Here's my [totally true!] story on that. I used to collect (hoard?) old electronics - not just all sorts of computer components, but old reel-to-reel tape decks, amps, tuners, preamps, receivers, cassette players, 8-tracks, loudspeakers, turntables, VCRs, test equipment, phones, every type of cable you can think of, and more. I didn't collect it as a hobby, however. Generally, it started out because I did not like idea of throwing out something that still worked perfectly fine. Besides, "I might need it someday!" But "someday" never came. Over the years, I ended up with a room in my basement filled with shelves stacked with old electronics. And in terms of this collection becoming an "investment" (another excuse I kept giving myself), well, that never happened either. Unless you stumble on a very rare, first of its kind, museum quality piece of historical value, you will never get what you think that obsolete, superseded, legacy hardware is worth. After finally coming to my senses, I cleaned out my basement storeroom, loaded up my truck and hauled everything out to a local electronics recycling center. They paid me $80 for the precious metals in the CPUs, GPUs and RAM and for the salvage value of the copper, aluminum and steel. Yes, that was pennies on the dollar compared to the original purchase prices, but in terms of investment value, there just wasn't any. They also promised to "wipe" clean my old hard drives of any previously saved data, but I did that before hand anyway. I recommend you do too. Ultimately, and most importantly, it all was properly recovered and recycled, keeping all that hazardous waste out of the landfills, oceans, and water supplies. That $80 paid for the fuel to haul everything out to the recycling center. $40 went to a 12 x 12 foot carpet remnant, and the rest went to a couple gallons of paint and paint supplies. I now have a nice spare bedroom in the basement. It also made for a happy "better-half" - always a good thing! One problem area is old CRT TVs and monitors. There is a tiny drop of mercury inside cathode ray tubes. Here in the U.S. and I suspect most other places, there are strict environmental protection rules about recovering, storing and disposing of the highly poisonous metal. Compliance with those rules is expensive. Also, CRTs are under some extreme vacuum pressures. There is an extreme risk of first, an implosion then a subsequent explosion resulting in extremely sharp shards of glass projectiles flying through the air if those CRTs are not properly "popped" open by a trained, qualified technician. This again is expensive, but is the only way to safely release the vacuum and remove the mercury for safe and proper recovery. So the recycling center here wanted me to pay them $10 for each CRT device to help cover their expenses. I had 6 of them. I ended up taking them back home and found a local repair shop who said they would take them off my hands and use them for spare parts. I can only hope they've been, or will be properly disposed of when that time comes. Anyway, the point is, I have rid my house of old, electronic "junk" that was just taking up space, collecting dust. I avoided polluting the environment with hazardous waste. I got a little bit of cash in the process. Created a comfortable bedroom for guests. Got the other-half off my back. And, helped with the shortage of copper and other metals too. Hard to argue with any of that.
