Might be of interest to some of you.
From OzBargain. This is the seller they do their group buy with.
According to the comments on the OzBargain post:
This seems to be the cheapest NZD price so far? Could get 2x for under the $1000 threshold to avoid the extra Tax.
And then another 2
And then another 2 more to make it and even 6
Fairly sure there should be no extra tax on hard disks since eBay collects GST and there should be no duty. You will have to pay the IETF & BSEL along with any clearance fees that may be charged by the courier (if you don't clear it yourself or they don't let you).
Remember also if they arrive at the same time especially on the same flight they might be combined if going to the same person even if separate parcels.
I'm not too sure of the correct "terms", but even though GST is collected by eBay regardless of value, you still have GST and fees on anything over $1000 coming through. Basically this article: https://www.customs.govt.nz/personal/send-and-receive-items/… (Step 4).
The only overseas company that you try avoid this with is B&H whereby you can select to handle the import fees yourself upon checkout.
To be clear, AFAIK eBay will collect GST on anything above $1000 too. Which means you just have to show that you've paid GST and will not need to pay GST again on the value of the parcel itself. You will have to pay the BSEL and IETF as I mentioned and these fees do include GST so there is a very small amount of extra tax but it's minimal. If you have to pay a clearance fees to the courier because you aren't clearing it yourself or because they won't allow you too, I think this will also include GST. But again since GST is only 15% the big cost is from the fees themselves not the GST component/tax. Since eBay does collect GST on items under $1000 the tax difference by buying fewer is very small.
And note, B&H won't allow you to avoid this. With B&H it's worse since with B&H you aren't already paying GST. And that's where it starts to get expensive $1000 vs not. Since when it reaches $1000 not only will you have to pay the BSEL & IETF but also GST on the entire $1000+ transaction because B&H isn't collecting it, similar to the $400 threshold people used to fear. While B&H are known for questionable practices, I'm fairly sure they aren't willing to falsely declare values. So the value will still be on the customs declaration and probably submitted electronically to NZ Customs. (This is function of the courier rather than B&H.)
If you have to pay duty it also starts to make a bigger difference in tax between $1000 and under but there should be no duty on hard disks.
Haha, I just bought one of these last night. Great deal.
If you can wait for the next group buy, you should be able to get it even cheaper as you don't have to pay GST to eBay, and also the price is lower at around $185 USD. I got mine for $305 NZD delivered from the previous group buy.
So Neology buys them (outside of eBay) and you pay and organise shipping with him?
I contacted the seller East Digital, paid via Paypal and they shipped to NZ directly via FedEx. They honoured the group buy price as I mentioned Neology's group buy.
Did you contact them via Ebay or?!
@philyy: hi there - just wondering where you found there email - or if you could pm it through to me
Thanks for the help
Hmm curious. Where to you follow along to see the next lot?
What's a group buy?
Large order for a group of people. Doing so to bring the price down.
From the link in the description:
I've found an HDD vendor in HK on eBay who is selling large capacity enterprise-level hard drives at a pretty good price (cheaper than Amazon) and provide a reasonable level of post-sale support.
If we have enough interest and we can order in bulk, the seller can supply the HDDs at a better price compared to their eBay listings.
Please be mindful that all the HDDs are OEM stock, so you will not get a warranty direct from manufacturers (Seagate, or WD), the warranty will need to claim with the seller, and the seller will arrange the return label for the warranty.
Good deal. I got 4x16TB Seagate Exos (OEM) from Taobao for about $220 NZD each last year.
That's insane… any idea what the warranty situation is / would be like?
No warranty lol that's the risk
Lol, that makes sense - price is low enough I guess /shrug/
Hey does anyone have any idea how long this deal will last? I would love to buy two now so I don't miss out, but that's like $700 something. To spread out those costs, I could one now and one later, but I don't know how long it will stay at that price. Get two now at this price because it won't be around much longer, or it will and in that case I could wait
Any thoughts would be great!
The expiry date is on the eBay listing: 4d 20h as of this post
Will edit post. Hopefully got it right.
Oh yes of course. I don't know why I never thought of that, I probably should have paid more attention looking around on the Ebay page Thanks for quick help
No worries! If you're price conscious / worried, you could gamble and wait until the next deal which sounds like it could be cheaper (no experience, just repeating what I've read)
Would that be with a group buy situation or just an even more price drop?
