Taking computer hardrives on planes?
 

Has anyone here had any experience taking hard drives not connected to a laptop/pc on board? I need to take three with me and I don't want them in my baggage because I think they'd get damaged. But because of the paranoia surrounding electronic gadgets and because my (American) passport says Origin: Pakistan on it I'm afraid they might be confiscated "just in case."

If you're on a domestic flight, don't show your passport as ID. I recently traveled LAX-SJC on AA, brought 2 bare hard drives in my carryon, and they didn't say a word. On the first part of the trip SJC-LAX, I took a router, PCMCIA wireless card, and a PCI wireless card in my carryon luggage. No problems there.

Wireless Card???

You could use that to communicate with terrorists on the ground or crash the plane!!!!!!

I've travelled with hard drives no problem. But they never peeked in my bag.

I had an external hard drive in my carryon 2 months ago, no problems at all on 2 NW flights.

Shouldn't be a problem, but
 

I've never had a problem with it, and I bring two USB drives with me all the time. I jokingly refer to my computer case, with all of the wires and gadgets (they LOVE the 20' Sirius radio antenna cable ;-), as my "office on wheels". I joke with them, they joke with me, I get on my flight.

Of course, I've never had the joyful experiences of DWB or FWP ("driving while Black" or "flying while Pakistani") myself.

While I had to do it a lot pre-9/11, oddly enough since then I've never been asked to power up any of my electronics to show that they are what they say they are . . . but I'm ready to do it if needed, and you should be too.

I wouldn't worry about it a lot, hard drives on x-ray are very distinctive - I get yelled at sometimes b/c "I left my laptop in the bag" . . . no, my MP3 player with a 30GB microdrive is in the bag, thankyouverymuch.

Just give yourself time to set up the laptop in the security area and plug in the hard drive. Bring a power strip with you if the drive needs external power (mine do) - don't count on them having a plug that will accomodate your AC adapter, let alone multiple adapters.

Good luck

VF

That's pretty reassuring, although just to clear things up, I am flying internationally to Pakistan, my hard drives are bare as well (and I have no laptop) and they aren't external drives (so they don't look like a standalone piece of equipment and hence are probably more suspicious).

I've flown internationally post-9/11 and I often get stopped for that secondary check (random my ...) and a least for some airlines I believe they add a number to my boarding pass so that it is in a seperate category that boards last. I just hope they realize a hard drive is a hard drive.

You should be OK. I bet the screeners will notice them on x-ray and probably perform a hand-check of the carry-on bag they're in. I would NOT put them in a checked bag, for reasons of both potential theft and data integrity (the x-rays used on checked bags are much stronger and have a very small chance of damaging the drive's data).

The screener may not recognize the hard drive during a hand-check, but a simple explanation should suffice. I've traveled with external drives before--not with the bare drives you refer to, though--and have never had to even explain them.

I've yet to have a problem with secondary lap top hard drive (always carry) and desk top bare hard drives (sometimes carry) going into and leaving the USA. I carry mine in a pelican case (incase they want to check them or I have to check them) and put them through screening, and they always do a hand screening on them.

This all doesn't do you much good as they could still give you grief; however the general opinion here so far is that we've all done it and not had a serious problem. And yes, as veefib mentioned, I also have had more trouble with my archos mp3 / video player then the hard drives. Good luck.

I have one I use to transport data from home to work and I just put it in my bag, never had anyone look at it.
I thought this was funny. The guy in frount of my puts his carry on on the belt and the screener asks the standard "do you have a laptop, take out your laptop" question. The guy says "no, I have a full tower computer in there". Screener says OK, no problem.