How much safer is it to buy a HD from a retailer than...

Your fears about shipping are crazy. First thing an etailer like Newegg has the drives shipped to them, then they ship to the customer. The local small computer shop buys from a distributer that has the drives shipped to them, then they ship to the local stores. The large retailer gets the drives shipped to their warehouse, then they ship it in some instances by their truck to the store, some instances they ship by those same FedEX,UPS or USPS to the store depending on quanity ordered and distance to the store. Sure there is a risk that the item may get damaged due to shipping but its really no greater or less depending on where you buy it from. There is no way to have total peace of mind, even if you picked the drive up at the factory the number of possible times the drive or the package could have been damaged by handling is astronomical. The only good thing about buying local is if the drive is DOA when you pull it out of the box you can jump back into your car and return in quickly. But even then some of the small shops will try to say you damaged it and must RMA it directly to the manufacturer.

So basically you're saying that the odds are the same.

I was thinking about it this way... both retailers and etailers like Newegg get their HDs in bulk on pallets. But if you buy a HD online, that one individual box is going to get tossed around, dropped, and handled more roughly getting shipped separately than a whole bunch of boxes on a pallet...

If you read the newegg reviews that complain about shipping, you will see that most problems are from some time ago. Newegg wraps the drives in bubble wrap, then in a box with lots of peanuts. Problem solved. No doubt because of some complaints. Their return process is very good if you should ever need it.

Thats being paranoid. I've ordered 4 drives online and bought one on Ebay. None of them arrived DOA, and none have failed on me.


Of course. The natural action that someone would take when receiving a dead drive from an online seller is complain about it, as the return process is sometimes lengthy and tedious. But does this mean that the majority of the population will receive dead drives? No.

The individual drives shipped in small boxes through fedex/UPS/USPS get tossed around. It get tossed and dropped. A lot of things happen in between shipment.

The BIG Boxes will mutltiple drives that get shipped to stores takes less stress than the small-individual boxes.

Given the above information..... It doesn't matter..... The mechanical specification of the drive is for more higher than the beating it takes during shipping. READ the DATASHEET.

When i purchased a drive from store or get it shipped say from NEWEGG.... As long as the package or shipping box has no damage or puncture 99% of the time its good.

Make sure that the PACKAGE or SHIPPING BOX is in good order and the drive should be GOOD.

Don't lose sleep on this issue... get your drive