We recently switched to using a Linux Mint laptop with an adblocker for our streaming (while also cancelling a bunch of services). A friend at the recycling center set it aside for me - the screen was irreparably smashed but it was otherwise quite a nice little laptop. Replacement screens were too expensive so I carefully removed the broken one entirely so it’d default to the HDMI port and then set it up as a quick media center (we watch a lot of YouTube and the ads were driving me crazy, I might switch to a more purpose-built OS eventually). The TV is one I pulled from an ewaste bin to replace my previous ewaste TV after it finally gave up. It has a thin line through one edge of the screen occasionally but is otherwise fine. I also recently found a perfectly good wireless trackball mouse and a Bluetooth keyboard in the same bin where I got the TV (came with that other mouse). The bin even supplied HDMI cables. The whole thing is perched on a particle board TV stand I found like a decade ago when the college kids move out.

  • Beacon@fedia.io
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    20 hours ago

    If you’re using this stuff in lieu of buying new stuff, then you are indeed reducing waste. Kudos!

    • JacobCoffinWrites@slrpnk.netOPM
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      19 hours ago

      I’ve only ever bought one new computer in my life (I currently own like a dozen laptops) and I’ve never actually bought a TV. I’ve gotten them all from friends and relatives, pulled them from ewaste and picked them up off the curb. I’m sure this varys wildly but where I am it feels like working electronics are so common and available in our world we’re one step short of just picking them up off the ground.