. What I hear some processors are worth about $3 a piece. What about the others, and various processors. How many of them does it take to make an ounce?
Thanks ahead for the info.


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## Smitty (Feb 5, 2008)

Do a search on cpu yields and you should get a good idea of how many pounds of certain cpu's will yield an ounce of gold. I believe the Pentium Pro are the $3 dollar variety you are talking about. Other cpu's are worth maybe 1-2 dollars a piece. Good luck.


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## amosfella (Feb 7, 2008)

Ok, what about various types of ram for cutting fingers off of. I'm asking more about the gold content. l Have heard that about 175-200 fingers 3.5 inches long will make about an oz of gold. Is this true??


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## Gotrek (Feb 7, 2008)

Using the search function above you can probably find yield data for almost everything

For fingers see

http://goldrefiningforum.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?t=1640&highlight=finger+yeild+yield

There are more and better ones just used that one as an example.


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## Smitty (Feb 8, 2008)

I do not think you can get an ounce of pure gold from 175-200 memory fingers. You might though if it's Slot type cpu's. I have about 200 PCI and ISA fingers to process. If I can ever get to it I'll post the yield data online.


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## skyline27 (Feb 8, 2008)

The quantities of gold you are looking at with consumer electonics are small. You will be working for grams not ounces, unless you have some huge operation with a steady flow of material. Some of the parts (cpu's and memory) sell very well on ebay. 

If refining is your interest, you will find everyhing you need to get started on this site. Start reading about the processes and watch the tuturials. Ask questions if you get stuck and someone will sort you out.

Good Luck!


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## Gotrek (Feb 8, 2008)

skyline27 said:


> The quantities of gold you are looking at with consumer electonics are small. You will be working for grams not ounces, unless you have some huge operation with a steady flow of material. Some of the parts (cpu's and memory) sell very well on ebay.
> 
> If refining is your interest, you will find everyhing you need to get started on this site. Start reading about the processes and watch the tuturials. Ask questions if you get stuck and someone will sort you out.
> 
> Good Luck!



definately sell the parts first. There are tons of goofs like me who need parts for older systems, I still have 386's in operation.


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## hungry (Feb 8, 2008)

Smitty,

I have not seen a pentium pro go for 3$ a piece in a long time. I sure would like to find such a source. I see them going for 6 to 9$ a piece at least. They act like they're selling pure gold. I stopped buying on eBay when I paid 177$ for 29 pros and I snuck that one out at that price. I would imagine that somewhere down the road they will pay off, but anyone trying to move thier money quickly it is not so good. I don't mind too much because I'm in for the long haul and I'm having fun learning. It's going to take me some time to get through Hoke's book anyway. I've wasted some scrap parts trying to do it on my own and I'm not going to do it again, too painful.

My two cents worth

ED


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## Smitty (Feb 8, 2008)

I've bought a few locally from old timers that used to own computer shops, i'll offer them $3 for pentium pros and .75-1.00 for the rest of the cpu's. Most of them are just friendly guys, so i'll even get free stuff from them just by offering to haul a few unwanted items away to clean their garage up a bit. They're not interested in selling it on ebay, although they already know what it's going for. Ebay prices are silly sometimes. I would sell them on Ebay myself but I'm more interested in getting some hands on experience than flipping them for profit. I'm staying away from Ebay unless I'm selling. I'm willing to loose some money learning in the process, but i'm not going to give it away. I say be patient until you get enought scrap to work with. Plus I have 200 pounds of motherboards to go thru anyways. :lol: You are smart to stop buying pros online because aparently some people locally are thinking they are woth 9-10 a piece when I deal with the guys that are still in business selling and building computers. Although I have never gotten any of them to buy my pros even after offering them 1.00 discount if they'll buy from me.


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## Scott2357 (Apr 7, 2008)

Somebody correct me if I'm wrong but by my calculations a pentium pro should yield about .34 grams each using most of the processes in this forum.
Crushing the ceramic package should yield more but I don't know how much since I haven't tried it.


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## calgoldrecyclers (Apr 10, 2008)

five to five and a half pounds of 486 CPU's will yield one ounce. there is more, thicker, heavier plated gold on the 286, 386, 486, and 586 varieties, than what you will find on pentium chips. when the aforementioned chips were being produced, gold was trading at a relatively low cost, prompting the chip makers to use extra gold for conductivity processes. todays chipmakers are aware of the rising cost of gold and are using less and less. they will use just what they can get away with to keep profits up.


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## Scott2357 (Apr 10, 2008)

Calgold,

Wow, that's significantly different than most estimates posted here. I don't necessarily doubt that's true but want to be sure before I go off and buy a bunch and overpay. Is there a more efficient process you could share with us to get yields like that?

Thanks.


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## calgoldrecyclers (Apr 10, 2008)

reverse electroplating (electrolysis) is the method i understand that the values derive from. one once posted that one pound of CPU's netted, oh, wow. i just figured out my mis calculation. i was converting into ounces, not grams. wel, there you have it. the post was that you would retrieve anywhere from 3 to 3.5 grams per pound of CPU's. which would mean, it would take roughly ten pounds of CPU's to produce an ounce. 
sorry to all for my flubb!


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## loco (May 5, 2008)

yeah but 10 lbs of what type of processor?


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## calgoldrecyclers (May 5, 2008)

The 586 and below type. they contain the most " good gold". i think that would be early nineties and below.


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