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Comment by andrewstuart | Hacker News Reader

I'd thought this would be about dumpster diving for computers/electronics, rather than for food.

If you're interested in doing some dumpster diving for computers/electronics - just take some old electronic junk to your local e-waste facility and drop it off, then look in the bins of e-waste and pick out what you'd like and take it home - it's only going to be destroyed anyway. You can find some amazing and weird electronic stuff that people just chuck away as well as lots of things like analog TVs, laptops and desktops and all sorts of gear. Every now and then you can find a vintage computer.

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In 2020 i got a 27" mid-2011 iMac with maxed out specs (i7, 16gb, 256gb ssd, 2tb hdd) this way (I was dumping my electronics there when I noticed some guy unloading the iMac).

Of course at home I found out why it was dumped... the left half of the screen's backlight was defunct, turned out to be a torn off connector that I could resolder and it had the infamous radeon gpu issue: flickering, distortions and crashes depending on the chip temperature. Fixed that by rom hacking [1] a dell nvidia quadro MXM-card off ebay for 30€ and replacing the radeon module.

I sold both the broken radeon mxm-module and the working iMac for 35€ and 380€. Succeeding with the repair was very rewarding, it will run for another couple years, I learned a few things along the way and made some buck.

[1]: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/2011-imac-graphics-card...

Reminds me of this:

HalTed in Silicon Valley used to have bins of broken motherboards. The sign above read:

"Guaranteed non-working. If yours works, bring it back and we'll exchange it for one that doesn't."

Oh I miss HalTed, Haltek, and Weird Stuff Warehouse. I managed to drop in to WSW on a business trip just weeks before it closed... it had barely changed in a decade, which was a little sad. I would have liked to see newer surplus!

As a broken-stuff enthusiast in California, I have never seen an e-waste place would let you just go through their bins and take stuff home. Where do you go?

You have to take some electronic stuff to drop off - that's the key - where I live you can find e-waste outside the front of people houses waiting for the council to come get it. Pick it up and put it in your car boot to take to the e-waste facility.

I go to the e-waste facility and just open the boot of the car and drop off the ewaste I bought and if there's something interesting I put it in the boot. Give and take.

There's no-one watching - I guess that depends on the e-waste facility, but I've never seen anyone watching. No doubt if the workers there saw you doing it they would object because that's not the purpose of the e-waste facility.

I don't feel like it's stealing or doing anything wrong because the stuff in there is destined to be crushed.

Maybe try a range of different e-waste dropoff points till you find one that works.

The one I go to (in Australia) - last time I went it had four giant bins stacked full of stuff. Frustratingly the e-waste was closed because it was so full so I couldn't pick through it. I could see it was full of computers and stuff.

It's official in Copenhagen (possibly more of Denmark), although it will have been unofficial for much longer.

> Residents of Copenhagen can recycle their waste at a recycling station or a collection point. A collection point is smaller, only accepts certain types of recyclable waste and is accessible by foot only. Both types are staffed and most have a “swap stand” where you can donate or collect items which are still usable. [1]

In addition, most apartment blocks have a small e-waste bin. That's big enough for something like a computer screen or laptop; larger things should be taken to the recycling station.

I fished a MacBook Air out of my block's bin, and sold it online for €150 or so. I kept a Kindle I repaired, and gave an old iPad to a friend. This was a couple of years ago, I think there's either now someone else looking in the bin for good stuff, or a wasteful neighbour has moved away.

(A typical apartment block has bins for cardboard, paper, metal, mixed plastic, electronics, batteries, glass, hazardous waste, food (for compost) and non-recyclable waste.)

[1] https://international.kk.dk/live/housing/settling-into-your-...

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