I get why recycling has a charge, but it sure makes it seem less attractive. I don't need them to pay me for the crap, but if I have to get up and mail this thing, my ideals don't extend to paying for the privilege.

Looks like HP'd let me trade it in for $15 (or $30, if I bought a flatscreen monitor from them). Eh.

I think I'll look up my local Goodwill.

Thanks!

Where's a good local place to which to donate (ugh, ugly grammar) a 17" CRT in good repair?

Schools are always good.

Okay, for donations, TechSoup has a site where you can enter your zip code to find local nonprofits that will take your equipment. Might have to do some searching for someone that wants the CRT by itself.

I lurve TechSoup, btw. They also handle corporation donations to nonprofits, so I buy almost all my software through them for minimal "service fees" to get donated software.

Unless I find a better solution I am about to toss stuff in various construction dumpsters around town.

Yeah. I have the dumpster at work if needs be. The thing is, we were told by our state agency that only CPUs and Monitors had to be recycled (which we do, at about $35 a whack). Miscellaneous cards and parts were deemed okay. Shrug.

Excellent, Liese! I just sent off an e-mail to a nearby nonprofit.

Thanks Liese. I found a couple options there.

I dumped my old computer and old stereo at the Alameda County Computer Reuse Center, which runs a program that teaches kids computer/electronic skills while they rehab the equipment, and then it gets shipped overseas for use in third world schools and stuff. It's a great program, and I don't mind at all that I have to pay $20 to cover the monitor recycling.

Question for all you sound people out there -- when shopping for speaker wire, what do the gauge numbers mean? Is 18 better or worse than 16? (I lurve my sound system, but when the source is of poor sound quality -- i.e. Comedy Central -- there's a tiny bit of buzzing, which I think higher quality wires would help fix.)

And wrt the iPod dock vs iPod stereo connector kit, is it worth getting the kit, or should I just buy the dock and get the cables separately?

[eta: And another A/V question -- my DVD player has both composite and component output. My A/V reciever has only composite input, but my TV has component. Would I be crazy to wire the DVD player's audio through the reciever, but run component video directly into the TV? And if I did that, would it so confuse the system that nothing would work, or would I be rewarded with snazzy digital optical surround-sound AND lovely vivid component video?]

The numbers are gauge sizes. The bigger the number, the thinner the wire. I'm not sure what that means in terms of sound quality. I'm pretty sure there are other factors, such as the length of the run and the quality of the shielding.

The bigger the number, the thinner the wire. I'm not sure what that means in terms of sound quality. I'm pretty sure there are other factors, such as the length of the run and the quality of the shielding.

Okay, thanks. I'm working on the assumption that the wires that came in the box were really cheap, and so almost anything I buy will be an upgrade. But phrases like "at least 16-gauge" (which is all over the Amazon reviews) only becomes helpful once you know which direction the numbers are going in. So cool.