Got a call from IT repair guy closing shop!!!

I have lost a lot of regular pick ups do to dumb reasons. Companies don't like getting cash from small recyclers. They like giving it for FREE to large recyclers!!! I was getting 40-60 cellphones a month at $2/lb from a resell tech company, now they give them away for free to the needy who already get free phones from the gov't. Can't figure it out. Anyways, I am on the verge of ending my LLC and moving from my 10x25 and 15x20 storage units to a single 10x10 unit.

Then Wednesday I get a call no name on caller ID or didn't leave message. I call back and it's an IT guy I bought from a year ago. His business is struggling and is closing shop. I stopped in on Friday and picked up 80 towers, misc plastic and 20 Power supplies. Saturday, I returned with more cash after working all night processing (also partially my rental unit money, due Tuesday, so dumb). He then gave me 120 laptops, 3 boxes of laptop scrap, a LCD monitor, 2 CRT monitors and a broken microwave. I paid a little under a $100 for everything, though he wants a little more maybe 20. No problem. When I pay that, then he has CPU's and RAM to sell next. What a break!!!

I am keeping the 10x25 unit for another month, but have to leave the other unit because of lack of funds and supply of Ewaste and down grade to a 10x10 until something improves.

Pictures of the Laptops please ! :D

Congrats on the score. Take it as a sign that things will improve!

A small repair shop closing in a large city is NOT a sign of improvement. Instead of getting things fixed people just toss them in the trash or dump them at bestbuy. I noticed quite a few people around here that used to do laptop repairs have given up over the last few years since they are cheap enough people just buy a new one when they break or get slow. I would think it would be much easier to get ewaste in bulk from a busy refurbishing guy who gets all kinds of gear dumped on him then having to chase stray machines in the trash.

Any old complete Thinkpads in that 100 laptop bundle?

I does look a little grim. The trend has been from larger devices (towers) to smaller (laptops) to even smaller throw away devices like tablets & I- phones.

Been watching CL for the last couple of mos. The market for refurbished towers & laptops isn't good. There's not much call for them anymore. Every week or two there will be a listing from someone that's given up on repair and is selling out.

If you're doing e-waste it's probably better to downsize. The micro devices that will be coming in won't take up as much space.

To put it another way: E-waste is bought & sold by the pound. Weigh up what you get from a tower and compare that to what you get from a tablet. Hummm ........

You all that are heavy into e-waste have seen this coming, devices are becoming cheaper both in actual cost to the consumer and how they're made. Just my opinion, but I think the glory days of e-waste may be fading into the rear view mirror...

Quote:

---

You all that are heavy into e-waste have seen this coming, devices are becoming cheaper both in actual cost to the consumer and how they're made. Just my opinion, but I think the glory days of e-waste may be fading into the rear view mirror..

---

I can't find the post from a few years ago on here about Ewaste and its dismissal ending. But soon technology will push a lot of us Ewaste scrapers out. You have to adapt your recycling or close your doors. Soon it might be just electronic devices that you wear that will be passed on down to scrapers.

How do you recycle a broken fit bit, a smart watch, or tablet and still make money? Today's homes are being geeked out with super tech and so are cars. There will always be Ewaste to have, it will just be difficult to find if your not thinking outside of the box.

Ewaste just won't be profitable since it will contain little actual metal and the $ lb/s per device will be minimal. Look at newer cars, they all have multiple computers inside but how profitable is it to strip them out and recycle them? Companies use cheaper material to save money since its all a race to the bottom. Even now the prized ewaste is stuff from the 80's and 90's plus old telecom.

More than resale is key. Larger companies won't abandon desktops for iPads. Schools will still have some systems, as will hospitals, municipalities, and businesses. They'll need parts, and they'll send systems out. As for car computers, if they're failure-prone, there will be a market for them.

------------

I offer local repairs on computers. Business on the service side is down a little, but the reason is simple: money. The economy isn't doing very well out here, meaning that many people have less disposable income. A $50-75 virus removal that would be a no brainer in the past looks harder to do now. I'm seeing a stronger demand for laptops, though. A lot of the people who held out with XP are moving ship to Windows 7. I think a lot of people held on as long as they could to their old systems. As they move up, the businesses that sell refurbished products are doing better than the ones that are service only. Give the people time, though- they'll need service at some point.

