Do We Have A Price Estimate For The Kit?

[Chris Kostanick]

I haven't seen anything mentioning a price and I was wondering if there is at least a ballpark figure for it?

This is an insanely cool project.

Chris Kostanick - PiDP 11/70 owner

[Angelo Papenhoff/aap]

Oscar has yet to do the final tally, but we're aiming for below $240 for the small/console version and below $400 for the big/frame version.

There can always be unpleasant surprises with shipping and what not, so these numbers are sort of a pessimistic estimate.

[Bill E]

I responded as noted in the email that came out multiple times, never got a response. Things seem to have gone silent, at least for me. Wondering just how I get on the order list.

BTW, I used the MIT PDP-1 back in the day to of course play Spacewar. What fun.

Bill

8, 10, and 11 owner

[Angelo Papenhoff/aap]

The first PiDP-1s for the first courageous customers of the first batch should hopefully be ready any day now. There should be an announcement soon and a way to order one.

[Bill E]

I'm courageous. :) I had an early -11, early -10. I fixed a serious threading bug in the 11 emulator early on. I can solder. Sign me up!

[Brian Jamieson]

I hope people realize that you're not doing this because you owe THEM a favour...

Take your time, sort out what you can, and we will love you for your hard work.

But remember - you PROMISED me PiDP-1 #007 !

;-)

[PDP11 Processor]

Hi,

I wondered about the cost of an assembled rack version posted to Australia. This should approximate the worst case as Australia may as well be the on the moon when it comes to postage.

[Oscar Vermeulen]

Shipping is fixed to one price, worldwide. It is just annoying to make it dependent on the destination. It's $45 for the Console, $65 for the Rack. But don't quote me yet on the latter, DHL has not confirmed the price for the Rack parcel yet.

We have done $45 for the other kits as well, so far. And the real shipping cost averaged out to $48 last year over all destinations, so $45 as a fixed shipping cost pretty much covers our real shipping costs.

The price is now set at $225 for the Console, and $385 for the Rack version. 

To be honest, we added $10 to the Rack version price over the weekend, and will use that to lower the price of the Console version by $10 to end up at the $225. Cross-subsidising one version with the other.

I hope people see that as a positive thing: we really wanted to make the Console affordable. And shipping charges put a huge fly in our ointment. We once had the ambition to stay under $200, but then shipping costs and Feature Creep set in. We really wanted to include both the white (Angelo insists) and the blue (I insist) front panels, and to make them click-on exchangeable panels added quite a bit to the cost. But made assembly easier, oddly enough! There's this Ottopanel idea: a front panel that fixes the LEDs in place. Then you clip on the blue or white front panel and that fixes the switches in place. It takes away a lot of fiddliness.

Our naive dream is to get the PiDP-1 in the hands of younger democoders at at some point. Graphics coding on the PDP-1 is really fun.

I know, likely won't really happen that way. But unrealistic ambitions are OK  :-)

Young budding democoders might see cost as a barrier. 

Maybe later on, we could even drop the idea of exchangeable cover panels, it saves us the cost of 4 PCBs!

But for now, we have too much fun with white & blue to cost-cut that panel-swapping idea away. Besides, what do we go with then? Blue would annoy Angelo, white would make me sad... :-)

Kind regards,

Oscar.

[Bryce Jeannotte]

I don't live in the US and I was wondering what the country of origin is for these kits. I assume that it is China, but is that true for every part? For me 100% made in China would be the cheapest to import.

[Paul Birkel]

"County of Origin" is an expression likely defined differently by every import authority on the planet :-{.

I expect that the kits will be shipped from Panama.  The components are from "all over the place" ...

[Oscar Vermeulen]

Right,

Made in Panama! Since I handed over the actual kit production in 2022 to Jose and Ivan. Before, I did the kit packing from my house in Switzerland. That became a bit too much when it was no longer just the PiDP-8 and -11. 

The parts come from all over. Of course the switches and PCBs from China; the injection molds from the UK (for the PiDP-11), the front panels from Holland, the chips from the US  (to avoid the risk of getting fakes and rejects, learned the hard way) and many small parts locally from Panama.

