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A Different Way To Recycle Old PCs
Posted by
timothy
on Sun Apr 03, 2005 03:22 AM
from the better-than-most-modern-art dept.
from the better-than-most-modern-art dept.
Anonymous Coward writes "Glasgow based artist Sandy Smith has some slightly different suggestions for what to do with those outdated PCs and Apple Macs -- build your home out of them! Photographs of his work; rooms and structures made out of up to 100 (switched-on) computers and other equipment can be seen at computersforart.org/create/;
these should be of interest to anyone who has a habit of collecting old (working)
computers, or just hates the thought of throwing out their old 486 friend."
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Hmm. (Score:5, Funny)
I'll have to ask my mom if I can build a house in her basement.
Aw, she says I have to bathe first.
BTW, Coral cache mirror [nyud.net], MirrorDot mirror [mirrordot.org]
Re:Hmm. (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Hmm. (Score:2)
You must be new here.
Re:Hmm. (Score:2)
Junk (Score:3, Informative)
Electricity bill? (Score:2)
You wouldn't need a heater... (Score:4, Funny)
That would be quite an electric bill, though.
Re:You wouldn't need a heater... (Score:5, Interesting)
Parent
Re:You wouldn't need a heater... (Score:4, Informative)
How much electricity does it take to make a new computer to replace them?
Not to mention that when I switched from a new 1.7 GHz PC to a 400 MHz half-decade-old Mac my room became much cooler in the summer. Older computers may well use less electricity than newer ones.
Parent
Re:You wouldn't need a heater... (Score:5, Interesting)
Parent
Looks like my garage .. (Score:4, Funny)
But seriously - what to people consider art ? This looks like someone who just piles computers up and plugs them in. Kind of like kindergarten but with stuff only adults can lift.
What defines art? No, it's 'WHO' defines art (Score:5, Insightful)
http://www.google.nl/search?hl=en&ie=ISO-8859-1&q
That's a lot of definitions. Art is art when 'articians' say it is so.
Authoritarial justification.
Even extreme things, like burning crosses or crossdressed foetusses can be considered art. And before modding me down for this: I do not agree with the examples I just gave.
Parent
Re:What defines art? No, it's 'WHO' defines art (Score:5, Insightful)
Art is "art" to an observer whenever they think something has the qualities of art.
Errm, in other words:
Anything at all is art (to the observer) when the observer thinks it is because of a (artistic) quality or meaning percieved...
If I find a 5 1/4 inch floppy disk artful, then it is to me because I think it is.
It is arrogant (and unfortunatly common) though to force a perception of art upon others.... that's what pisses people off about the "what defines art" question.
Parent
Re:What defines art? No, it's 'WHO' defines art (Score:3, Interesting)
I think what constitutes Art is something that conveys emotions or a new perception to the observer / listener / participant.
A lot of "modern" art may mean something profound to the creator (they claim) but it singularly fails to convey anything to the observer - at least not without reading a two page explanation of the work, at which point an intellectual understanding of the meaning may be grasped, but nothing that really stirs the emotions or the mind.
Of course, my definition could conceivably ru
Re:What defines art? No, it's 'WHO' defines art (Score:2)
Re:Looks like my garage .. (Score:4, Insightful)
I would look at some of those pictures and start thinking "I have one of those computers..and one of those..that one too.."
Parent
Re:Looks like my garage .. (Score:3, Insightful)
When laid off, build your shelter out of your pc. (Score:4, Funny)
Re:When laid off, build your shelter out of your p (Score:3, Funny)
KFG
Lain (Score:5, Interesting)
Queer eye for the... (Score:5, Funny)
http://www.computersforart.org/create/blue/big/sa
Re:Queer eye for the... (Score:2)
Sorry, the vic20 is not rated for heavy loads.
call your own cell phone to find it (Score:3, Informative)
while true; do printf "\a"; sleep 1s; done
Pretty? Scary? Sad? (Score:5, Insightful)
Pictures [computersforart.org] like [computersforart.org] these [computersforart.org] remind me of how eery a society we live in. It's actually kind of depressing or even scary.
(In an I'm-in-front-of-my-computer-at-4:45AM kind of way)
Re:Pretty? Scary? Sad? (Score:5, Funny)
It's okay. Those things in the picture are called "girls". What you're feeling is natural.
In any case, you're posting on Slashdot at (apparently) 4:45 your time, so they're nothing you'll ever have to worry about.
Parent
Re:Pretty? Scary? Sad? (Score:5, Funny)
Pfft. Dude, I think I know what girls look like. I do see my mother every once in a while so she can cut my hair.
