Boatload of Stuff

[Kyvinaria]

Well, it seems I'm on a roll lately as far as getting computer's goes.

Today I managed to get the following from a guy who was moving. He listed it on Kijiji, so i pounced on it. I got it all for a flat price of $50, since it wouldn't all fit in his new house

(This is a rough list, I haven't gone through some boxes yet):

- A 30"x60" Desk. It's nice, and will serve as a workbench

- 1 HP NetServer 2000 LC: Has dual PIII's, and that's all I know about it so far (I haven't tested it yet)

- 1 HP NetServer Storage System/6: It's the RAID Array that goes with the Netserver. It has 6 Hot-swap bays, and each seems to have an 18.2GB 10K SCSI drive in it. With the bays on the server included, there are a total of 12 Hot-swap bays in the system (6 on the server, and 6 in the Storage system :O )

- A box of spare parts for the Netserver (all sorts of components)

-Many, many internal SCSI Hard disks. I have 2 boxes of around 10-12 in each box. Some are 50-pin, but most are 68-pin and 80-pin SCSI.

-About 5 External Iomega Jaz Drives, with about a dozen Disks

-2 or 3 External ZIP drives, and some disks

-2 Internal ATA ZIP drives

-1 Iomega Ditto Drive: It's an oddity, I've never seen one before. Hopefully there are some tapes in the boxes somewhere

-Some odd 250MB Hard disk cartridges. They look like miniature Jaz Disks, but they aren't from Iomega. They're from Compass or something

-A box of DAT Tape drives (and a few tapes, I'm told. I haven't found them yet...)

-The usual assortment of old Floppy drives and CD-ROM's.

-Bags and bags of DDR and SDRAM. Not sure how much, but the guy figured it was around 8-9GB's worth. There's also some 72 and 30 pin stuff

-A box of Pentium II and Pentium III CPU's (The slot 1 Variety) as well as coolers

-Numerous SCSI cables, DB-25, 50-pin, and 68-pin varieties, for both internal and external drives

-A couple boxes of Motherboards (from Pentium 1's to 4's)

-A box or 2 of Graphics cards

-A box of NIC cards

-A lot of wireless equipment, routers, cards, etc

-A single Camera Surveillance system (He threw it in for free....not sure what I'll do with it)

Now, The only real problem (aside from the space it takes up...and that there are no Macintosh systems...) with this stuff is that it was in a smoking environment. It's not yellowed, but some stuff smells HORRIBLE. Can anyone here recommend a method of removing this smell from the stuff?

 

[Christopher]

Febreeze?

I had a compaq tower that was like that, and I just let it run and run so that fans would go and in turn filter the air out. but that takes a long time.

Check for dust, thats what is the bigger holder of the smell.

 

[MacMan]

I find that leaving machines in a well ventilated area is generally the best way to get rid of a smokey smell. Perhaps somewhere that is covered but has a good airflow through it (such as a shed). Also, giving them a good wipe down with a damp cloth will help.

 

[Unknown_K]

Dismantle everything (case parts and stripped motherboard) and wash it with soapy water, vacuum the PS. I don't think the smell goes away with use normally, you just get desensitized to it.

 

[wally]

...Now, The only real problem (aside from the space it takes up...and that there are no Macintosh systems...) with this stuff is that it was in a smoking environment. It's not yellowed, but some stuff smells HORRIBLE. Can anyone here recommend a method of removing this smell from the stuff?

The cleaning/airing suggestions of the earlier posters may be sufficient for the items less contaminated mainly on the outside by falling smoke particles. But for items with cooling fans inside (if the smoker was nearby) you will likely need to disassemble them and wipe down the areas where tar from the smoke has condensed using ethanol. You can do a controlled experiment where you first simply run a dirty cooling fan for a day or two, then wipe the fan blades with water only, then with water and detergent and inspect the towel as you wipe each time. Then get some ethanol (denatured alcohol/shellac thinner from a paint/hardware store) and wipe again and look at the paper towel, it likely will have some stinky stuff: yellow brown tar stain that the previous water cleanings did not remove. My experience with a smoker's Mac IIci is that the stink persists for years unless cleaned with alcohol wipe down. In that particular case I ended up having to completely disassemble the IIci power supply to clean it. The areas immediately up and down stream of the airmover fan, and the fan itself, are the ones to clean first, then the cabinet walls inside and out. I found I could blast away soot accumulations with a shop vac on blow, but the tar coating still stunk until I wiped it away with alcohol. If you have to bathe a circuit board use an alcohol spray bottle and a natural bristle paint brush and allow lots of drying time.

 

[MacPlusOwner]

That's my experience too; only a very thorough cleaning of all the parts will get rid of that smell, otherwise it'll linger for years. At least you didn't inherit a smelly CRT. I can't image an easy way to get the smell out of one of those.

 

[Christopher]

That's my experience too; only a very thorough cleaning of all the parts will get rid of that smell, otherwise it'll linger for years. At least you didn't inherit a smelly CRT. I can't image an easy way to get the smell out of one of those.

let it discharge and blow it out.

 

[defor]

You forgot to mention the kind of boat the conquest came in!

 

[Kyvinaria]

You forgot to mention the kind of boat the conquest came in!

Hmmm, does the '94 Aerostar (not mine, a friends) I used to haul it count as a boat? :lol:

 

[LCGuy]

Does it out-run a

? :lol:

 

[Kyvinaria]

hehe, good video. Thanks