Posts Tagged ‘usb’

Repurpose USB Flash Drives so Less Fortunate Can Use Them

repurpose usb flash drive

The following list of people have recently donated their unwanted and used USB flash drives so that other people, who are less fortunate, can have access to this wonderful technology. Take a moment to appreciate those who put in the little bit of work to hopefully, make the world a little better of a place.

  • Megan Schneider – Cincinnati, OH
  • Claudia Leftherst – Walnut Creek, CA
  • Holly Kondras – Terre Haute, IN
  • Virginia Scarlett – Flintridge, CA
  • Patricia Rodrigues – Littleton, CO
  • Krystal Goetz – West Jordah, UT
  • Chris Cameron – Braintree, MA
  • Ted Stein – Bellevue, WA
  • Emporium Warehouse – Anaheim, CA
  • “MK” – Seattle, WA
  • J Bingel – Venice, FL
  • Sherry Woolridge – Pageton, WV
  • Jen Roberts – Seatle, WA
  • Eric Fredricks – Davenport, IA
  • MCW – Geneseo, NM
  • Laurin Moran – Denver, CO
  • E George – Dallas, TX
  • No Name – Beverly Hills, CA
  • Diana Guevara – Edgewater, MD
  • No Name – Pennington, NJ
  • No Name – Concord, MA

notes from people who donated USB flash drives

Some general information about the elements of a USB flash drive which can be recycled or disposed of properly. This website does not “recycle” USB flash drives in the traditional sense, our goal is to repurpose the flash drives so less fortunate people can have access to this wonderful technology, free of charge.

Flash drives contain a variety of elements that can be recycled, such as plastics, metals, and rare-earth elements. Plastics can be recycled into new plastic products, while metals can be melted down and reused in new products. The rare-earth elements, such as neodymium, praseodymium, dysprosium, and samarium, can also be recycled, though the process is more complicated and requires specialized equipment. Additionally, many flash drives contain small amounts of hazardous materials, such as lead and mercury, which must be disposed of properly.

Old plastics can be recycled into new plastics through a process called ‘chemical recycling’. This involves breaking down the plastic into its constituent parts and then reforming it into a new plastic. The chemical recycling process can be used to create a wide range of new plastic products, from packaging to bottles and containers. Additionally, chemical recycling can help reduce the amount of plastic waste that ends up in landfills or the environment.

Rare earth elements, such as neodymium, praseodymium, dysprosium, and samarium require specialized equipment to be recycled. This equipment typically includes shredders, smelting furnaces, and leaching systems. Additionally, the recycling process may also involve the use of chemicals and other hazardous materials, which must be handled with extreme care.

Recycling companies must properly dispose of lead and mercury in order to protect the environment and prevent contamination. Lead and mercury must be handled carefully, as they can be toxic if not handled properly. The recycling company should first isolate the lead and mercury, then place them in sealed containers for transport. The recycling company should then dispose of the lead and mercury in a hazardous waste facility, where it can be safely and properly disposed of.

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List of New Donors – Mention About Non-Working Donated Flash Drives

Thank you for those who donated to Recycle USB for the repurposing of USB flash drive media. If you are new to the website, please visit our Mission Statement page about what we do and how our website “recycles” USB flash drives. Our service is not the assumed and traditional “recycle” process most associate with e-cycling electronics.

donated USB flash drives

Most recent donations came from the quality people listed below:

  • Ryan Orgera – Alexandria, VA
  • Rich Sherman – Santa Monica, CA
  • Victoria Kirby – Hoboken, NJ
  • Scott Petty – Pittsboro, NC
  • ??? – Briarcliff Manor, NY
  • Mr Ferdon – Battle Creek, MI
  • Coy – Boston, MA
  • Angie Reyes – Bothell, WA
  • ??? – River Valley, NJ
  • Travis Miller – Cambridge, MA
  • Donald Hardin – Riverside, CT
  • Sheli Radoshitzky – Frederick, MD
  • Santesh Kumar – ???
  • Laura Labriola – Fairfield, NJ
  • Mike Diamantes – Los Angeles, CA

Audimation Services Inc – Huston, TX – Thank you for the large three box donation; however, after testing 10 random drives, none of the drives worked or functioned in a Windows computer; therefore RecycleUSB cannot use these drives for the SugarLabs project. We will coordinate with our local electronics recycling center to properly dispose of the items. We very much appreciate the effort and wanted you to know the final resting spot for your kind gesture.

