Thrift store find

[AlphaKilo470]

Yesterday I was at a thrift store and found this gigantic and quite ugly computer marked for $10. Naturally I had to look inside of it and when I saw it had a somewhat modern motherboard in it (just saw it had an LGA775 motherboard) I had to have it. When I got home, to my surprise, it had a Core 2 Quad in it. I added a 1gb GeForce GT220 to it and installed Linux Mint and upgraded RAM to 6gb. Downgraded the CPU to a dual core Pentium and stuck the Quad into my main desktop which, while having a lower RAM limit, is smaller, prettier and I know the history of and thus, am more trusting of it. This thing is in my living room hooked into my TV right now. I consider it $10 well spent just for the C2Q chip. Also, this ugly case is on wheels.



http://i.imgur.com/aSz17eI.jpg
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[dr_st]

Black bezel drive in a beige case - ugly indeed.

The second (beige) optical must be quite old or unique to have an analog volume dial and headphone jack.

[axur-delmeria]

The second (beige) optical must be quite old or unique to have an analog volume dial and headphone jack.

Probably an IDE CD-RW / DVD-ROM unit. I don't recall ever seeing a SATA one with a headphone jack.

[rkawakami]

The second (beige) optical must be quite old or unique to have an analog volume dial and headphone jack.

I'd vote for quite old. This is my current Gateway tower (Pentium III 600Mhz):



The top optical drive (DVD) was the one bundled with the tower. The bottom drive (CD-RW; IDE) was purchased as part of a "multimedia" upgrade that I did circa 2000.

[Brad]

Well bought!

And Ray how many power supplies has the Gateway eaten in 17 years?

Brad

[rkawakami]

@Brad,

As far as I can remember, 0. It might be due to the fact that in the last 10 years or so, it's been powered up about that many times . Hmm... you've probably jinked it now that you mentioned it. I'm afraid to go power it up right now .

[teamde78]

Very nice find. I always enjoy taking a look at older machines. You never know what you may find. The thrift store is definitely a great place to look.