iPAQ and Customs

[Legend]

Is it safe to have my iPAQ in a bag that will go through the carry on bag check at the airport?

[nolispe]

It's safe in the respect that nothing will be wiped from your machine by the evil rays of the scanner. However you might want to be careful as to how you place it in there as some of the airport guys can be a little heavy handed with your gear.

I put mine through a couple of weeks ago and it survived OK.

[tap2]

When I was really young, I took a Desk Clock with me on holiday and after it came out of the X-RAY it was completely trashed. I'm not joking, I don't know WHY it happened but all the components were fried and it smelt of burning.

[beantown53]

Originally posted by tap2
When I was really young, I took a Desk Clock with me on holiday and after it came out of the X-RAY it was completely trashed. I'm not joking, I don't know WHY it happened but all the components were fried and it smelt of burning.

I would call them quite a scan! ;^)

[Legend]

Thanks for the info. I just bought a hard case so if they toss it around it will hopefully endure.

[ipaq5455]

I had mine in a regular old gym bag and it went thru fine also. Also, the airport scanners didn't really ask me about it or make me turn it on.
It think they thought it was just a calculator. Don't ask, don't tell I guess.

[strickjh05]

Have you tried keeping it in your pocket? Then putting it in that little tray thingy with your keys are change. I dont know. Thats wht I do whenever I fly to Minnesota.

[TeddRi]

Couple of thoughts.
1. Make sure that you have filled in the owners page info and also have some data in the PDA like appointments and contacts so that customs can see its a used device and you are not smuggling it in to get past VAT or other custom duties.

2. European X-Ray machine are often far stronger in power then US ones, they have different safety levels, watch out for the old looking ones (ie like in the Ukraine and Russia) those can cause problems.

3. The thing that is most likely to get hit is a high density SD card, (512 MB or higher)

4. If you are really concerned, just go to a photo store and buy one of those Xray proof bags for film, most of them will fit a PDA just fine.

Other then that....However I have taken Ipaq's and others thru hundreds of xray machines and never once have had a problem on them or digital cameras. Only twice I have had problems with a analog camera loaded with ASA 1000 film and had some "ghosting" problems with it.
My 2 cents..