[kwlug-disc] Laptop Rescue Mission this Saturday

[Paul Nijjar]

Once again, some of us will be gathering at Computer Recycling to go
through donated laptops and fix the ones that are good enough to sell.

This will be happening on 
Saturday, Feb 7 
4pm-8pm
Computer Recycling
66 Queen Street South

There is a secret phone number to get in, which I have inadvertently
leaked in the past. If you do not have it in your email archives,
contact me offlist.

RSVPing is helpful but not strictly required if you are able to get
into the building. 

If you know of people not subscribed to the list who might be
interested in participating feel free to invite them as well. 

If a secret phone number does you no good because you don't have a
cellphone, that's okay too! Just email me by Friday and we can make
arrangements for you to get into the building without standing in the
cold for too long. (Apologies to Chris, who got stuck in the cold
because of my thoughtlessness.) 

There is no good reason we have to hold these sessions on a Saturday.
Sundays are out for me, but other evenings could work. If some people
would like an alternative day then we can arrange something (maybe
using a Doodle).

So far we are finding that there are two bottlenecks in getting
laptops in good shape. Even if you are not interested in participating
in the rescue days, maybe you can help: 

- Many of the BIOS batteries are dead. We have the raw materials to
  put together new batteries for IBM laptops, but I do not know who
  has the skill/inclination. This would make the IBMs more enticing.
  Other laptops need BIOS batteries too, but I do not know how hard it
  is to change them.

- We are pretty short on 2.5" SATA drives, so for now we are not
  refurbishing any computers that use these drives. This is a shame,
  because these tend to be nicer laptops than the ones we do get
  ready. If anybody has working 2.5" SATA drives (any size) that are
  kicking around after an upgrade, then we could put them to good use.
  If you specify that you are donating these specifically for the
  Laptop Rescue Mission, then I will try to make sure that we get one
  SATA laptop ready for each working SATA drive donated (as oppposed
  to hoarding these drives for internal use, which is what we are
  doing now because we are pretty short on 2.5" SATA drives). 

We are also having trouble finding markets for the laptops that we
refurbish. We have sold a handful through Computer Recycling, but we
are finding that people are reluctant to buy them because: 

- They are older, and nobody likes older things
- They do not come with warranties of any kind (and we are pretty
  explicit about this)
- They come with Xubuntu installed and not Windows (which I consider a
  feature and not a bug, but others disagree)

So if you know of people/projects that would be interested in
purchasing these laptops, then get in touch with us. I am not
promising that we will give the laptops away for free (although for
really old laptops like Pentium IIIs we would consider it), but I
would really like to see these laptops put to good use. 


-- 
http://pnijjar.freeshell.org