One of the keys to successful business is low costs. A lot of the repair companies out here run massive overheads, and that's a killer. That nicer building that costs an extra $1000 per month needs to land you an extra 10-20 virus removals per month to break even, much less justify the added expense.

I don't know specifically what the future holds but I think I will be getting into tablets and cell phones soon, I've been burned recently on desktops...parts still sell but I think it's time we acknowledge that yes the scrap market is down, yes it is becoming MUCH more technical which is weaning out the garage e-scrappers...and that is unfortunate but thats how it is.

Fortunately I have the skill set to replace charging ports, digitizers, amoleds, motherboards, buttons, glass...do hardware resets on bricked i phones (attempted jailbreak failures)...I repair laptops from our scrap pile that quite frankly would have been passed over by anyone else. All this said, I do not do repairs for things I didn't refurbish myself mostly because ebay and the rest of the scrap side takes up too much of my time. It's been stressful on a level that's hard to describe lately.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by unknownk

A small repair shop closing in a large city is NOT a sign of improvement. Instead of getting things fixed people just toss them in the trash or dump them at bestbuy. I noticed quite a few people around here that used to do laptop repairs have given up over the last few years since they are cheap enough people just buy a new one when they break or get slow. I would think it would be much easier to get ewaste in bulk from a busy refurbishing guy who gets all kinds of gear dumped on him then having to chase stray machines in the trash.

Any old complete Thinkpads in that 100 laptop bundle?

---

Are thinkpads rare? I've got one I just sat off to the side because it was IBM, haven't really done much more than try and boot it up

there will always be ewaste...and more of it. Some of the things you guys mentioned (smartwatches etc), you would not break down (time vs $$ does not work)....you will end up sending it in whole and take a lower price per pound on that stuff. ALL of that is still made with precious metals to some degree....they will just grind them up and separate out the metals using acid like that do now. Tablets and other things like that still have plenty of precious metals in them...maybe not like the old stuff, but there just is more to be recycled and you shouldn't have to break it down soon enough...stack it up and send it off.

YES, the heyday is probably behind us, BUT there are millions of pounds of stuff still out there. They will find a way to recycle stuff, even the newer stuff. You also need to make sure you adapt to the next wave anyways. Paper and plastics are plentiful if you have a place you can send it in quantity....an alot of it pays better than metal these days.

Point is, recycling is just that, a constantly changing business...you have to adapt and keep more than one avenue in place. One thing dries up or go down in value...something else will replace it.

"Companies don't like getting cash from small recyclers. They like giving it for FREE to large recyclers!!!"

No joke. The place here that pays can hardly stay in business yet the places that charge you to take it is overflowing. I don't get it.

Also, I read somewhere that with all of the tablets, etc, towers are actually doing better now. Laptops are the thing slowing down. Of course it will take 3-5 years before that trend is seen in the waste stream.

great thread sorryI didn't read it before I sorta steeped on it. lets go to the members room and see if we can find a way to get ahead of this trend.

Personally I am not all in on "EWASTE"......I do it because it is good money but I don't really see a huge future in it..........For this reason I have stayed small, flown under the radar, and made my money.......I have not expanded out of a large storage locker, I have not invested in any fancy tools or equipment to move ewaste.....ETC....ETC.....ETC......I think I may have stated this before but if I wanted to quit tomorrow it would just cost me a little money to clean out storage and with all the scrappers around could probably give it away easily..........I will stay in until it becomes not profitable then I will hopefully have made enough to at least live comfortably until something else comes along or I give up completely..........As usual KUDOS to the big timers like "Ewasted" that provide us a place to sell our goods but that level of biz/stress is not for me......I have thought it over time and time again I just don't want to do it........Good luck to all and I don't think ewaste is going away anytime soon it may just get to a point where it is not profitable to handle

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Longhairboy

Are thinkpads rare? I've got one I just sat off to the side because it was IBM, haven't really done much more than try and boot it up

---

The only really rare Thinkpad is the 8xx series which is PPC, those can sell for $100's if they work.

I collect Thinkpads, which is why I asked.

toshiba and ibm both made pentium pro laptops...well...comact desktops? They used the black fiber P Pro not the ceramic gold cap.

I believe IBM also had a Cyrix-based laptop, but I can't say for certain.

Other than that, is your run of the mill Pentium III/IV ThinkPad rare? Nope.

There are no "Pentium Pro" laptops that I know about. There are Pentium laptops using mobile processors.

