Retailers with good shipping/packaging for oem drives?

G

Geshtar

Limp Gawd
Joined
Apr 15, 2004
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Hey guys, I have heard enough bad things about newegg's hard drive packaging for oem drives that I don't really want to buy HD's from them. What are some retailers that do quality packaging? How is Zipzoomfly in particular, as they seem to have prices pretty much in line with newegg's.

Thanks in advance,

-Geshtar
 
I don't get the recent negative feedback on neweggs hd packaging. I received an OEM drive from them last month that was tightly wrapped in the big bubble wrap and the box it came in was filled with packing peanuts. To top it off they included a sata cable. I've heard it depends on which distribution facility sends them out but I'm not sure on that. I'm in TX so I get the CA facility.
 
I ordered five drives from newegg recently and they came incredibly well packaged. I have had some poor packaging before, but I feel like they are turning around and doing things well again.
 
ZZF and Fry's packs their drives in proprietary containers which are HDD manufacturer rated. These two stores along with a couple others are some of the best when it comes to packing hard drives.
 
ZZF has "better" packaging, but this whole thing over packaging is pointless. A hard drive would have to pull some extreme G's to be damaged while off since the heads are parked. As long as there's a layer of bubble wrap and enough paper/peanut padding to keep it relatively secure it should be fine.
 
My hard drive ordered from Amazon did not come like that. It was wrapped in really thing bubble wrap and double boxed, but no extra padding so the hard drive shifted around.

This was with the Free SUPER Saver Shipping (or whatever it's called) though, so that may have been a factor.
 
Dell has by far the best packing i have seen for single drives.

But it will take you a month to get the darn thing
 
I just ordered four OEM Hitachi drives from New Egg.

They were packed just fine. Wrapped in ESD bags inside a foam box that was wrapped in bubble wrap in a box loaded with peanuts.
 
Never had any problems with ZZF or the Egg. Both companies have such good return policies if a drive was DOA you can just return it no problem.
 
I only order drives from ZZF and Mwave. Both of these places have always provided packaging far above the mfg's recommendations and I've yet to get a bunk drive from handling after 50+ drives between them. Newegg is really hit or miss on packing drives, the last time I got a drive from them it was packaged in a subpar manner, but it seems to be up to whomever packs them and which warehouse it comes from.
 
I live in Alabama, so most of my Newegg stuff gets shipped out of Memphis, TN. They tend to use a layer of bubble wrap around the drives and crumpled brown paper for packing material. It kinda sucks, but I have never receiving any damaged items. California warehouse still tends to pack theirs with bubble wrap and packing peanuts.
 
I've received two failed drives (failure code = excessive shock) from Newegg in the last 3 months after several years without problems. I've been receiving an increasing number of drives that are dumped in a box that is then filled with peanuts... the net result is that the drive settles to the bottom of the box where it receives absolutely no protection during shipping. So, I'm likely to move away from newegg in the next month or two. ZZF seems good (price-wise) and I'm willing to give Amazon a shot as well.
 
I have ordered from both the Egg and ZZF and not a lot but now and then I get a drive that looks like it was tossed on the bottom, covered with peanuts and then taped up from the Egg. ZZF does seem to pack them a little better but it has been a while since I bought hard drives.
Though I am thinking about buy 2 more GP 1 TB drives to server as a duplicate backup to my current drives. When that happens, most likely it will be from ZZF.
 
EnderW said:
Ordered Feb 12, shipped Feb 13, delivered Feb 17
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You got lucky, most of dells suppliers have stopped holding inventory, my AALS took 1 month to ship. I only stayed with it cause my Gold team gave me a good price
 
I order all my drives from newegg. Even recently. Never had any problem with any drive from them.
 
I usually order from ZipZoomFly. An important thing to consider is that ordering large numbers of drives (say, 6 or 10 at a time) is likely to get you a 20-pack box, which is a good thing. I've made large orders from ZZF several times, and each time the drives come in a molded foam container inside a cardboard box which holds the drives securely in place without being completely rigid.

Amusingly, my experience is that you get a box from one manufacturer with drives from another. Hey, as long as it's what I ordered I'm happy.
 
Last time I ordered 8 drives from ZZF I also got the 20 pack box.

A Seagate 1.5tb from Amazon came in a small pre-packaged box with two plastic holders and a bubble pack below the drive. That drive is three weeks old and failing but I don't necessarily blame the packaging.
 
I came to a conclusion a while back that there's no retailer with consistently good packaging; probably because many of them ship from different warehouses with different standards. If you usually get good packaging from one place; then I say keep ordering from there.

Besides, unless the packaging is extremely poor you generally don't have to worry about it. Unpowered hard drives are remarkably durable; I think that most of the time people get drives that are defective rather than damaged in shipping. It's just a lot easier to blame poor packaging than to blame bad luck.

I've generally had good experiences with NewEgg when they ship from NJ. The last time I bought 7 drives in a 20 pack box. Most of the time the hard drives are wrapped in liberal amounts of bubble wrap and placed in a box of Styrofoam peanuts. The last hard drives from CA were packed with peanuts but the hard drives were in regular mailing envelopes - not as good packaging but not that bad.

My experiences with ZZF have been worse that NewEgg. Some times I consider the packaging inadequate even with the foam box - such as when they don't add any peanuts and the hard drives are free to slide around the box. And one time I got a hard drive that was visibly beaten up with a chipped corner in the casing; don't know who to blame for that one.
 
jfkriege said:
I ordered five drives from newegg recently and they came incredibly well packaged. I have had some poor packaging before, but I feel like they are turning around and doing things well again.
Click to expand...

They're very inconsistent with regards to that-They start taking a little more care for a little while, till people quit whining about it...Then they start slacking with it again.

Though, that may have more to do with how differing the SOP is with each individual warehouse, and they've got at least five of those....

Generally though, with a Fry's and a Micro Center nearby, I can usually find deals that cost around the same amount, (give or take a few bucks) and not need to wait for them to be shipped.

Sure, there's tax, (among the highest in the nation right now) and gas, but it's been more reasonable this year, compared to last in the end.
 
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