  The one billion objects in the GSC-II make up a formidable data set for the
hunt of peculiar and rare targets such as late type stars, white dwarfs, carbon
dwarfs, asteroids, variable stars, etc. Here we present a survey to search for
ancient cool white dwarfs, which led to the discovery of several stars with
peculiar spectral distributions and extreme physical properties. Finally, we
discuss the impact of the GAIA mission with respect to these peculiar and faint
white dwarfs.