I possess a pentium pro laptop made by IBM, so now you know about one. It's almost 3 inches thick and weighs about 14 lbs, most of which is battery weight.

What model would that be?

IBM Thinkpad 760EXD PPGA Chip, 233Mhz, it was designed as a workstation, enhanced screen resolution, cd and floppy drives, large li-ion battery when most were still using ni-cd. Same laptop NASA used on the space shuttle missions. There's videos on youtube from the 90s where you can clearly see astronauts using this particular laptop. I got it from a university and it still works.

I'm sure they said the same years ago in regards to regular scrapping. An yet..people still do it full time. People still recycle cars, trucks an the like. Cans, all metal items, etc.

As has been said before whenever these threads come up...Adapt or get passed by. It's really simple.

To Rolly,

Congrats on landing that deal. May it be the start of more coming your way.

Back to everyone else...

Adapt an overcome or don't adapt an get run over as time marches by. It's the same for businesses. You will find a way to make it work, or you'll cease to exist in providing such services. I'm sure it's a lot harder for the hobby scrapper/part timer.

As a full timer, I put a lot of work into building relationships/networking. So this downturn...while current prices may drop, I still have my sources for items. As long as their in business or upgrading...I'll have clients. This talk of cell phones makes it sound like nobody has ever mentioned it here. Some of us have been dealing with cell phones for a good long while.

Cell phones are nothing new. An don't think they won't escape the use of less PMs. They won't be your miracle item, unless your into fixing screens, and other issues in regards to cell phones. I found it to be way more consuming then fixing up a tower. That's me tho.

I wish all of you luck. An as always...YMMV.

Sirscrapalot - Adapt an overcome, or get run over by the wheels of change.

they apparently made a DUAL PENTIUM PRO laptop.....check this **** thing out

Raytheon Dolch
RareCPUs.com - Find the rarest and most exotic CPUs in the world!

It is like a friggin suitcase. Looks like they show all sorts of CRAZY old tech there. I see a 386 laptop even...HOLY BEJESUS...I am betting you could do curls with that thing ;)

I was reflecting the other day and it reminded me of the local cobbler that i knew as a boy back in the mid 1960's. He was an older gent,very personable, and uncommonly good at his craft. He had a thriving business in our little town of 15,000 people. As time wore on a wave of change came through. Within a few years he closed his doors and went into retirement.

For those who never heard of a cobbler it was a man who repaired shoes. Mass production & lower prices rendered him obsolete.

The same thing happened to the man who would visit the neighborhood every month or so with his knife & scissor sharpening cart. It used to be that he would ring a bell to let everyone know he was there and the housewives would bring out their kitchen tools to be sharpened while they watched. It was a sad day when he rang the bell and nobody came out because with advances in technology the knives & scissors didn't need to be sharpened anymore.

I think we may be trending that way with e-waste. It's trending from large items to smaller items to even smaller micro devices. Prices are down and the average board yield in weight is pretty small.

The big hope has been in refurbish & repair. That's a valuable skill set to have but that trade may be going the way of the venerable cobbler.

It seems more likely that the devices will continue get smaller and lower in price. There will come a point where it will simply make more money sense to replace than repair. If you're micro device fails just go buy another one just as you would a pair of shoes.

It's not good news, but it may be the way things will look in a few years. Not so bad for the part timer or the hobbyist because they really don't stand all that much to lose. I'm more concerned for the full timers because it affects their livelihood. One should always hope for the best but it might be wise to develop some kind of fallback plan just in case things don't work out.

Changing and adapting in this circumstance might involve some kind of exit strategy where you can use the skills you've developed somewhere else.

I think that as SaaS (Software as a service, where you pay monthly grows), it's only a matter of time until a computer manufacturer makes a monthly plan, where you pay every month, and are given hardware upgrades. Until that day comes, there will be refurbishing. Laptops and desktops may not be as popular, but 2-in-1s such as the Lenovo Yoga, and tablets, will be refurbished then.

Look up the values of used iPads sometime. People will buy used ones all day long.

It's hard for me to visualize what the landscape will look like in 3 - 5 years with all of the innovation going on. The item that's relevant today will most likely be obsolete in 6 - 12 mos ? ie: DDR 2 memory, IDE HDD's, and Core 2 processors went the way of the Dodo bird during the past year.

LOL ... Five years from now something that hasn't even been invented yet will already be obsolete.

