Moving House: Geek Survival Guide

Moving house can be a pain, especially for the technologically empowered.

I should know, I just moved house, its been six days and 15 hours since I’ve had hardline connected internet, in fact I’m surviving on my 3G wireless key.

Thats right, I’m currently burning my way through a 1gb of data I have left on my latest recharge.

Worst of all, its the Easter weekend, and here in Australia that means two days out of a standard work week are taken by public holidays, the wait for always on internet is even longer.

I’ve moved house in the last 8 years more times than I like to think, and each time I’ve picked up more than a few good tips as a geek moving house.

Moving House Tip #1: It’s all about the Media…

No matter how busy you think you will be packing, moving and unpacking your possessions, it is an infinitely smoother process if you have something to listen to while you do so.

That said trying to watch something while doing the same will only slow you down, so before you pack your PC plug in your media player of choice and fill it with some upbeat music, great podcasts or anything else that takes your fancy.

Moving House Tip#2: Finish your downloads!

Nothing is more irritating than having unfinished downloads, you’ve just watched the second last episode of your favorite show, the final one is 10mb off finishing its download and you have no internet to download it with!

Actually, I’d suggest to grab a few episodes of everything you can, you can’t be unpacking all the time so some downtime watching something enjoyable can remove some of the stress of moving.

Moving House Tip#3: Take care of your devices…

Now this sounds like a no brainer for most of you, the Geekocracy, but trust me I’ve seen many a device take a turn for the worst because of careless packing.

If nothing else make sure you:

• Check your CD/DVD drives for media
• Pack your devices in original packaging if you can

Moving House Tip#4: Label your cables…

Simple, easy to do and something that will save you from having a dead device.

Imagine this scenario, you’ve just unpacked a box, it has several external hard drives in it along with their respective power cables / supplies but you can’t match the cables to the drives.

You look at the drives, scratch your head, try to check the voltage requirements on the drive against the cable, plug one in cross your fingers and… Hooray its alive!

Again you play power cable roulette and plug in a drive, you notice the power isn’t coming on, the mad panic to try to correct the mistake but its too late, you can kiss 1 TB of storage goodbye along with your music and movie collection.

Luckily I’ve only ever lost a set of speakers in this manner, but it was still frustrating, I can only imagine what a simple mistake blowing a hard drive would make you feel like.

Moving House Tip#5: Know where your flash drives are…

Keep your friends closer and your enemies closer, we have all heard this time and time again, but keep your flash drives the closest you can, tape them to your body, put them in your socks do what ever it takes to keep track of these pesky but useful of devices.

Trust me, you don’t want to lose one of these things, just read one of my more recent posts to find out why: Lost a USB drive? I almost did… Again!

Moving House Tip#6: Get your connections started early...

Power, gas, water, telephone and Internet, the five cornerstones of a geeks existence. Without at least power, telephone and internet, we cannot truly function.

Just remember to order the move of your internet connection the same day as you organize your new telephone service.

Moving House Tip#7: Many geeks save the day…

Twitter, Facebook, Myspace, LinkedIn, whatever your social networking poison, get them working for you. Even the most shut in, digitally connected person should these days be able to rustle up some help to move, and the more geeks you have the safer and faster your gear will be transported and setup in your new digs.

Just make sure that you throw a lan party or <insert sci fi series here> fest at the end of the move to appease the helpful geeks.

Moving House Tip#8: Remember to rest!

This might sound silly, but the contrast between overdoing it and having adequate rest can make all the difference.

We geeks love to stay up late watching sci fi, using the net, tweeting, but trust me when it hits midnight GO TO BED! you’ll thank me for it!

In Conclusion…

Well, hopefully this should help make your move a smoother transition when transporting all your devices and getting them all connected!

If any of you have some good or bad stories about moving your gear around please leave them in the comments!

Related Posts B

1. Why are people these days so inconsiderate?
2. Lost a USB drive? I almost did… Again!