# How much gold in a laptop?



## midaselm

Hi all,

im a newbie to all this , so first let me thank all who have set-up this site . Thanks for not being greedy with your knowledge like the rest of the internet . So refreshing to see people wanting to share knowledge. Ive been wanting to get into urban mining for years and have just started 5 mnths ago. I'Ve been buying scrap gold and silver and Im currently in the process of leaching my first cat converters so cant wait to get my first self made metals and PGM's. 

Along the way Ive been offered laptops, mobile phones etc but cant honestly offer anything because Id hate to rip myself off but more importantly dont want to be ripping off other people , so here's my quite obvious question. Has any one here got an average minimum PM content for an average laptop, or has anyone got similar for mobile phones (similar to the PGM content charts that exist for the catalytic converters) ? 

I like trying to quantify stuff so as I process my items I'll try keep record of yeilds and hopefully be able to share some yeild data myself sometime !

Elmo


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## nickvc

Welcome to the forum Elmo.
The information you want is here but I'm afraid I don't mess with e scrap but if you use the search function, top right of your screen, I'm sure you will find that information. I figure that old phones and laptops are fairly low value items unless working and can be sold on, we have members who advertise what they will pay us for certain items so check those too.
Spend some time reading and researching and I'm sure you will come to your own conclusions about what items are worth to you but always remember you still have to recover and refine those values which takes time, chemicals and equipment, not to mention knowledge!
Goid luck and happy searching.


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## gold4mike

I don't mess with recovery from laptops because they're time consuming to take apart for the little value I derive from them. I sell them to Boardsort and they're currently paying $0.75 per pound. 

I usually buy based on 50% to 75% of their payout so I know I can turn a profit on any item I decide not to process myself. My current rate is $0.50 per pound for laptops and the computer repair shops I deal with are happy to get it.


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## etack

mike shop around on that. that seems really low for complete laptops. check out boardsorts neighbor. 1.10#

Eric


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## midaselm

Thanks for the advice people  i just realised i had posted this in the chemicals section , d'oh! 

So laptops arn't worth the hassle ? I've read places that state each would have between 1-2 gramms of pure gold , so i was just going to start offering 20 euro a unit and see if i win or lose but now im not so sure ...... and as the chemicals are near impossible to get in Ireland and expensive if you can get them, might just avoid the e-scrap lark until I find some for free to do some yeild test ! 

thanks again


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## nickvc

midaselm said:


> Thanks for the advice people  i just realised i had posted this in the chemicals section , d'oh!
> 
> So laptops arn't worth the hassle ? I've read places that state each would have between 1-2 gramms of pure gold , so i was just going to start offering 20 euro a unit and see if i win or lose but now im not so sure ...... and as the chemicals are near impossible to get in Ireland and expensive if you can get them, might just avoid the e-scrap lark until I find some for free to do some yeild test !
> 
> thanks again




I'd divide that estimate by 10 and you might be getting closer...you only have to look at what these sell for new and that includes taxes and the retailers markup then you have the manufacturers costs and their profit, they don't just throw gold in there if there's no need. If you do some reading you will find the answers your seeking but we won't hold your hand for you, this is very much a self help forum but with experts at hand if you get stuck. Chemicals are available if you look we have several Irish members who process, again your going to have to do the leg work if you want them.


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## element47.5

escrap is very low yield in most cases if you're talking about normal PC junk. Laptops don't even have the base metals of a normal desktop power supply. You need serious piles of computers to generate any appreciable amounts of PMs, indeed, most escrap refiners on this board report they scrap the base metals and regard any gold recovery as a freebie. No way is there even a gram of gold in a laptop.


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## midaselm

thanks everyone for the advice. Had a feeling that that the figure of 1-2 g per unit might be someones fantasy, and think it became mine too ! If it sounds too good to be true ...... 

Will concentrate on the Cat Converters for the foreseeable future then , oh and just found someone who give me the hcl.... 

cheers folks for the quick replies and info :lol:


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## jimdoc

midaselm said:


> thanks everyone for the advice. Had a feeling that that the figure of 1-2 g per unit might be someones fantasy, and think it became mine too ! If it sounds too good to be true ......
> 
> Will concentrate on the Cat Converters for the foreseeable future then , oh and just found someone who give me the hcl....
> 
> cheers folks for the quick replies and info :lol:



What PGM content charts are you using for converters? You may be going by fantasy numbers on them also.

