chatillion 71M
2289 posts
1/7/2015 4:48 am
Junque...


I'm reminding myself that I have too many unused 'things'. You know... things that women call JUNK. Office equipment, tools, old computer parts, software, gadgets, etc. Technology changes and some of these things are obsolete. Actually, some aren't and that's the problem. Obsolescence is often a marketing tool or a state of mind.

Many people have simple needs and don't require the very latest technology to run a business or make their lifestyle complete. That's like the decision of buying a $2,000 quad-core computer simply because you need it for e-mail. If the salesman at BestBuy told you it was necessary, he should be executed by a firing squad in the morning.

Years ago, I bought an all-in-one laser fax that scans legal paper. Right after the warranty period, the paper feed broke and it's $200 to repair. I no longer need the scanner or the fax (as I have replaced them with other equipment) but I wouldn't mind having the laser printer working.

Checking for online deals, I can buy factory refurbished laser printers for $50. That's about the same price as the toner cartridge. Basically, they are giving away the laser printers. Do I absolutely need this? No, but I often print documents 10-15 pages on an inkjet that seems like an eternity. So a $50 laser printer isn't a far-fetched idea.

Consider this: Trashing the bulky (unused) laser fax for a compact laser printer removes a box 2' x 2' x 2' from my storage shed. Good, more room for some other junque!

When you run a business, you have to keep records. This I have. OK, so maybe I don't need 20 years of records sitting in my storage shed in my back yard, but I don't want to spend a day sorting through boxes of old things deciding what to throw out.

I do have years and years of my old hand drawings for furniture... some of my life is on those drawings and I would like to select the nicest drawings and scan them for my portfolio.

I've been looking for other things somewhere in storage that I did while in High-School. One got me an award when submitted to the county art show for all the schools in the area. It was a pencil sketch of Eric Clapton, guitarist of the Cream. The other was an ink & watercolor psychedelic rendering of a man with a big puffy (Afro) hairstyle... something you would find on logo for the Broadway show HAIR. I was proud of some of my art work, these were my favorites. I know they are somewhere in a box of junque waiting for me to reclaim them.

Sometimes friends and offer to help me eliminate some of my junque, however, they don't know the difference between junk and junque. So I cannot trust them for they might mistakenly slip some junque in a garbage bag with junk and I'll never see it again.

I bought a SAMSUNG color LaserFAX that I'm waiting for it to break. It's been disappointing using this device. Wi-Fi connection so I can send images from a smartphone or tablet directly to the printer. Nice feature if you don't want to be bothered uploading to a computer first. I'm sure I'll need a few years setting up the software and drivers to get these features working.

Back to the Junque... My wife says if I haven't used it in 3 years, it's junk and needs to be discarded. I'm trying to get her to agree in 5 years.

I dragged some old electronics and fans to the curb (where trash normally gets picked up on Tuesday) and 30 minutes later they all were gone! Proof that one mans trash is another mans treasure.

beyondfantasy3 113M
4740 posts
1/7/2015 3:55 pm

Yes... things do accumulate. I have two computers in the garage, that are old, probably the only thing in it worth keeping is the HD. the interesting things is one is the type where you can change out many card.. where now everything comes on a integrated motherboard.

I'm going to buy a large Tera Drive, and store the data I want to keep. maybe one day I might even get around to scanning old documents I created when I enjoyed writing with pen and ink... Now, I type most things,
but my mission is to RE set up my file cabnet, I just got one a few weeks ago, and my home office has "papers" as I have two desk in here.
I have two more desk in the room out back, and I have another desk in another room, which has its own computer, and then there's the lap top. It's old, but it works fine. I got rid of the other, because its just too much to keep all them up. I probably should have set up a "home network", but seems time and limited patience to do so has delayed that process.

Maybe I need a home server, I'll have to look into what is the best options so all data is in one place, and a separate storage unit for back up.