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lynnalexandra

What to do with old (some dead) laptops?

lynnalexandra
12 years ago

How can I safely dispose of old laptops? By safely, I mean both in terms of not letting any retrievable data get into the wrong hands - and safe in terms of the environment/recycling.

First, I have one dead Dell Latitute 600. This thing cost me $150 used - a couple of years ago. Two weeks ago it would not come on at all. Even trying another battery (a Dell travel adapter) - it just wouldn't start up. Should I just throw this away? recycle?

Then I have two very old laptops we haven't used in years. One is a bottom end Toshiba from maybe 1o years ago. Last time I tried using it (about 3 years ago), it was so slow it wasn't worth using. I know specs might matter - but it's so old - needed a network card plugged in to get wireless B. No wireless built in. The other old laptop is a Dell from probably 8 or 10 years ago. My husband has had two laptops since he last tried using that one. Again - no wireless.

The two that aren't dead yet might be of some value to some charity - but I'm worried about the data we have on there. And I'm not looking for a big project in terms of erasing data - just to pass on a used laptop that probably isn't worth $50.

So any ideas for disposal would be appreciated.

Thank you.

Lynn.

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