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A Little Bit of USB Recycling

Recycle USB Flash Drive

Since December of 2021 here is the list of people who’ve donated flash drives along with a picture for proof of processing. We wonder, does anyone ever check back on our site to make sure their package was received and processed?

Once again, thankless job for those putting in the effort to package up and ship out USB flash drives to be recycled.

The full list of people who recycled USB drives between our last post and today:

  • Allieoop Bricks & Figs – Peoria, AZ – These folks have a unique website which is about buying used Lego blocks. Here is their webpage link for buying used Lego blocks.
  • Nora Quinn – Claremont, CA
  • ??? – San Rafael, CA
  • Mohle Miller – Portland, OR
  • ??? – Pleasanton, CA
  • Laura R – New York
  • Liz Welch – Raleigh, NC
  • Esther Shmagin – Minneapolis, MN
  • HAQ – Richardson, TX
  • Jazz – Hanton, CT
  • Joan Schramm – Annapolis, MD
  • Stephen Byrd – Willow Springs, NC
  • Jasmine Mcgurk – Roswell, GA
  • Kristin Knopf – Washington, DC
  • Bowers – Marysville, PA
  • Weber – Tomah, WI
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Donated and Recycled USB Flash Memory Drives for December, 2020

Twenty people/organizations have donated their flash drives for recycling since our last post in September of 2020. Your time and effort to package up and ship off your unwanted flash drives is much appreciated. As we’ve said before, these drives will be cleaned up (formatted and data erased) from the donor with our flash memory copier equipment and repurpose the drives and sent to sugarlabs.org for re-use.

Here is the list of twenty who contributed since our last post:

  • Ravi – San Mateo, CA
  • Stephanie Shae – La Palma, CA
  • Thomas Hearns – North Ridgeville, OH
  • Feltault Family – Topsfield, MA
  • K Nuss – Pacific Grove, CA
  • Ryan Mitchell – Puyallupa, WA
  • Gloria Yehilevsky – Poway, CA – Check it out: www.gloriaymusic.com
  • Risan – Menlo Park, CA
  • Jamie Schmidt – De Pere, WI
  • Lily Kim – San Diego, CA
  • Thomas Mielke – Flower Mound, TX (sounds like a nice place)
  • Cathie Lee – Laguna Hills, CA
  • M.T. Taglang – Bethleham, PA
  • Kendra Lewis – Somersworth, NH
  • Rooney – Naperville, IL
  • Jocelyn Delmar – Kenmore, NY – Check it out: www.etsy.com/shop/paragraphloop
  • Daniel Potts – Walton, KY
  • Charles Hotchkiss – Everett, WA
  • S. McMahon – Biscayne Park, FL

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Donate USB Flash Drives For A Good Cause, Those Who Did…

Thank you for those who donated flash drives the last couple of months. Per our routine, the donated drives will be sanatized with some techy erase function so if any data was on the drive, it will be 100% removed.

Here is a list of those who recycled their USB flash drives for a good cause:

  • Unknown – Redondo Beach, CA
  • Bristol Township School District – Levittown, PA
  • MaryAnn – Unknown location
  • P Brown – New York, NY
  • Stadium Systems – Canaan, CT
  • N Otfinger – Atlanta, GA
  • Pamela Myers – Horsham, PA
  • recycled usb drives

    RecycleUSB received a large shipment from Untion Sanitary District and included a nice company outline about what they do, here are those details:

    The Union Sanitary District, founded May 27, 1918 is an independent special district which provides wastewater collection, treatment and disposal services to the residents and businesses of the cities of Fremont, Newark and Union City, in Southern Alameda County, California. We serve approximately 356,160 people.