If you wonder about 'why Panama ', the story is here: https://obsolescence.dev/about.html . It allowed a much wider cooperative effort. So with Lars Brinkhoff (PDP-10 software) and Otto Oosterwijk (the mold), I did the PiDP-10; Jürgen Müller now did the Enigma touch and soon, will do a LGP-30. Angelo is working on a PiDP-6 and -7, a group of us on a Whirlwind. And plans for an IBM 360/370 will come true at some point. Otto Oosterwijk contributed the know-how to do metal cases and other more sophisticated construction. Like custom-molded aluminum rack profiles for the PiDP-1, that was a fun story (see here). The whole idea has morphed into the ambition to do 'computer history capsules' for the pre-microprocessor era. And to secure that will keep going for a long time.

Kind regards,

Oscar.

 

[Anthony Eros]

A veritable United Nations of vintage computing — so cool!!

— Tony

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[Randy Eubanks]

Do you think the 370 run RPG II? The first computer I programmed (or tried to) was a System/32 back in 1975 or early 1976.

Randy

[Unibus]

Hi,

As shipping is via the USA is there going to be an additional Trump tax?

And totally unrelated, how long do you estimate it will take to fulfill the earlybird orders?

Regards,

Garry

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[Oscar Vermeulen]

On Friday, August 22, 2025 at 6:01:56 AM UTC+2 uni...@gmail.com wrote:

As shipping is via the USA is there going to be an additional Trump tax?

We changed shipping: DHL picks up the parcels at our door and send them straight on to their final country of destination. 

For the US, we still have the option to ship from that Florida warehousing company. We might need it for US kit buyers, if it turns out that the scrapping of the US 'de minimis' rules kicks in at the end of the month. But for now, we use DHL to send to US addresses too.

 

And totally unrelated, how long do you estimate it will take to fulfill the earlybird orders?

We're making 5 kits per day right now. It will ramp up in a week or so, when we get more parts. Annoying: we bought game controller cables for 200 kits, but we only got enough for 40 or so kits delivered. So we are waiting for that to arrive...

Kind regards,

Oscar.

[sunnyboy010101]

One question: the newsletter announcing the kit and inviting earlybird applications indicated the website, and that indicated emails should be sent to oscar at ceds.dev. I sent an email to that address but have not heard anything. Was this the correct email to express interest / request a kit ?

If not, what email?

[Randy Eubanks]

I have likewise sent an email to Oscar at the above referenced address and am awaiting a response. I am not worried though as Oscar is probably swamped. I'll get it when I get it. (I hope)

Randy

[Randy Eubanks]

Wow, I think I sent this message to the list two days ago (Monday, August 25th), but it just showed up here on Wednesday the 27th. 

That's quite a delay in a reply being posted!

Randy

[Oscar Vermeulen]

Randy,

I was knocked offline for a few days, Jose took over the moderation of the group, but he does not check every day. Moderation is normally trivial, but once in a while Google's AI does a false spam detect. I'm happy with their spam detection otherwise, it keeps a lot of 'pharmaceutical vendors' out of the group posts. I once switched it off and learned the hard way.

Kind regards,

Oscar.

[Helium Phoenix]

Well, I don't know if it is normal for shipments to the US, but I just got hit with a $106 Import Duty for the Rack Kit.

Kind of a surprise, since I didn't get hit with one for the other kits.  Wish I'd been warned about it.

So a heads up for other US buyers.

[Mike Arrington]

I just got hit with the import duty also for about the same amount.

---

Mike A

On Thu, Sep 25, 2025, 02:17 Helium Phoenix <helium...@gmail.com> wrote:

Well, I don't know if it is normal for shipments to the US, but I just got hit with a $106 Import Duty for the Rack Kit.

Kind of a surprise, since I didn't get hit with one for the other kits.  Wish I'd been warned about it.

So a heads up for other US buyers.

--.

[pbi...@gmail.com]

I thought that US shipments were supposed to originate in Florida.  I sure hope that mine does :->!

