Things I've pulled from the dock:

* (Brand New) HP Keyboard - Discarded because it's a french keyboard. It's now my desktop's keyboard. Parlez vous francais?
* Complete Dual P3 Workstation system. Stripped for parts and distributed. Presumably discarded because one of the two HD's was malfunctioning.
* Functional P4 Workstation system. Also stripped for parts (SOCIS now has a backup RAMBUS module for beddie as a result of this find)
* CRT's a plenty, even up to 19 inches. Never an LCD though.
* 2 Functional UPS' though lacking batteries.
* PCI NIC's. These can just about always be found, and usually work.

Things I've found but not taken:
* Non-working iMac G3. I contemplated retrofitting it with PC parts, but decided against it in the end.
* Printers a plenty. Some laser, some ink-jet, even the occasional dot-matrix.
* Laptops, though these are a rare find. I've only seen 2, and neither of them worked. They are far from modern too, the best one being a P2 Celeron.
* Server-grade chassis. We're talking solid-steel painted a badass black with more ventilation than I would care to use.

There is a power outlet in the dock not far from the discard pile if you need to test anything that plugs in. Otherwise you're going to have to roll the dice on any hardware found.

If you're going to the dock looking for system hardware, don't set your expectations too high. P1-P2 class systems aren't uncommon, if you're lucky you'll find a P3 or P4. I've never found any DDR Ram, or a graphics card beyond DX7-era. Earliest system I've found in there was an 80286 with dual 5.25 inch floppy drives. I don't think it would take too much scavenging to put together a low-end linux box.

That said, they do empty the dock periodically, usually on a Tuesday I think. Be advised that if campus police finds you scavenging in the dock, they may ask you to leave (it's happened to me once). Dock workers have never given me any trouble though. There is nothing illegal about taking from the dock, everything that's there has been discarded, but don't argue if you're asked to leave, just come back the next day.

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Jordan Kapp
Third Year - BAH/CIS
Canadian Forces Regular Officer - Aerospace Control Officer