If it’s no longer usable to you, either sell or donate it. Simply because you don’t have a use for it anymore doesn’t mean you have to make a new use for it.

@Sticky @pcmasterrace

I usually sell my GPUs shortly after upgrading to the last one. Otherwise I usually keep them until they break

Let…go? No, I don’t think so.

If you haven’t touched it or needed it after a few years, time to go.

I used to try and donate to hackers for charity but I wound up tossing most of it. I used to have fucking 5 ft tall boxes full of shit. Just gotta let that stuff go.

I like to think I sell them or give them to friends. Realistically I either put them in my server (started when I build a new PC) or put them in the way until my wife gets mad and puts them in the basement where I never remember them again.

I usually just give them to friends. The more friends I have who are into pc gaming the better, I think.

I just built up a PC for my kid to play with while I’m gaming out of hardware I’ve had for at least 8 years so… I don’t.

My dad used to have some really old hardware, and he ended up getting rid of it after we convinced him to because it was so outdated and there would never be a time we’d actually want to use that.

I kind of regret that now. Some of it was broken and a lot of it was outdated, but I could really use a dedicated machine for older software and games. I’m sure if I look online, I can find that stuff. But not that long ago, there they were, in the garage, about a half-dozen old enterprise machines that between them probably had enough to run an XP machine for some old games and other programs.

I’m in the process of upgrading to a whole new computer and putting my six-year-old tired prebuilt to more relaxing work. My dad and I are discussing what to use it for. We can hook it up to get games and movies we have on its hard drive on the TV. Or, my dad hasn’t had a desktop of his own in ages and he’s considering turning it into a Linux box for his own projects that just can’t be built comfortably on a Pinebook.

It sounds like you’ve considered doing that kind of stuff, finding the right job for the tool. Well, here’s what I, someone who often doesn’t finish what they start, did to finally kick my own train into gear. I made a plan. And I’m sticking to it. Hell, my parts got here early and my plan still isn’t to start building until Thursday because it’s all part of the plan. My old PC will be put to use, one way or another. He’s still got a lot of fire in him. Runs a hell of a lot better than a machine of his specks and age has any right to! There’s no way I’m junking or scrapping him or leaving him in a corner to collect dust. But without a plan? Without a plan, he’d be piled up like the 16-year-old hard drives my dad will never throw away.

So if you don’t want to give your machines to people who can use them or otherwise get rid of them, but you also don’t want to start up your own personal museum, then make a plan. All the work to get everything running sounds like it sucks before you do it, hell, it might while you’re doing it, but it’ll be over soon enough and you’ll forget all the trouble you had with it.

I might suggest a few things you can do if you’re trying to dejunk. The first is to use your old hardware for stuff like a game server,Nextcloud instance, or any number of things you could do to improve your digital QoL. I’d also try and give away old gear to folks you know that might be in need. For instance, I gave my old laptop to a writer friend of mine who I kid you not was writing on his phone, so I gave him my old laptop with a copy of Fedora Linux(Which I daily drive too, so I can help him if he needs any help w/ stuff) on it and he’s been using the hell out of that thing. The third thing I’d do if you can’t figure anything out to do with it is just to make sure its being stored in a place that’s out of the way and won’t cause storage issues for other stuff. Then you can just sit on it until it finds a use and if you do not have the space, just go ahead and get them recycled or something. I would definitely caution against keeping too much stuff as well as it really does negatively affect mental health.

Hope these ideas help some, good luck!

Every time I’ve gotten rid of hardware, I end up wishing I hadn’t. So now I just don’t get rid of hardware.

I just built my daughter a PC out of mostly spare parts. There’s be some other use case again for more of my junk too I’m sure.

If I don’t use the parts for another server or something, I will donate or sell at a steep discount to friends.

If you can’t install it into the new system or have beyond 1 or 2 parts in a category only existing as a backup it’s probably junk. If you have old ram or something that could still work on the newest board it might be useful but you probably don’t need 5 builds worth of ram. Especially if 95% can’t even be installed on to the new board.

If you’re updating parts to have the latest all the time you probably need to sell your old parts just to afford new parts. And sooner the better to maximize the sell price. Personally I’m still using 6 year old hardware and will probably worry about upgrading when it bursts into flames or windows stops pushing security patches to the OS supported by the hardware.

Drives would probably be based on size and age if they aren’t already in the system or on a NAS.

I hold onto to everything. Never what what hobby build I might try on a rainy weekend.

My hoarder pride does not allow it. It is such good feeling if you suddenly years later get the idea how you can reuse it once again. Even if you later come to conclusion it is a terrible idea.

So many memories. It’s like being young again.