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[Michael Gardi]

Sure sounds like a 25% tariff to me. 

On Sep 25, 2025, at 3:38 AM, pbi...@gmail.com wrote:



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[Milo Velimirović]

I just got an invoice from DHL for the rack-mount PiDP-1 kit I purchased.

REGULATORY CHARGES (L1) 1.31

IMPORT EXPORT DUTIES (L2) 87.50

DUTY TAX PROCESSING (L3) 17.00

Total USD 105.81

This is definitely we, the consumers and end users, who are paying the tariffs.

—Milo

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/pidp-1/F057F314-1666-4796-928D-B75CA88FAF4E%40gmail.com.

[Oscar Vermeulen]

We send out the PiDP-1 kits as soon as we've made them, 5-6 per day. So they are sent straight out of Panama. From what we learned, a tariff of 10% should then be levied.

It seems that new tariffs are clicking in! We checked with DHL yesterday, but neither they nor anyone else can offer any information right now. DHL described it as 'chaotic'.

Kind regards,

Oscar.

[Whit Turner]

Are you planning on stocking the Florida warehouse with kits?

Whit

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[Ken Hansen]

Stocking/shipping kits in Florida and assembled in Panama doesn't escape tariffs, it could possibly reduce tariffs as the value of the imported goods may be lower (retail vs wholesale price).

A bulk shipment of, say, 20 kits might save on processing/overhead fees (one fee vs 20 individual fees), but the value used to calculate tariff would be the same.

It's gonna be messy for a while, I fear.

Ken, N2VIP

On Sep 25, 2025, at 08:42, Whit Turner <james.t...@gmail.com> wrote:



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[Oscar Vermeulen]

On Thursday, September 25, 2025 at 3:54:47 PM UTC+2 k...@n2vip.org wrote:

Stocking/shipping kits in Florida and assembled in Panama doesn't escape tariffs, it could possibly reduce tariffs as the value of the imported goods may be lower (retail vs wholesale price).

Correct. But we'd prefer that route because it avoids the current uncertainty. We're investigating...

Kind regards,

Oscar.

[Mike Arrington]

I just got off the phone with DHL.  866-638-7668.  The automated system prompted me for a number.  I pressed an asterisk at the prompts and was transferred to a person.  He said that I was billed at a 50% tax rate and that it should have been 10%.  He said that it looked like a billing error.  He was going to forward the dispute to someone else.  He said that it could take 24-48 hours or up to 2 weeks for a response.  He said my shipment would go back next Wednesday if not paid.  The invoice I received says it was shipped from Panama.

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[David Adams]

Yeah, I got hit with the tariff the other day ($43/15% for those curious).  DHL doesn't make the process particularly clear when collecting the fees, of course.  I have learned to look for that "includes duty" label when ordering from off-shore, but I fully expect there to be continued "surprises". '

Otherwise, I am very excited to get started on the kit.  Looks like another great piece of work, oscar!

Dave

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[Ken Hansen]

Oh, certainly there's a benefit for you as the shipper, but since the reaction seems to be about lowering costs for the buyer, I just wanted to point out that tariffs are charged when goods cross boundaries.

An item shipped from overseas is tariffed at its declared/stated value.

An item shipped from inside the U.S. assembled in the U.S. but assembled with parts from overseas would tariffed as the components cross the border at the value of the imported components.

And, for completeness, an item assembled in U.S. from components sourced from within the U.S. would not be charged any tariffs.

Ken

On Sep 25, 2025, at 09:10, Oscar Vermeulen <vermeul...@gmail.com> wrote:



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[Oscar Vermeulen]

Thank you!

Looks like the basic work of designing something and then putting the parts in a box is getting one step more complicated again.

Mind you, for EU kit builders this has been the case since forever. But the US had this very pragmatic De Minimis rule of just letting small things go through without the 'added services' of Customs. No more.

It adds to the chores of getting parts shipped in with all the paperwork that entails, doing QC on incoming parts, trying to send back bad parts, doing senseless accounting work just because you need to. 

But in fact, almost half of the hours that go into this project are government-induced paperwork chores. Literally.