Jim


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## midaselm

Good thinking Jim ! 

well i am using this PGM content list as a basis for this experiment ......

http://www.scribd.com/doc/24745162/Catalogue-PGM-CONTENT-1-of-Catalytic-Converters

I have a few cats already from working on cars, and have one from an opel corsa that appears on the list , its quite an obvious design so am fairly sure it's the cat in question. So my plan is to try extract from this cat and at least see what i can get from it , then compare to the PGM data on that list and any difference will either mean I have extracted badly, the figures on the yields sheet are wrong, or their are losses from the original cat PGM content that are not considered on the data sheet . 

At least when I have done this one as a test run , I will learn the process , and hopefully know how much the actual content I can extract , differs in respect to the data sheet. I'm not expecting to actually make the numbers on the list but If I can get 50% will be a proud man 

How do these yield sheets measure up ? Can they be trusted in your opinion?


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## patnor1011

If you start offering 20 euro for unit you will get broke in about a month. 
I mean while I like pins and stuff from them, easier to process as they are thin and tiny I would say that if somebody offer me laptop for more than 5 euro I will not touch that. In fact if and when I got some I paid usually about 2 euro a piece and only sometimes 3 when there was more of them on offer.
Chemicals here cost more than alcohol that is truth but try mistral from north, they are expensive too but somehow easier to deal with than anyone in Republic.
Price of them is what taught me to use them sparingly and only when I really need them and always less than needed with final additions. That do have some advantages too, less waste to deal with.


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## Mattie

In my point of view, spend sometime reading as well as researching and I'm sure you might arrived at your own conclusions in what items are usually worth to you personally.
Home-Based Jewellery Valuations | Cash for Jewellery


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## skippy

When I was intererested in cats I had assays done on four different cats and they matched up somewhat with the list. My numbers weren't quite as high on the rhodium and platinum as I recall. I posted a couple of results a while back on GM and Ford cats. Mind you my sample sizes were small, I only took samples from six cats of each type. If you can get cats cheap enough it could be worth your time. I wasn't able to get them cheap enough and I realized that I would never make any money processing them myself. 1-2 grams per unit isn't uncommon by any means, it's pretty typical actually. 

If the document you are talking about is the one everyone has seen, from my experience my assays came in a little lower, but overall I was impressed at how well some of the numbers matched - but typically the palladium and rhodium was a little lower for me. So no I wouldn't say the numbers are fantasy, but don't count on the values in any way but a ballpark sort of way, if at all. Enjoy processing your cats, ease your way in and if you want to make money you need to figure out what the local market is all about. 

The most sensible in a dollars sense way to deal with cats is you don't try to recover metals yourself. You deal in volume, you decan, mill, assay and sell to a plasma smelter. Like I said, I wasn't able to get them cheap enough to make processing myself worthwhile, but even if I could get them cheap and I wanted to make cats my livlihood I would get some capital together and decan them and sell the ceramic. You'll do much more volume, in all likelihood get better return, but you will need substantial capital. That's how the business of cats works and anything else is just hobby, experimentation, speculation.


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## Flytripper

That depends, i had 2 compact laptops that were filled with gold


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## patnor1011

Flytripper said:


> That depends, i had 2 compact laptops that were filled with gold



It only look that way. Generally there is more plated areas or pins in a laptop but while it is nice eye candy final value will not exceed few $ worth. And by few I mean few - less than 10 I would say and closer to half of it.
But if you disagree then it is very easy to prove me wrong. Just try to process one of them and you will see by yourself.


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## Marcel

element47.5 said:


> escrap is very low yield in most cases if you're talking about normal PC junk. Laptops don't even have the base metals of a normal desktop power supply. You need serious piles of computers to generate any appreciable amounts of PMs, indeed, most escrap refiners on this board report they scrap the base metals and regard any gold recovery as a freebie. No way is there even a gram of gold in a laptop.


He said it all that needed to be said!

Still I love notebooks and I buy them from time to time and dismantle the little beasts. I usually pay around 4€ / piece sometimes only 3€.
Sometimes they have very high yielding chips. 
They have lots of tantals (around 10g/notebook)
lots of MLCCs (10-20g/notebook)
Dont forget the displays! I am still collecting them for future recovery, but they do contain Indium, which is a very rare and expensive metall. 
I rather have 100 notebooks in my basement than 30 big servers cloaking my space.

Marcel


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## midaselm

Thanks all for the replies and help ,

i almost got to find out how much gold there is in my laptop as for some reason it died and i lost my last 6 months work !!! 

All those spreadsheets for my gold , silver and coins gone!!! But at least I'll get to start a fresh and better this time.

thanks, elmo.


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