How do I go about disposing of desktop computers?

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With two gaming sons at home, both with reasonable levels of income, plus a DH with a penchant for a gadget, my garage is an IT graveyard, as they all keep upgrading. There's also an old desktop of mine that was used for household finances etc.

I'm not sure what to do with them to make sure they're disposed of safety with regard to our data and in a sound environmental way. Also, is there a possibility they're worth any money? How would I find out?

I removed the hard drives from the 2 towers we had sitting and then took the rest of them to the tip. Dont know if you can sell bits for parts. Have dismantled the hard drives with precision torx screwdrivers (bought from B&M) and will have to destroy the two discs/platters (not sure of correct name) that I removed as thats what stores the infornation

How old are they? Older computer stuff, especially if they have floppy disk drives etc, can sometimes (not always) sell for OK money...

I am looking at this too and have discovered a couple of places where you can donate them.

Try Little Lives UK and the air ambulance. Apparently they wipe the data.

Can you Google ‘charity recycle computer’? It should find organisations near you that take, clean up and reuse computers for ‘worthy causes’.

We've got a couple of charity organisations near us that collect and refurbish or recycle computers printers, consoles etc.

Yes I'd look for a local charity. Ours employs people with special needs who might struggle with a "normal" job, they delete any personal info left on the machines, refurbish any parts which are working and have a decent life left in them, and sell the rest for the precious metals. They then sell the refurbished computers for a low price to people who might not be able to access tech otherwise.