Ongoing community support is critical

As a 501c3 Charitable Organization, donations are what allows the Purple Elephant to operate.

Donations to the Purple Elephant can take the form of:

• Funding - Help pay our bills.  In the past few years, the PE has been fortunate to receive grants from several organizations.  We have also received many smaller donation, which also help.  As little as $25 can help sponsor a child to receive a computer. Click here for details on making a donation.
• Time - Volunteer at the PE
• Equipment - PC's are our basic building blocks.  We have been fortunate to receive donated personal computers and equipment from major corporations, small businesses and many individuals throughout the Raleigh - Durham area.  See details below on what we need.

What equipment may I donate?

The Purple Elephant accepts donations only at our main site at 6808 Davis Circle in Raleigh. We stop accepting donations 30 minutes before closing time.  Please do not leave donations at our door!

We will take a wide range of personal computer equipment, including:

• CPU's - the central processing unit (big box)
• Laptops
• Keyboards
• Mice
• Speakers
• Storage devices
• USB components
• Monitors (15" - 17" CRTs, any size LCD)
  • There is a recycling fee of $5.00 for each monitor not part of a PC system donation.
• Printers
• Cables

PE provides itemized receipts for equipment donations. These can be used in preparing income tax returns but PE cannot specify the value of such donations.  Check out what happens to your computer.

PE also accepts donations of

• other computer-related materials including but not limited to modems, routers, and cords
• other small electronic equipment, such as cell phones and digital cameras.

PE accepts old and non-working CPUs.

We can no longer accept CRT monitors that are 19" or larger, TVs, and telephones.  We are not able to use donated software.

Monetary Donations are always welcome!

You may make a credit card donation to the Purple Elephant Computer Factory through the Network for Good, where we are listed by our original name, the Marie Arrington Hinton Foundation*.  You will have the option of making a single donation or setting up a monthly or quarterly donation.

You may also mail a check or money order donation to:

We will acknowledge all contributions.  The Purple Elephant Computer Factory is a 501(c)(3) charitable organization, so all contributions are tax deductible.  Our EIN# is 20-2174724.

* Note:  Our legal name is the Marie Arrington Hinton Foundation, while we do business as the Purple Elephant Computer Factory. We are listed both ways in the Guidestar directory for nonprofits.

What happens to my old PC?

Every PC that is donated to PE is valuable to us.

Each PC is evaluated to determine if it is working well and meets a minimum configuration requirement to be refurbished and placed back into the community.

All donated keyboards, mice, monitors, speakers, etc. are tested and cleaned before going out as part of a completely refurbished system.

If a PC cannot be upgraded to our minimum configuration or can not be repaired to a working condition, it will go to a technology recycler where materials will be reclaimed.  The PE will receive payment from the recycler, which will help us pay our bills ...  AND ...  keeps your donated equipment out of the landfills.

We use either dBAN or the WipeOut extension on the Image MASSter 2000i to wipe data from hard drives on our refurbished computer, meeting the US Dept. of Defence specification DD5220-22M regarding the sanitization of hard drives.  However, we cannot guarantee the removal of information from contributed computers and assume no responsibility for the removal of any information from contributed computers.