what to do with two broken laptops...

[Techy]

I have 2 laptops that will not turn on. I took them to a repair shop and they quoted the fix to be higher than the value of the laptops themselves! I determined them to be pretty terrible laptops anyway but I don't want to just throw them away. I reckon that someone could salvage the parts.

 

[BobK]

If the hard drives have any respectable capacity you could put them in enclosures and use them as external drives. Other than that, they'd make dandy doorstops and heavyish paperweights, that's about it.

 

[LMSCorvetteGT2]

I have 2 laptops that will not turn on. I took them to a repair shop and they quoted the fix to be higher than the value of the laptops themselves! I determined them to be pretty terrible laptops anyway but I don't want to just throw them away. I reckon that someone could salvage the parts.

We can rebuild them, we have the technology...

Seriously though if they aren't that great by your own regards then the parts salvageable aren't going to be worth it either. Also depending on the year I'd say they're most likely outdated for anyone to want to hassle with them. If they were some rare or special type components in them for their time then they might be worth it, but this sounds run of the mill.

Just use them as cheap externals like bobk said, that's what I did with my old laptop hard drive.

 

[Techy]

Well, one of the HDDs no longer works. The other has 500GB of space so I guess that could be added to my main PC. I still find it unfortunate that none of the parts have salvage value.

 

[MHPALA]

You can recycle their parts. They're just bricks collecting dust. Wifi/bluetooth cards are reusable too (depending on the manufacture. Cause driver). Antennas, also.

 

[Techy]

There isn't much I can recycle for my use, apart from the HDD I said earlier.

 

[BobK]

So pop out the useable harddrive and cart the rest down to the local recycling center.

 

[Robin]

You know what would also be useful... remove the LCD panels and turn them into external monitors. You can buy reasonably cheap kits on ebay which convert the connection into DVI or HDMI and you can use them like any other screen.

The RAM will be worth selling.

 

[Techy]

So pop out the useable harddrive and cart the rest down to the local recycling center.

Guess I'll do that

You know what would also be useful... remove the LCD panels and turn them into external monitors. You can buy reasonably cheap kits on ebay which convert the connection into DVI or HDMI and you can use them like any other screen.

The RAM will be worth selling.

You can do that? Sounds pretty difficult though

 

[MHPALA]

It is simple. All LCDs run off of the LVDS standard (edp from now on). Still, it not worth the cash (IMO). You'll have to fabricate a enclosure for a small TN screen. When you're done fabricating and buying the driver component, you'll notice that you've spent enough money to buy a new monitor.

 

[nk4e]

You could try fixing them yourself.

 

[Pophead]

Hit them with a hammer.
And then take the parts out and sell em.

 

[Robin]

It is simple. All LCDs run off of the LVDS standard (edp from now on). Still, it not worth the cash (IMO). You'll have to fabricate a enclosure for a small TN screen. When you're done fabricating and buying the driver component, you'll notice that you've spent enough money to buy a new monitor.

You can pick up the adaptors for as little as $20 and you don't really need to make an enclosure. People just prop them up on a desk or screw them to a wall. Still cheaper than buying a monitor especially if it's a good screen size.

 

[sesselpupser]

You can pick up the adaptors for as little as $20 and you don't really need to make an enclosure. People just prop them up on a desk or screw them to a wall. Still cheaper than buying a monitor especially if it's a good screen size.

And even if you do want to make an enclosure you could just use some acrylic and hex spacers. Also laptop displays, being small, could be useful for all sorts of non-standard applications like a MAME table, accessory display for a triple screen setup, etc.

 

[Techy]

You could try fixing them yourself.

I could. But I highly doubt I will be able to fix both of them without expert help.

You can pick up the adaptors for as little as $20 and you don't really need to make an enclosure. People just prop them up on a desk or screw them to a wall. Still cheaper than buying a monitor especially if it's a good screen size.

One of them is about 18 in, so it could be good as a multitask sort of screen. But honestly, it isn't much use for me. Plus I traced one of the issues in the panels themselves so even if I used them as external displays, it won't work anyways.

 

[nk4e]

Google might help but depending how old the laptops are, parts do come in handy for other people.
Screens can probably give you a good penny or so through ebay.