Shipping my PC overseas

[Charl10]

Is it financially feasable and practical to ship my PC overseas when I move? And how?

Not sure if I'm in the correct sub forum here, but hoping to get some insight here...

I have seen a couple of other threads on the topic but the most recent thread I could find is from early 2015, so was thinking it might be worth asking again...

I'm going to be moving overseas (to two different countries in a short period actually) and was wondering whether it is advisable to take my desktop PC over?

First what would be the best way to do it? Door-to-door courier? Will it come in one piece?

And then also what would the cost approximate? (I guess this is dependent on the answer to the first question).

The PC is only 4-5 months old which is why I don't want to separate with it just yet

Follow up question two the above two... If shipping is going to be too expensive or it's going to arrive in a thousand pieces, then I guess I have to sell it here. What would be the best place to try sell it on?

 

[SYNERGY]

Personally, I would sell and purchase a laptop.

 

[gregmcc]

It depends where you are moving to and what the cost of a new machine is.

 

[ponder]

Will you be shipping any other household goods over?

Either way remove the gpu & any heavy cpu cooler so as not to cause any stress to the MB.

 

[Charl10]

Well the problem is I'm going to be in the USA for just under a year and then in Europe for 2 years... So think moving it twice is probs not an option.

Where can you get decent resale value for a PC?

 

[Charl10]

Will you be shipping any other household goods over?

Either way remove the gpu & any heavy cpu cooler so as not to cause any stress to the MB.

No, unfortunately we won't be moving any other household goods over.
So would be the PC only

Yeah I figured it makes sense to remove the expensive/heavy things if I do decide to ship, and carry those in luggage. Don't know if it's worth the effort to be honest. Will most likely then take over the CPU cooler, GPU and maybe RAM and then go buy a new case, mobo, etc. abroad. But then surely I may as well save the effort and try sell everything here and buy from scratch there (if I choose that route)

 

[Charl10]

Personally, I would sell and purchase a laptop.

Where can one sell a PC in SA aside from Gumtree/Facebook?

 

[ponder]

If you're going to the US just get a new one over there, used is much cheaper. They're not that cheap in the EU though.

 

[RedViking]

Where can one sell a PC in SA aside from Gumtree/Facebook?

Carbonite.co.za? What are the specs and price you would like to get for it? With whom is the warranty?

A gaming Notebook is nice to travel with, but can be expensive.

 

[OrbitalDawn]

Depending on the airline, they could have an air freight service that syncs up (roughly) with your travel time. So you give them your flight details, check in the stuff you want to send a couple of days before you fly, and then you pick it up again when you're on the other side.

Was worth it for me, but having to move again pretty soon afterwards would have made me think twice.

I'd say keep stuff like the GPU that you can just take with you. If you can sell most of it and just replace in the US it might be the best option.

 

[ArtyLoop]

I've done some calcs and have gotten quotes in the past. In the end I'd buy a decent spec laptop with the proceeds of the sale of the machine and buy a new one overseas. Not worth doing the whole schlepp of shipping it over and the expense isn't justified.

 

[Archer]

Sell the case, put everything else back into its packaging and put it in your suitcase. If you need extra space just buy an extra suitcase for the flight. I've built four whole pcs with parts primarily sourced in the USA while I was on business trips there

 

[killerbyte]

take the mobo, cpu and RAM and put them in the motherboard box, put the GPU either in its box or a smaller one, HDDs and SSD in a compact box too. take them all in carry on. Put the chassis, cooler and even PSU in one box (put the PSU and cooler securely in the chassis inside its box) then put that as check in.

 

[Aghori]

Dismantle everything. Sell the case. The rest of the components can fit in your luggage.

 

[Lord Farquart]

As Archer and killerbyte said. Under no circumstances put it in carry-on. A Mobo of mine got flagged as explosives at Frankfurt.

I am shipping 2 PCs over. One packed in a shipping container tomorrow. The other will go as fragile check-in instead of 1x23kg bag. No extra cost, but the 28”monitor can not go with, as it exceeds the max dimensions, but not weight.

 

[Dan C]

Where can one sell a PC in SA aside from Gumtree/Facebook?

https://mybroadband.co.za/forum/forums/classifieds-for-sale.162/

 

[Charl10]

I've done some calcs and have gotten quotes in the past. In the end I'd buy a decent spec laptop with the proceeds of the sale of the machine and buy a new one overseas. Not worth doing the whole schlepp of shipping it over and the expense isn't justified.

If you don't mind me asking, can you remember roughly what the calcs and/or quotes came to? I have a mid tower case (quite heavy chassis too, NZXT H440)

I have a strong feeling that I will come to the same conclusion as you, unfortunately.

 

[Charl10]

Carbonite.co.za? What are the specs and price you would like to get for it? With whom is the warranty?

A gaming Notebook is nice to travel with, but can be expensive.

Thank you for the suggestion! Looks like a good place to advertise.

Yeah a gaming notebook would be ideal but the price is definitely an issue, especially if I cant recover most of the cost of the PC.

Specs:
NZXT H440 chassis
Palit GTX 1080
GSkill Trident Z 16GB RAM 3200Mhz RGB
Intel i5 8400
Asus Prime 370P
250GB Samsung Evo SSD
1TB Western Digital HDD
650W Super FLower Fully modular power supply

Almost everything bought from wootware.co.za about 4 months ago only :/

 

[RedViking]

Thank you for the suggestion! Looks like a good place to advertise.

Yeah a gaming notebook would be ideal but the price is definitely an issue, especially if I cant recover most of the cost of the PC.

Specs:
NZXT H440 chassis
Palit GTX 1080
GSkill Trident Z 16GB RAM 3200Mhz RGB
Intel i5 8400
Asus Prime 370P
250GB Samsung Evo SSD
1TB Western Digital HDD
650W Super FLower Fully modular power supply

Almost everything bought from wootware.co.za about 4 months ago only :/

If you want to sell. Please give me a shout and how much you would like.

 

[Charl10]

As Archer and killerbyte said. Under no circumstances put it in carry-on. A Mobo of mine got flagged as explosives at Frankfurt.

I am shipping 2 PCs over. One packed in a shipping container tomorrow. The other will go as fragile check-in instead of 1x23kg bag. No extra cost, but the 28”monitor can not go with, as it exceeds the max dimensions, but not weight.

Are you checking in the entire case as-is as fragile? Or did you take out the heavy parts (GPU etc). I'm way too scared to use fragile check-in... Can't afford anything to happen to it. :/ I've read some horror stories of people's PCs arriving in pieces