Parent
Great Concept. (Score:2, Insightful)
Amateur Execution.
Untitled (The Sky is Blue) (Score:2)
His bathroom. . . . (Score:3, Interesting)
This is not art (Score:2)
Oh hell no (Score:4, Funny)
So, if I call it "art" I can claim my pad is an art gallery, eh?
Re:Oh hell no (Score:4, Funny)
and the insane fan noise scares away the women
It's probably your cats and not women who are scared by the "insane fan noise." You can't fool your neighbors into thinking you have women over just because you keep saying "Here, pussy, pussy."
Parent
100 per structure... (Score:3, Funny)
400 kilowatt power usage, and emission. The "emission" part would be good if you live in Alaska or Antarctic, or so. The "usage" part would be acceptable if you're a millionaire or own a power plant. I've also seen many CRT monitors. a LOT of them, and old ones, when emission wasn't taken into account so much...
Run SETI@Home on it all, and expect the aliens will visit you really soon. Your house will be shining like a radio-beacon in the space.
Wooha, tumour time... (Score:2, Insightful)
Seriously... that much screen radiation, buzzing, hot air and electrical interferance just cant be good for... well, anything or anyone.
The Arch (Score:3, Interesting)
castle (Score:2)
Speaking which, I have a surplus auction to budget for and some warehouse space to rent...
Hong Kong will thank you (Score:2)
Is this really recycling? (Score:3, Insightful)
I note the lack of LCD flat screens in these projects - bet it wont be that way in five years time...
Waste of Power & Idea (Score:2, Insightful)
Is it what we call... (Score:2)
Anyway, that's obvious now artists don't know how to use computers.
Imagine... (Score:4, Funny)
Junk... (Score:4, Insightful)
It's the whole 'dimly lit round basement space' that gets me... I walked past this when it was built a few weeks ago, as I live 2 blocks from the Art School, and not only was it in the floorspace of an empty shop, but it was looking out onto a busy main road. To be perfectly honest, it looked like someone was bored and had arranged a pile of junk computers in a circle. Completely uninspiring and boring. I even told my girlfriend about the 'pile of crap in the shop' and that she shouldn't worry as I won't be asking for any of it. I'm sorry, but I can't see how this passes for 'art'...
And furthermore... (Score:2)
X-Ray Test Rig for Harmful Radiation (Score:2, Interesting)
Two words (Score:4, Interesting)
Hazard.
Re:Remember (Score:2, Funny)
Re:had to say it (Score:2, Funny)
Yeah, I can just feeeeel the awsome computing power equivalent to three gameboys and a HP48 pocket calculator.
Re:Crashing house? (Score:2)
Re:Computer Box furniture (Score:2)
I had an old base unit - desktop style - with most of its guts ripped out and installed in other working machines - which now has a piece of perfectly shaped wood on top and acts as a bedside cabinet.
I also have a sliding cup holder which came as standard in my new PC. In my first PC I had to fit one of those myself but was rather relieved to see they came included with new PCs these days...
Re:Any Custom Programming? (Score:4, Interesting)
I have some old DOS "slideshow" programs.
I load up an old hard drive with DOS, the slideshow program, and a diskful of .jpg's and let it fly.
These go in minimal security places, like shopping malls. Ok, if someone gets malicious and vandalizes or steals the whole shebang, its not really any worse than if the trashman did it.
I mean, what he got was an old '286 with a 40MB 5.25" MFM HD and an old VGA monitor. Good enough to show photos of what's in the food court.
I just arrange things so that the still operational machines continue to work as designed until the bitter end.
I still have a couple of crates of old 40MB 5.25" MFM HD's and a couple dozen controllers still laying around I am slowly getting rid of this way.
I may get into designing a driver board for those large incandescent bulb-matrix displays one sees in front of many businesses, as I constantly see them not working proprely... it kinda pains me to see so much expensive hardware out there that does not function properly because the latest state-of-the-art computer systems don't run all that long before hanging up on something or other.
Its not at all like those old days I went through when I would get an embedded system going and expect it to go for years without any deviation at all. Much as one would design a motor and expect the same. There's nothing magic about sequencing the bulbs on a sign so they spell text, just as there is nothing magic about designing rotating magnetic fields in a motor so the shaft turns. We don't have to constantly maintain our fans either, unless they made them with badly designed bearings.
I still enjoy the breeze from 20 year old fans.
Why is it that the output of older computers is so neglected? Its paid for, and will continue to work for you as long as you give it some power.
Parent