FYI:good supplier of used computers....

[simple_gifts]

Thought I would just post this link to a refurb computer place;

https://www.intechraoutlet.com/home/

I ordered (2) GX270s as spare PCs for a church for which I do pro bono work. They have GX270s in the office (with Dell OEM install disks) and I figured having some spare PCs would do them good in the long run, should one of the main machines go bad, they won't have to buy a new machine with Vista.

It is amazing how well a 2.8Ghz machine with 512Mb will run XP without the nonsense of try and buy clogging the registry. One of the machines I threw in 1Gb extra and loaded Ubuntu and with results like this, I'm not sure I'll ever buy a new machine again.

Cost for the Dell was $72 since I get a corporate discount thru my employer. I'm thinking of ordering a few more, loading Ubuntu and sending to my Aunt (still running W98) and someone I know still using a 750Mhz Ubuntu box.

 

[greenaccord02]

The GX270 is a fine box. We just retired ours about a year ago. There were very few failures with that bunch.

I found a warehouse down here in Houston where you can browse around the used equipment. It's owned by an African guy who likes to haggle. I buy a lot of miscellaneous parts and machines at once and we go back and forth on the price. He buys the stuff by the pound from auctions so he lets it go for a little more than free and still makes a killing. It's nice to shop online, but this warehouse is amazing. I was shocked at the volume of used equipment. It ranges from piles of Apple ][ all the way to near mint condition Core 2 series boxes and everything in between, not to mention all the peripherals and printers to match. It's like a museum for nerds but everything is for sale.

 

[Colt45ws]

You must show me the location of this warehouse.

 

[oilboy123]

Originally Posted By: greenaccord02
The GX270 is a fine box. We just retired ours about a year ago. There were very few failures with that bunch.

I found a warehouse down here in Houston where you can browse around the used equipment. It's owned by an African guy who likes to haggle. I buy a lot of miscellaneous parts and machines at once and we go back and forth on the price. He buys the stuff by the pound from auctions so he lets it go for a little more than free and still makes a killing. It's nice to shop online, but this warehouse is amazing. I was shocked at the volume of used equipment. It ranges from piles of Apple ][ all the way to near mint condition Core 2 series boxes and everything in between, not to mention all the peripherals and printers to match. It's like a museum for nerds but everything is for sale.


You lucky Dog! I can only dream of that........

 

[Scott P]

I am in Houston and would be interested in knowng the location of this place.

 

[Cutehumor]

I picked up a used compaq from ebay over a year ago for $150. no problems so far.

 

[GMFan]

Seems like any Dell Optiplex will run for years and years without issues. I remember in high school we had 8+ year old Dell Optiplex Pentium II desktop machines in our MS Word/Excel classes and they ran pretty much all day.

Not only that, but since millions of these are in service by companies who retire them every 3 years, they are a dime a dozen and cheap.

 

[ToyotaNSaturn]

Well, GX270 & GX620 models are the the most problem prone from our experiences.

The culprits are:
GX270 - power supplies and leaky caps
GX620 - power supplies and bad motherboards & PATA and/or SATA controllers going bad--these are on the m/b of course.

745, 755, 170L series are the ones I would aim for on the used market as they work well.

 

[eljefino]

I have a Gx270 I got off ebay a year ago for $30 with unbeknownst-to-me leaky caps. It ran awesome when it ran, I had win 2k on it and it really got the lead out.

I still have, well, all of it, in case a better motherboard fits. It's cute as well as fast.

GMFan, those Optiplex P IIs are what we still use at work.

 

[simple_gifts]

Quote:

GX270 - power supplies and leaky caps


I have heard this; this is why I bought extras for the church. One from the church already requires a special incantation to power on; so in the meantime it is left on...

HPs and IBM on the reburb site also.

 

[greenaccord02]

This is the location of the fabled warehouse: They're open 9-5 during the week only. It's off Spencer in Jersey Village. Don't expect clean store shelves or well lit walkways - this is a warehouse for used equipment. Also, nothing is priced so you have to know what's fair and what you're willing to pay. I'd call first to make sure they're open. It's not a shangri-la but it's pretty good fun for nerds.

Beatronics
12915 FM 529 Rd.
Houston,Tx 77041
(713) 466-1311

 

[ToyotaNSaturn]

I just had an HP server die today that we bought in early '03. The cause? Bad caps. This is the 2nd (and final) m/b. Time to shoot this old horse.

 

[bakechad]

Originally Posted By: simple_gifts
Thought I would just post this link to a refurb computer place;

https://www.intechraoutlet.com/home/

I ordered (2) GX270s as spare PCs for a church for which I do pro bono work. They have GX270s in the office (with Dell OEM install disks) and I figured having some spare PCs would do them good in the long run, should one of the main machines go bad, they won't have to buy a new machine with Vista.



Simple_gifts,

Thanks for the info, the site looks good. What did they get for shipping? I can't find any shipping info on their site.

Thanks

chad

 

[simple_gifts]

Thought I would bump up this post for anyone looking for good used gear.

Picked up an engineering workstation

IBM Intellistation 6218 (Pentium 4 3.6GHz)

4Gb RAM (expandable to 8Gb using PAE extended kernel; thanks Ubuntu)

512Mb NVidia graphics.

Firewire port.

Ultra320 Adapter with (1) 72Gb drive and (1) 146Gb drive.
CD/DVD combo

all for $140; + $25 shipping.

Ubuntu loaded with no issues.

Prices of the machines don't seem to be dependent on features, probably just age calculated. I seem some machines with 3Gb and 750Gb drives, DVD RAM for a pittance.

 

[Rand]

I just checked that place I was looking for something similar..

they seem pretty wiped out right now.
I'll check back in a couple days.

plenty of home boxes left if anyone needs a family pc for web browsing etc.

 

[Silver]

Off-lease pc's are a gem. They retire them years before their life is up. I bought a 3Ghz P4, 1 GB RAM for $129 from tigerdirect.com a few months ago. Some dopehead IT guy figured it was time to upgrade so they could use IE 9... or some similar fluke I'm sure.

 

[ToyotaNSaturn]

Originally Posted By: Silver
Some dopehead IT guy figured it was time to upgrade so they could use IE 9... or some similar fluke I'm sure.



Evidently, you don't understand PC lifecycles in a business environment. 5 years maximum, 3 years leased if a company goes that route.

If the motherboard on your system has bad caps, then up & dies because of it, maybe that IT guy wasn't a dopehead after all...

 

[Silver]

Yeah, I do.

Yeah, he probably was.

 

[brianl703]

The Dell Optiplex GX280 I bought for $60 (3GHz P4, 80GB, 512MB ram) has had all of the capacitors replaced before I got it. I checked, there's a website that tells you what the original capacitors look like and this one doesn't have the originals anymore. It was an off-lease PC.

The company I work for has started to lease laptops for 3.5 years. They were 3 years.

 

[simple_gifts]

Our customer's PCs are Dell w/ 3 year warranty. When the warranty is up the machine is replaced regardless of the status of the machine (could be still in the box) Out of warranty repairs are just one big hassle (for 6000 machines) to even consider it. You have a tech work the machine for 3 hours, you might as well just thrown the machine away.