Quote Originally Posted by rbrooks715 View Post
Seemed like my question would be easy to answer, but after reading a few responses to my post early today, I've decided to refine a couple of pounds of 386/486 myself and see what I get out of them. <<

seems like you would be sharing first? perhaps you could share the recovered values of that telecom scrap you had 'refined'.

i do exchange returns with a few individuals. i compare my returns to their returns. or vice versa.

as an example. i just got a settlement back from a processor. it was only X oz of gold, Y oz of silver, Z oz of platinum and D lbs of copper for my # of lbs of 386/486 cpu's. i ask how does that compare to your last lot of 386/486 processors. pretty simple.
I was asking what refiners/buyers pay compared to the actual spot value of gold. Same thing I would do if I took a 14k ring in to sell. I'd want to know what percentage of spot I was getting. Shady guys try to get around the question - good ones tell you exactly. In another post I wondered what a tower was worth. I did my e-scrapping mostly of telcom, mini and microcomputers. Been stockpiling towers til now. So I don't know about 386/486 but I'm going to refine a few pounds and then I'll let the forum know. As far as my telcom goes it was a ways back. Cascade at the time was paying around 80% of spot on gold, nothing on other pm or non-ferrous found. I was happy at the time. I wasn't looking to find out your or anyone elses actual returns - just a ballpark figure so I could figure how much time to take on an item and determine if the e-scrap is worth it compared to the other salvaging I do.