I have too much hardware, help me rationalise it!

Simply put, I have too many computers (7 at the current count). While all are functional to a greater or lesser degree, I don't need this many. One is presently loaned to my mother, so I can probably knock that number down to 6, but still!

I've got (in order of age of me owning them)
1) OLD desktop (Athlon XP 3200+, GA-7NNXP, 2 GB DDR) - was going to use retro gaming rig - needs new GPU.
2) My old main rig (i7-980X equivalent Xeon, ASUS P6T7 WS Supercomp (powerhog board), 12 GB DDR3, 9600 GT, SSD, 500W PSU) - still works, but VERY heat-generating
3) Laptop (basic el cheapo AMD thing from about 2013, 6GB RAM, dual core, SSD) - functional, if not great.
4) Athlon 5350 rig (8 GB, micro ATX board, 400 W PSU) built to mess around with, not used much.
[5) Kaveri rig (A10-7850K, 8 GB, SSD) - presently on long-term loan to my mother]
6) Present main rig (6850K, MSI Gaming Pro Carbon, Radeon Fury (old now), 32 GB DDR43000, 1500 W Enermax PSU, many hard drives) - generally OK, though GPU lacking for 4K gaming.
7) "backup" rig (5960X, AsRock X99 Extreme11, 5870, 750 W PSU, 16 GB RAM)

And various cards lying around (old 465 GTX, a few 5570s, an old quadro, PCI expansion cards, etc).

What's the best thing to do with all that?

I figure there's a bit of cash tied up that could be used to invest in some newer kit. I figure I could amalgamate some things, sell off others. Really only need a main PC and a backup, maybe the retro one.

Suggestions?

 

I also had x5680, 24gb x58 system gived to my friend who cant afford better. Also gived one 24" monitor and asus k53 laptop to my other friend who needed it. Makes me happy that someone else can make use of it becouse i dont like to hoarding hardware that i dont need.

 

Sell everything, buy only what's necessary

 

sell everything except for 6850K rig
backup rigs - why ? you do have a laptop in case it breaks down,albeit slow,it'll do for desktop work

6850K is still good especially with QC,can't imagine it would struggle to hit 60 in anything new.Sell the Fury too,those cards aged very badly with 4G.Get yourself a used 2070S on warranty or higher.

Also,5960X is faster albeit more power hungry than 6850K.That asrock ext 11 board is sweet too.Why the hell aren't you using them in your main ?

 

Discard everything from 1 to 5 and call it a day.
Yes it hurts, I went the same way, but it IS necessary at some time.
I recently discarded everything I don't need. I REALLY made a "tabula rasa".
I kept one machine for every member in my house hold plus some spares. I threw away about 10 Mainboards (some with cpu), 16 "barebones" (stripped down machines, mostly just tower and mainboard) and 2 trash bins full of cables, old adapter cards (SCSI 320 and stuff) and a lot of these tiny adapters like "PS/2 to USB" and these sorts.
I really feel better and the space .... THE SPACE!!!! ....I didn't know I had this much SPACE in my flat!!!

 

I don't know anyone in need of PC hardware, TBH. Most people already have better kit than me xD The Athlon XP rig was loaned to a friend for a while, bue he's now got an ipad which fulfils the role.

I guess that depends what is "necessary". I tend not to get rid of stuff unless it's terribly out of date or more usllay, dead completely.

The 6850K isn't a particularly good overclocker, it wants high volts for 4.2 GHz as far as I can tell, so that may be a detractor for it. Backups... I like having redundancy, I guess???
I was given the Asrock board (and the 5960X) by a friend. Tried putting the 6850K in it for a while, but the BIOS is so old (pre-broadwell release) that it didn't support it. Just never got around to updating it, I guess! The MSI board does have some newer tech, though - USB C, U.2 etc, partly why I went for it.

I should also add my main rig isn't just used for gaming, I do audio production as well, which needs Win7 (dualbooted) and firewire for the (very expensive) soundcard attached, which may throw a spanner in the works.

 

Redundancy was my "excuse" as well. But at some point you should ask yourself about how much redundancy you really need. No offense here, but this much machines but no real clone? Pure redundancy is 1:1 switch. You don't have that. And you have more than enough machines to keep working if one fails.

Sleep a night over it. But from my point of view you can live without problems when discarding 3 or 4 of the oldest machines you named.

Have a nice day.

Edit: probably you also have a dump of old cables and stuff to start with. It helped me. "Do I really need this? Oh well I just dumped the fitting SCSI card, the psu, the cables, then why should I keep the old tower when I have no spare parts anymore?"

 

I'd take redundancy as equivalent or near-equivalent performance.

 

Hardware hoarding is a thing.
You don't know you have it until it's too late

 

Trust me, this is nothing... at one point I had 14 guitars and basses...

 

How about selling them all and collecting a real station?

 

English, dude, but that's why I'm asking what to keep.

 

I say sell what you dont need if YOU can sell it for price you will to let it go for.

I have like 4 computer I can put together not counting the current 6700k system, I just need case and power supply for them, mostly cause I cant sell them, I not gona give away full working system for 50$ my x58? build The motherboard alone is worth more then 50$ it seem alot x58 board go for more then cpu's do.

 

OP, a shot in the dark.
If you need so many computers (or you think you need) try something different, way different.
On a older but still powerful computer install Proxmox. And create all virtual machines you need.
Wanna try a new W10 version update - feel free to do so in a virtual environment.
MacOS - heck ya
Linux- Proxmox is Linux love baby.
BSD...
Whatever man, whatever.
And you can have all the computers you want, saving the physical space.
Oh and before you ask, you can do GPU passthrough and expose the GPU to the OS you want -aka gaming.

 

and then... build a home router/firewall inside Proxmox VM!!

 

@Noisiv glad to see someone catching my drift.

 

got you brother

 

Me2 when I was playing out in clubs. And monster ampeg svt 300 watt 8x10 stack. That was fun lugging that around too but usually just 2 or 3 basses to bar, I decide beforehand what I'm using at show. [sorry off topic gotta stop doing that]

 

You have OCD and cant throw away anything that works, tadaaa.


If you want rid of any, take photos and post on Ebay.

 

get a girlfriend