At some point along the way my desk area turned into a chemistry lab/shed and one day the poor rock got attacked with mineral acid. The black shit is just copper and antimony nanoparticles so bacteria won't have much chance of thriving there
I use one to play .avi films and music through the TV. It's running XBian on it which lets you go through any connected HDD and play things using your TV remote, which kinda blew me away.
Cables can be considered general WEEE so can be recycled.
Just put your postcode in here; http://www.recycle-more.co.uk/banklocator/banklocator.aspx to find your nearest bank.