Shipping complete build?

[night_2004]

Alright, so my wife's 2000+ miles away and she needs a desktop PC and also doesn't want to learn how to build one.

So I've basically got two options. (1) Build it myself and ship it to her or (2) ship her the individual pieces and pay a local computer shop $85 to put it together for her.

If I go with option #1 (which I really would like to do since I know I'll get it right) is it safe to ship a complete build with a Corsair H60 and a GTX 570 cross country?

 

[m_isom]

It should be safe to ship, you might need to build a little bracing to keep things from shifting during transport. Pack it back in the chassis styrofoam and box, then place that in another box with shipping peanuts. Insure the package to cover replacement if its damaged or 'disappears' from the shipping and require a signature delivery. Then tell her how to remove any bracing.

 

[draken24]

h60 is gonna be one of the safest thing in there... The gpu however I would leave out and have her put it in

 

[hossdaddy]

I wouldnt trust ups/dhl etc if anything goes wrong it could be more trouble than its worth.

Where is she exactly(city) maybe we can pick a build list and you call a local shop and work out a deal for them to build it.

 

[night_2004]

It should be safe to ship, you might need to build a little bracing to keep things from shifting during transport. Pack it back in the chassis styrofoam and box, then place that in another box with shipping peanuts. Insure the package to cover replacement if its damaged or 'disappears' from the shipping and require a signature delivery. Then tell her how to remove any bracing.

What kind of bracing? Properly sized boxes or something?

h60 is gonna be one of the safest thing in there... The gpu however I would leave out and have her put it in

That's a possibility. She could do that you'd think. Having never put a PC together she isn't comfortable doing more than maybe that.

I wouldnt trust ups/dhl etc if anything goes wrong it could be more trouble than its worth.

Where is she exactly(city) maybe we can pick a build list and you call a local shop and work out a deal for them to build it.

I wouldn't trust USPS either (they recently destroyed a Lian Li A77F). Just FedEx, and even then only because they damaged a 22" LCD and paid out the insurance money very quickly.

Already know a computer shop in the area that does that kind of stuff; it's just...meh...I've seen their work. It's a last resort.

 

[hossdaddy]

Step 1: buy and asemble system yourself.
Step 2: buy 2 plane tickets, one for you one for the new pc.
Step 3: hand deliver it.



Barring that maybe there is someone in the HardOCP community near where she is located who can help you with assembly?

 

[night_2004]

Hahaha...a plane ticket for a PC? A bit expensive...

It just crossed my mind that she might not actually need a high end GPU to get the work done. We might be able to skate by with a GT 520 (single slot, no longer than the PCIe x16 slot itself). That's definitely safe to ship attached to the motherboard (right?) and costs a much less.

At this point I think I'm going to build it here and do some burn in testing for a week or so, then disassemble and hand deliver during the weekend of the 4th. If the whole package with an H60 and GT 520 is safe to ship in one piece I might do that just so that the airlines don't get a chance to beat it up.

I'm only looking at right around $500-600 for the total build (Antec 300, i5 2400, GT 520, 4GB DDR3, etc). If this were a $2000 machine maybe I'd buy it a seat on a plane...