As far as consumer grade goods go it appears to be a race to the bottom ?

There are niches. The Mac products seem to appeal more to the discerning customer. The Mac refurbs appeal more to the discerning customer on a budget. The difficulty would be to get your hands on enough units to make a go of it. There's probably some kind of setup where you send in your Mac products that failed or got dropped while under warranty for an immediate replacement. It's like a factory approved refurbishing center ?

For working class & many middle class folks it's a trip to Wal-Mart for their electronics. In their minds there's a certain stigma attached to "refurbished". It's considered "less than". They're more apt to go with something new even though it may be of lesser quality.

I wonder if it would be better to do less of the consumer grade work & focus on providing " total care" service contracts to institutions like schools, govt agencies, and businesses. It would probably be cheaper for them to farm the work out to a private contractor than to keep an IT professional on salary. This would position someone on the ground floor for when new equipment is being purchased and old equipment is being taken out of service ?

That would likely drive you insane, but it would pay very, very well. The problem is that school systems are so complex that one person couldn't handle it.

Mac stuff doesn't depreciate much. I sold a Mac Mini last week. This is an 11 year old computer. DDR2 was out in 2005. Core 2 Duos came in 2006. The problem is that when I started, they were new and state of the art. If you had a Q6600, you were in high cotton. Today, not so much....

Now, we need to adjust our focus, and realize that the Core i5 is the same value as the Core 2 Duo used to be.

I've done "total care" with a number of different things besides IT over the years and it really isn't all that bad. The key thing i found was that i had to be willing to put my own needs aside in favor of the customer. If the phone rang at 2:30 A.M on an emergency call i had to be down on the job within 30 minutes.

That really isn't the norm though .... for the most part it's about doing regular maintenance & upkeep on the system. Keep it well tuned and you get very few rush calls.

An ounce of prevention ... ? ;)

=============

IDK .... it just seems like it would be awfully hard to make a living at doing small transactions ( 20.00 - 150.00 $ / per. ) You would have to be doing a $h*tload of volume just to meet operating expenses even at 100% markup over cost.

It's a hard row to hoe but if it's working for you go for it ! :)

It depends on cost of living. The median salary for the county I live in is about $23,000 per year. Of course, a lot of the daily expenses are cheaper. Our entire family's yearly salary wouldn't even cover the rent in a place like San Francisco.

I've done the 2:30 AM service calls. I hated every minute of them, but they did pay well. If you're up to it, and can get it all done, total care can do well. Out here, it's 50 miles each way on a service call. Few places are willing to pay over $100 for a guy just to show up.

I don't know what the median income is but the cost of living here is a bit higher than in other parts of the country because we're so far away from everything. Everything that we use has to be trucked in and everything that we produce has to be trucked out. It does add to costs.

It's gotten tougher since the recession hit. People, from the wealthiest to those who have the least, just don't have the money to spend like they used to. The standard of living has dropped right across the board.

As it stands right now there's no way the working class folks can afford the cost of a skilled tradesman.

The middle class can swing a few hours here and there but for the most part are doing their own work. It's funny/sad because they'll call you in on some pretext and then try to pump you for information on how to do the job themselves. You might have hours of unpaid time spent in developing a quote but it seldom pans out.

It's really only the upper middle class and the wealthy who can afford my services now. If it weren't for them i would have been out of business years ago. Thankfully, this is a popular spot for the wealthy to come and spend their summers.

For me: The best choice was to focus my efforts on developing a customer base where the money is. It's the wealthy, local businesses, government, school systems,healthcare facilities, and so on. Excellence in service & quality of workmanship will take you a long way.

It's so much easier to serve them than the working person who can only afford the lowest cost option.

I had a connection a few years ago that was tossing me stripped out flat screens. He also told me he had a connection that was buying up laptops in large quantities as long as they had web cameras. None of my IT guys would budge on price (too greedy). Fast forward to today and that guy is long gone. The company that I compete with in Ewaste no longer gets laptops from big corporations and is having to advertise more to attract the general public.
My contact found his way to big corporations and is paying them for their moderately used laptops. A few years ago, to my knowledge, this was a billion dollar industry growing in Brazil. Now who knows how big this has grown. My phone calls to him are know never returned. I tracked him down a few months ago trying to sell laptops, but he said he was washed out. He can't compete with flat screens against Walmart and his buddy with the Brazil connection had lost his to corporate America.