Electronics don't survive a move the way a box of books does. Here's how to pack a TV, computer, and the rest of a home office setup so nothing shows up cracked, corrupted, or dead on arrival.
Nothing Electronic Lies Flat
This is the rule that gets skipped most often. Flat-screen TVs and monitors are weight-balanced to stand upright, not lie down. Lay one flat in the truck and the middle of the panel isn't supported the way the frame is, so a pothole or a hard stop on the ride over can flex the screen enough to crack it, sometimes with no visible dent to explain why.
U-Haul's packing guide is blunt about it: keep the TV upright the entire time, from the moment it leaves the wall to the moment it's set down at the new place. The same logic applies to full-tower desktop computers and large monitors, both of which are built to sit a certain way and don't handle being wedged sideways under a box of clothes.
How Do You Pack a TV Without the Original Box?
Original packaging is the gold standard if you kept it. The foam inserts are cut to that exact model, which means the screen and corners get real support instead of a generic fit.
Most people don't have it two or three years in, and that's fine. A flat-screen moving box with corner foam inserts, sold at U-Haul, Home Depot, and most moving supply stores, is the next-best option. Wrap the screen in a moving blanket first, slide it into the box, and fill any remaining gap so nothing shifts in transit. Skip the box entirely and wrap it only in a blanket, and you're relying on whoever's carrying it to never bump a doorframe on a tight Boston stairwell — not a bet worth making on a $1,000+ television.
Label the box "TV — Fragile — This Side Up" on every visible side. It sounds obvious, but a mislabeled box is how a TV ends up on the bottom of a stack an hour later.
Computers, Monitors, and the Anti-Static Problem
Back up your data before moving day, not the morning of. A dead hard drive after a bumpy ride is a bad time to find out your last backup was three months old.
Once that's done, packing paper and anti-static bubble wrap are the right materials for anything with exposed ports or internal components. Regular packing peanuts are a bad match here. They shift constantly, which means the item inside moves around too, and the friction can build a static charge that's genuinely risky for circuit boards. Move.org's electronics packing guide recommends the same swap: paper and anti-static wrap for anything electronic, peanuts reserved for everything else.
Desktop towers and monitors travel upright, same as TVs. Laptops do best in a padded sleeve inside a box, not loose in a bag where a stack of books can land on the lid.
Label Every Cord Before You Touch It
Take a photo of the back of your setup before you unplug a single cable. It sounds excessive until you're standing in the new place two hours later trying to remember which HDMI port fed the soundbar.
Tape a small label to each cord, or use painter's tape and a marker, and bag cords by device rather than dumping them all into one gallon bag together. Remotes go in the same bag as their device, batteries removed so nothing corrodes in a hot truck. This is a five-minute step that saves an hour of guessing on the other end, and it's the one most people skip because it feels unnecessary right up until they need it.
What Boston's Home Office Moves Usually Look Like
Remote and hybrid work changed what a typical move involves. It's rare now to pack up just a TV and a game console, since most homes have a monitor arm or two, a dock, a decent office chair, and a router that someone actually depends on for a work call the same week they move.
We see this most on moves out of the smaller Cambridge and Somerville two- and three-bedrooms that got converted into a home office at some point in the last few years. The desk setup is usually the last thing packed and the first thing unpacked, because nobody wants to explain a dead laptop battery and no monitor to their manager on a Monday. Budgeting the electronics teardown and setup as its own chunk of time, not an afterthought tacked onto the end of the day, is what keeps that transition boring instead of stressful. It's part of why we lock in a flat quote before the truck shows up: knowing the price isn't going to move lets you actually plan around getting your desk running again instead of watching the clock on an hourly rate.
If your building requires a certificate of insurance for elevator access, factor that into your electronics plan too — a high-rise COI delay at the loading dock means your gear sits in a truck longer than planned, which matters more for a laptop in July than it does for a couch.
Is Your Mover's Insurance Enough to Cover Broken Electronics?
Not by default. Every Massachusetts mover carries released value protection automatically, and it pays out by weight, not value. As covered in our full breakdown of moving insurance in Boston, that works out to roughly $0.60 per pound per item — a 50-pound TV that cost $1,200 gets reimbursed at around $30 if it's damaged, which doesn't come close to replacing it.
Full value protection is the upgrade that actually matters for electronics specifically. It costs more upfront, but it's the tier that pays out based on real repair or replacement cost instead of a per-pound formula that was never designed with a modern TV or gaming PC in mind. If your move includes several thousand dollars of electronics, ask about the upgrade cost as a flat number before move day, not a vague percentage you find out about later.
How Long Before You Can Plug Anything Back In?
Give it time. A device that spent hours in a cold or hot truck needs to reach room temperature before you power it on, because condensation can form inside the casing as it warms up, and that moisture near live circuitry is the actual risk, not the temperature itself.
An hour is a reasonable minimum for a normal-weather move. If your move happened during a real Boston cold snap or a summer heat wave, give it several hours, and let a computer tower or a game console sit overnight if it's uncertain. This is the same logic behind waiting to plug in a fridge after a move — the wait is short compared to the repair bill if you skip it.
Routers, Smart Home Devices, and Everything Else
Pack the router and modem last, and unplug them only once you genuinely need to leave. Keeping internet running until the last possible minute matters more than people expect, especially if anyone in the house is on a work call that day.
Call your internet provider a week or two ahead to confirm service transfer, since Boston providers can take several business days to activate a line at a new address, and that gap is worse if you find out about it on move-in day instead of in advance. Smart thermostats, video doorbells, and similar devices are sometimes tied to the unit itself rather than to you personally. Check your lease or talk to your landlord before you pull a Nest or a Ring off the wall, since some buildings expect those to stay.
Game consoles follow the same upright rule as everything else with a disc drive or a hard drive inside. Remove any disc first, and if you're moving during winter, treat a console the same as a TV on the acclimation wait.
Quick Reference: What Goes Where
| Item | Orientation | Best Packing | Wait Before Powering On |
|---|---|---|---|
| Flat-screen TV | Upright, always | Original box or flat-screen moving box | 1+ hour, longer in extreme temps |
| Desktop computer | Upright | Anti-static wrap, packing paper | 1+ hour |
| Laptop | Any, padded | Padded sleeve inside a box | Minimal, avoid extreme temp exposure |
| Monitor | Upright | Anti-static wrap or original box | 1+ hour |
| Router/modem | Any | Pack last, unpack first | None, plug in immediately |
| Game console | Upright | Original box if kept, padded box | Same as TV in cold weather |
NoTimeMover is fully insured, and our crews know to keep TVs and monitors upright without being asked. If your move includes a home office setup or anything that needs a careful hand, tell us when you book your local move and we'll plan for it.