Certificate of Destruction

/ hsoi

Just say that a few times: “Certificate of Destruction”

Sounds cool. Or at least, me and my kids think so. 🙂

I have (well, had) a bunch of old computers lying around: an old PowerMac 850/150 (that was the shiznit back in the day), a IIvx with a Daystar 040 upgrade card in it, and a few other things. I kept them around because I thought I could repurpose them somehow, like install NetBSD and have a little server or something. But the reality is they are so old, may not work, or to bring them into serviceable condition would be more expensive than just building a cheap Unix box or even buying a MacMini. So, then it became a matter of overcoming inertia to get rid of them, mostly because I was worried about data on the hard drive and was just not in the mood to dismantle everything and deal with it myself.

But worry no more.

I found a place in Austin called Electronic Recycling and Trading. They took my stuff, they will ensure the drives are either truly wiped or shredded, and they’ll resell things then either in whole or in part. Easiest solution for me.

And for my troubles? I was given a “Certificate of Destruction” which is their guarantee that it was done. So of course, if any information gets out that was on those drives, I’ll get to have happy fun suing them (good luck with that).

In the end, I’m just glad to be free of the clutter and that it was disposed of in a responsible manner. I did love that 8500… oh it was so cool. And the IIvx was my (personally) first Mac… should have gotten the Centris 650, but live and learn.

7 thoughts on “Certificate of Destruction”

  1. There are a couple places much closer to you that do the same thing. You won’t find a lot of people that shred the drives but they will do a DoD spec wipe on them.

    • There are? Well, that’s what Google turned up for me, so I went there. 🙂

      They said they would do a wipe, and if the drive could be salvaged they’d leave it at that… else it’d get shredded. So bottom line is, my data should be destroyed, and to me that’s all that I care about.

    • You should have been more specific when you told me what you do for a living! I would have brought it all to you.

  4. Tim, seriously can we drop systems off to you? Where are you located? I’m way up north of Austin and have a bunch of PCs I need to get rid of 🙂 They all have a “little” bit of data I need to pull off their drives… and one day I’ll get to it, just wondering about my options.
    I got rid of the last of my SPARC clones and HPUX boxes a while back but have several standard PC’s that the wife has been “suggesting” I get rid of for a while 🙂

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