Oh well. I remember back when I did this at the dinner table in Switzerland. The accountant at the time (I did not want to do any accounting myself) was the second-most expensive (though virtual and for me, unnecessary) part of the kit...

It is really insane: we have these ultra efficient logistics and shipping services in the world, and they work fine. But the paperwork hassle for especially incoming parts strikes fear and phobia into me almost every time we do a big order.

Kind regards,

Oscar.

[Curtis Smith (史國興)]

Oscar,

I can hear the frustration in your words.  Thank you for sticking with this!  I hope to order a PiDP-1 to join my 8, 10, and 11 one day, but not until things settle down a little.

Curtis

[sunnyboy010101]

My kit was just ordered this week and is due to be shipped soon, so I will let folks here know how it goes coming to Canada.

We have two methods to get stuff in Canada; "very expensive" and "late but less expensive". The latter being is fair postal system, which is slow but decent (see below). The very expensive is for couriers who, in addition to collecting taxes, usually add an exorbitant brokerage fee seems totally arbitrary.

I just ordered an RC2014 kit from the UK, and the only charges were Canadian/Provincial taxes (5% national, 7% province) plus a $10 "handling fee". That's pretty normal for post.

Since the PiDP1 may or may not be coming by courier (DHL express has a bad habit of unloading packages to Canada Post at the border), I'll let everyone know how it goes once I know.

-R

[Robert S]

I received my kit on 15-Sep-2025, delivered by DHL direct from Panama, and wasn't charged any tariff or other fees at all.  Strange...

[Glenn Babecki]

Likewise for me, to the day.  Luck of the draw I guess.

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[Oscar Vermeulen]

Curtis,

On Thursday, September 25, 2025 at 7:33:06 PM UTC+2 smi...@gmail.com wrote:

I can hear the frustration in your words. 

Yes, well, I guess it is normal. But when you do the calculation, 30-40% of the kit's sales price is the cost of bureaucracy (in its widest definition). Fine for a company I guess, but for something as simple as making these kits it is frustrating. Still, stumbling upon this PiDP project was the most fun I've ever had, so I should not complain too loudly. But over the past few years, looking back, it feels like constantly finding ways and solutions. Whilst all we want to do is pack parts into boxes, how difficult can that be? :-)

[Paul Birkel]

" finding ways and solutions" = innovative entrepreneurialism at its finest.   Three quarks for Muster Mark!  :-}

[sunnyboy010101]

Sorry folks, but I gotta ask... I have now received two emails from DHL On Demand delivery about my PiDP1 kit package. It seems as if they are really busting a gut to get me to select "no signature delivery", like they may not deliver if I don't accept. 

Did anyone else get these emails, and did you accept?

As I work from home and the delivery is scheduled for about 1 week from today, I don't see why they don't want me to sign for it.

Comments, suggestions from those who got these emails and have their kit now?

-R

[sunnyboy010101]

Yea, I just got my email from DHL On Demand Delivery. Looking forward to the arrival of the package!

On Thursday, September 25, 2025 at 3:47:26 PM UTC-7 Glenn Babecki wrote:

[Helium Phoenix]

I just got off the phone with the number you provided.  The lady checked it thoroughly.  It's not a billing error.  It's because it is marked as containing metals.  So because the aluminum supports are in the package, the rate for the metals is charged for the WHOLE declared value.

Oscar, Jose, if you are going to ship those kits from Panama, charge an extra $10 to ship the two separately, and then the value of the support beams will be what gets hit with the big tariff......not the remainder of the parts.

Yeah, it's stupid.  And Panama needs to drop down its tariffs on US products.

[sunnyboy010101]

WHO IS DELETING MY MESSAGES AND WHY???

On Thursday, September 25, 2025 at 3:47:26 PM UTC-7 Glenn Babecki wrote:

[Unibus]

Hi,

I had to change my delivery address for my PiDP-1 kit. Suggest you ask where their depot or nearest pickup points are located. In my case the location was where I would go once or twice a week, so it was very convenient. I could do this change very simply online and it didn't slow down delivery.

