In a nutshell, it’s a 32 inch HDTV, it weighs a metric ton, and I’m in humidity - rampant SC.
Will boxing it up be sufficient, or should I be worried about the 3000% humidity that we sometimes get here (our storage thingy is NOT climate controlled).
I have the capability to shrink wrap it here at work as well - would this be necessary?
Well, my first thought is that you should send it on over to me. I’ll take good care of it for you
My only experience with storing electronics was in a climate controlled unit, and it was very satisfactory. I did wrap the TV in quite a bit of plastic so that while it might not have been exactly watertight, I would have been fine walking it through the rain for a bit. However, being a fellow denizen of the South, I know just how bad humidity can get around these parts. How long do you intend to keep it in storage? If it’s just going to be through the wintery months I would think a good plastic treatment would be okay. However, if it’s still going to be there when the sun begins to bake us once again, I wouldn’t want to leave my TV in any sort of non-climate controlled environment, and not just because of the humidity.
If more than a year, you would probably do better to sell it now & buy a new one then. The current one is losing value at a furious pace, and new ones are getting cheaper (& better) all the time. Sell now, park the cash, and buy a new replacement later with the parked money.
In general, things in storage have a way of staying there 2-3x longer than you expect, and if you expect over a year now, I’d really consider selling regardless of the storage conditions.
My experieince with tropical environments & non-climate-controlled storage was pretty simple. No matter what, it had mold / mildew on it within 6 months. Steel? Mold. Plastic? Mold. Glass? Mold. Cloth? Disintegrating with mold. Paper? Gone.
The temp & humidity in and of themselves will do zero harm to the TV itself. And wrapping in plastic will do nothing other than keep bugs out of the insides.
The problem is the mold, mildew, algae, etc. That stuff is already everywhere, is microscopic, and in a sealed humid environment will really go nuts. Wrapping in plastic will (I expect) just amplify the mold problem 100x.
When I store delicate electronic gear in conditions of uncertain heat/humidity where mold is a concern, I plastic wrap it with those big shipping rolls of plastic (hunt/schmooze around the shipping docks of local tech/surplus companies. Folks are pretty darn helpful) and make sure to include a ridiculous overcapacity of oxygen absorbers and dehumidifying packets.
It’s worked pretty well. I got a metric sh*tload of high capacity oxygen absorbers from Walton Feed at particularly good prices (per my search), and they report hands-on testing of the supplies the sell, which you can easily replicate. Just make a point of storing the the packets well before use (I vacuseal them in manageable subunit packets, and when I open a vacu-sealed packet, I transfer the extras to sealed containers with very little excess space)
You may find a better supplier. I’m just offering my experience.
Oxygen absorbers give at least as good an edge against mold in my experience as desiccant packets. the two together are a killer combo. I also find leftover oxygen absorbers excellent for long term food storage. They do take a while to fully act, but since they just contain finely powdered iron powder, any side effects are easy to predict, and any humidity from an air leak actually helps them to absorb the oxygen/moisture from the leak ~$20 ( under 1% of your TV’s price) can buy a tub of 0[sub]2[/subabsorbers that could suck all the oxygen out of Skylab (maybe a slight exaggeration, but without running the numbers, I’d bet it’d render a Skylab volume all but uninhabitable)
Having said that. I think selling it and buying a new one later has excellent merit – if you can find a suitable local buyer or are willing to deliver locally (hey, you’d have to take it to the storage facility anyway), but I can’t predict the effects on anything but low end prices of the early 2009 analog cut-off. It could go either way, in the short term, but you’ll almost certainly end up with appreciably better gear at your fair selling price by late 2009 or so.
Moore can be just as nasty as Murphy, if you get on the wrong side of him.
– KP “Georgian, born and bred – seen a bit of humidity in my day”