Hello everyone, I have never owned a laptop before( PC user from the very start), I want a laptop for my IT career(coding stuff) but I have a really low budget and wanna buy just a second hand laptop that can run some lightweight Linux distro. The thing is that laptop prices are really high here in India, you can get a second hand laptop that has an i5 and 4gb ram for about rs.17000 (204 dollars), my aunt is in Canada and they are coming back to India next year so i can just ask them to bring me a laptop I went to ebay.com and found some really cheap options like “HP ELITE BOOK 840 G1” for just 30 dollars, now the question is that is it okay to buy a 30-60 dollar laptop from eBay and will they allow it while passing through the airport ???
Passing through the airport should be no problem at all. As somebody who’s done a similar thing before, I can tell you that your aunt probably won’t run into problems. My bigger question is about the laptop you are looking at that is $30. It’s rare that laptops go for so cheap here, even used ones. I would advise you to investigate the seller to make sure they are trustworthy to avoid being scammed or sold a broken computer.
The 840 G1 is extremely old, featuring a 4th Gen Haswell CPU and integrated graphics. It also likely had a mechanical hard drive and 4gb RAM. These were common enterprise machines, but they have all been phased out - possibly several times over.
$30-60 is on the low end, but not excessively so. In 2018 I picked up a comparable Lenovo Thinkpad 3rd Gen for about $100. 5 years later and 1 generation newer, $60 is reasonable.
Will this meet OP’s needs? Tough to say. SSD and a RAM upgrade are worthy investments, which will drive up the price, but it can handle lighter tasks.
Just be careful that many of these have the hard drive removed (data security), and many of them also remove the hard drive caddy (because that’s faster). You would need a replacement caddy and drive
I dont know any Indian laws, but i cant see why it should be a problem as many people travel with their laptop as do i. But keep in mind that the keyboard layout might be different.
You should be fine, though that price for a laptop sounds scammy. I’d expect you to pay about $60-70 for an i5 with 4 GB of RAM.
Also, get yourself a cheap SSD if the laptop didn’t originally have one. Not sure if that’s going to be cheaper in Canada or India.
I don’t know much about these laptop prices, but i’ve seen some youtubers trying out 30 35 dollar laptops, but considering that it can be a scam I will consider buying a 50 60 dollar laptop instead
Maybe you’ll get lucky, just look at the specs and never go off platform.
Bringing a used laptop will not be an issue. I have asked my friends to buy a new mobile phone and brought it to India with 0 customs tax. But check if they are okay to carry 1kg as she may plan to carry full luggage limit.
But, spend a little more and buy a better one. $30 is what 3% of the air ticket price?
Departing with it from Canada and getting through airport security shouldn’t be an issue. People travelling with laptops, even multiple ones, is obviously super common.
However, I don’t know what the rules on importing goods into India are. Customs may have restrictions or require import taxes to be paid.
I would assume a lot of people also travel to India with a laptop. How would they know if it is being imported or if the aunt is just traveling with it?
Some countries used to require you to list expensive gear (mostly cameras back then) and either pay a deposit or prove that you’re taking it back. I’ve never encountered it but it could be something countries with strict import rules still do (it’s more commonly done the other way - if you leave the country you can get documentation on the way out so you don’t have to pay import tax when you come back with the device).
It’s also possible that they do it only if you bring more than one per person. (I think this may be the rule India applies, but you should check it.)
They might also just ask whether your aunt is taking it back or leaving it in India as a gift, and charge her the tax when she says it’s meant as a gift. Lying would be illegal, but as you pointed out, possibly hard for them to prove…
Just make sure your aunt is tech savvy enough to make sure the laptop isn’t a dud before paying for it. $60 is incredibly cheap for a laptop though, so might be worth a gamble even if she isn’t.
HP ELITE BOOK 840 G1
I don’t know where these are coming from, I suspect schools, but my business got a dozen or so to resell and they were all working fine. Just check the seller’s reviews first.
In Europe when exporting items over 200€ you get a +30% tax to pay. You probably want to check your state regolamentation.
OP can just get their aunt to bring the laptop in as their personal item and leave it there. It’s common for people to travel with laptops
The bigger issue is OP finding an actual cheap laptop in Canada that isn’t either a scam, garbage, or needs a new battery
Are you currently running Windows non home edition?
If so you can enable HyperV and Windows Subsystems for Linux to get Linux running on your system without needing another PC.