    Our Mission:

    To safely and responsibly collect and treat wastewater, and to recover resources from process waste streams, while protecting human health and improving the environment in a way that benefits the Tri-Cities and all USD stakeholders.

    recycled usb drives

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D.o.D. Erase Function for Donated USB Flash Drives

For those of you considering to donate USB flash drives to our cause, you may ask yourself how is the recycled USB drive handled before going out to SugarLabs?

Below is a picture of some drives being digitally cleaned and erased before going out the door. We use Nexcopy duplicator equipment and with this gear, there is a D.o.D. erase function [Department of Defense grade function]. The USB erase function writes random ones-and-zeros to the entire memory space. So anything on the drive, whether it be inappropriate data, personal data or even virsus’ the erase function wipes them out.

Once the drive is completely written over with random binary data, we use a format function in the duplicator equipment and format the drives as FAT32. Not all drives will pass the erase function or the format function and those drives are taken out of the recycle process.

We have used the above procedure for years and very confident in the process and outcome. To donate your USB flash drives, you may visit our USB donation page to get the three step process.

For all of you who have donated, thank you! Please remember, if you include a note with your donated flash drives with a website link or blog address, we will be happy to post that link in this news room section of our site.

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Donated USB Flash Drives from July 2019

The month of July we received many donated drives. Here is a quick post to those who sent drives in and included their information on the envleop. Remember, if you want a mention or link back to your website, please include that information with your shipment.

Those who sent in, include:

  • Nadine Lai – Edmonton, Canada
  • Bennett – Raleigh, NC
  • James – UK
  • David Waro – Madison, WI
  • A. Harris – Forest Grove, OR
  • K. Saca – Alamo, CA
  • Mark Hank – Burnsville, MN
  • Unknown – Boston, MA

Remember, whatever you send in, we will use a Nexcopy USB duplicator to erase all the content on the drive. This process is done so that no data could be recovered or found on the drive after we give it away to SugarLabs.org

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USB Recycle Update; 13 Donated This Week

This week Recycle USB received 13 total drives for donation. Thank you for sending the drives. They will be sent to Sugar Labs on our next shipment out.

Those who sent in, include:

  • Kendall Priscoll – Newton, MA
  • Unknown – Thank You
  • Reosh – Davis, CA
  • Charles Markum – Sandy Springs, GA
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The New Way To Recycle

Recycle USB is a website for people looking to recycle their USB flash drives for a better cause.

Send your USB to school.

Each donated drive is loaded with Sugar, making it Sugar on a Stick.  Sugar is a standalone computer operating system which runs off a USB flash drive.  Sugar is developed to provide children a free portable and interactive learning environment in a self contained thumb drive.

Sending your USB stick to a recycle center holds far less Good Will then sending your USB stick to a child wanting to learn.

Here is how the USB journey begins:

  • Step 1: Collect all your old and unused USB flash drives. **Sugar requires a minimum 1GB stick**
  • Step 2: Send your USB drive(s) to RecycleUSB.com
  • Step 3: We receive the drives and perform a low-level format to clean the drive of any data.
  • Step 4: We then data load “Sugar On A Stick” operating system onto your donated USB flash drive to make the portable learning computer
  • Step 5: We send the finished product to Sugar Labs for deployment to any number of locations throughout the world.

Once Sugar Labs receives your donated drive, it is then deployed to any number of possible locations around the world.  Your generous donation could go to a child in Peru, or South Africa or Thailand!  Your flash drive will become a portable computer for a very lucky child.

This Good Will act of sending in your USB stick is far greater than recycling old components of a flash drive for a couple pennies in return

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