Group buy apparently: https://www.cheapies.nz/comment/164659/redir
P.S if you hit the "reply" button under the comment instead of typing in the main comment box below it will be in a nice thread
Thanks, I'm new, will keep that in mind going forward
Some more information from OzBargain.
Why every time that I see a post about Exos surely there'll be people with newish failed drives ?
Isn't Exos suppose to be enterprise grade ?
Or is Exos the new Deathstar ?
I think i might be a good position to answer this question given I've handled 600+pcs HDD from GB as well as the GB RMA.
For EXOS OEM stock, Seagate shipps them in form of pack of 20, see these photos from EastDigital's listing:
https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/bsoAAOSwXbNhursi/s-l1600.jpg
https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/tDEAAOSwgmBf1s3k/s-l500.jpg
https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/sMAAAOSwjKhindfY/s-l500.pngThey then repack them in smaller custom boxes to ship them to customers, something like this:
https://i.imgur.com/yQ1XvhH.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/lkoigOB.jpgThe hard drive package may get shocked, dropped or throwed during anytime in the logistic chain, could be with the wholesaler or FedEx/DHL or AusPost/Sendle.
Given the HDD is a mechanical device with pricision instrument in it, it could be damaged easily with the shock.
In my opinion, ED has done pretty well on the packaging to absord shock and be protective to HDDs, but there are still a chance that the HDD got damaged during transport.
For the GB, ED had already pre-packed all the HDDs in the relevant boxes, and ship them to me in the well packed large box.
As far as I know, ED spoken to me and they are analysing examples on the RMA cases and looking to keep improving their packaging to reduce the RMA rate.
As soon as I saw the thumbnail of this post I got PTSD. I bought 4 x Exos from PB Tech a while back and they were shipped exactly as shown in the thumbnail. No protection, just thrown into a box with "scrunched up paper" as protection. These drives are dense, and heavy. They need to be isolated from each other when packed together, and they need to have sufficient padding - exactly like the images show in the above post (foam). As you probably guessed, the drives got physically damaged during transit (dents caused by the corner of other drives slamming into each other). I was able to walk them back into a PB Tech branch and re-order from their logistics centre, but if you're ordering from overseas ensure the shipper packages them well.
Any idea if they have 10TB NAS drives with the GB option? I filled out the form but would be good to know if others have bought the same
Dumb question but what are you guys storing on these? I’ve got a 2TB HDD I use for movies and another for backing up photos. Barely managed to fill them up. What are you guys doing with 16TB?
assuming some NAS solution probably
Linux ISO's ofc!
Mostly VM's, TV Series' and Movies - Home server for Plex and seedbox.
so many distros to collect.
As the Streaming platforms continue to decouple from each other, you'll soon realise quickly how a 16TB drive or two can be useful.
Yeah. I bought a 4k LG OLED and download media in 4k encoded with dolby vision and atmos audio. A TV episode can easily be 10gb+
Quantities but also qualities are also relevant. You say you're barely able to fill up a 2TB for movies yet a 2TB can only fit 80 full size single layer Blurays.
MEDIA. movies. tv series. music, mixture of SD all the way to 4k! and up to disk quality too! ive got 100TB worth of hard drives and need more!
Would be interesting to see how much media you have only watched once or less but continued to store
Wait, you have to watch what you've stored?! Datahorders just store
@Moodkiller: :D I mainly buy datablocks rather than hoarding stuff I may or may not watch months later. I mean you can pull down your bluray backup in 5-10 min ondemand with how fast services are.
@Dunno: Haha, fair enough :) and the cost of said service is reasonable enough that you didn't wish you had bought the HDD instead?
Damn, I'm actually in need for some drives, will keep an eye out for the next post when funds are in order
Sorry fence sitters (me included), all out of stock :(.
213 units sold.
when people get these can they please report on the packaging of bare drives, most shippers think putting it in a large box is sufficient., pbtech/amazon included.
Will be good to compare to the second section of this comment but I believe this is what it will be in reality: https://www.cheapies.nz/comment/164702/redir
and are based on the Exos X18 platform rather than X16 so have an, albeit very small, increased data transfer rate.
These appear to be back in stock again! https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/284579625585
more than 10 available, 13 sold in the last hour
So tempting, until I look at the bank balances lol.