Regards,

Garry

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/pidp-1/49dba735-7445-4678-bdab-fb7e86b6765dn%40googlegroups.com.

[Oscar Vermeulen]

>> WHO IS DELETING MY MESSAGES AND WHY???

Not me! oh oh... Unless I clicked the wrong button: I just saw them on the 'pending messages' where Google sometimes sets messages from new posters apart (annoying, but then I do have pharmaceutical spammers now and them).

Oh dear - did I click the wrong button? Can't imagine but it seems the only likely explanation. In which case - apologies! Unintended!

Kind regards,

Oscar.

[Oscar Vermeulen]

No - it seems your messages just magically reappeared? 

[pbi...@gmail.com]

Yes, and yes.  Our local USPS PO ignores signature-upon-receipt stuff entirely; just dumps-and-runs.  I’d imagine that DHL would be more careful.  But dump-and-run works for me as I’ve had problems with “delivery agents” using post-sticker-and-run tactics instead of making serious good-faith efforts to get the occupant (me) to sign … even which I’m sitting about 20’ away waiting with “bated breath” for their arrival.

[Oscar Vermeulen]

On Friday, September 26, 2025 at 1:32:11 PM UTC+2 helium...@gmail.com wrote:

I just got off the phone with the number you provided.  The lady checked it thoroughly.  It's not a billing error.  It's because it is marked as containing metals.  So because the aluminum supports are in the package, the rate for the metals is charged for the WHOLE declared value.

Huh?!

 

Oscar, Jose, if you are going to ship those kits from Panama, charge an extra $10 to ship the two separately, and then the value of the support beams will be what gets hit with the big tariff......not the remainder of the parts.

Yeah, it's stupid.  And Panama needs to drop down its tariffs on US products.

Actually, Panama was blessed with only a 10% tariff for anything - they got one of the better Tariff deals! But either DHL or US Customs (I think DHL, they handle this themselves for DHL Express parcels) is acting erratically in these first days of tariff stuff.

So the lady's story makes no sense at all. There is a US-Panama trade deal: 10% on anything.

We're talking to DHL on Wednesday to see how we can help them (which is like, the mouse yelling at the elephant).

[Unibus]

Hi,

There is a free trade agreement with the USA so purchase of the earlier kits from Florida attracted no Australian customs duty. As far as I know there is no free trade agreement with Panama. I was concerned I'd be hit by Australian Customs charges plus delays. There was no tariff when shipping to Australia and it cleared customs without any delays. DHL provided an excellent delivery service.

Hopefully the delivery of packages to Australia won't have to subsidise the charges the USA government imposes on its citizens.

Regards,

Garry

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/pidp-1/b8f226bd-803b-49b6-b3b7-703a6eac633fn%40googlegroups.com.

[resi...@sbcglobal.net]

This is completely normal with DHL.  Its more efficient for them to not wait around for someone to answer the door so they push hard for the cost savings via that email barrage.  If there isn’t sufficient value assigned to the parcel they will usually just dump it at the door anyway – even if signature is required.  They have data people analyzing losses and determine where the line is where it becomes unprofitable to spend the time waiting vs. just paying a claim if a package disappears.  Follow the money…always.

 

RS

 

From: pid...@googlegroups.com <pid...@googlegroups.com> On Behalf Of sunnyboy010101
Sent: Thursday, September 25, 2025 8:07 PM
To: [PiDP-1] <pid...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: [PiDP-1] Re: Do We Have A Price Estimate For The Kit?

 

Sorry folks, but I gotta ask... I have now received two emails from DHL On Demand delivery about my PiDP1 kit package. It seems as if they are really busting a gut to get me to select "no signature delivery", like they may not deliver if I don't accept. 

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[sunnyboy010101]

Several things at once...

First, yea - I noticed the messages magically reappeared. Not so the one I posted yesterday in the PiDP10 group (about adding fans). No idea why they were deleted then this morning reappeared.

Second - you can't track the DHL package until/unless you accept their "request" to override signature request and just leave the box. It's basically not really an option if you want to track the package as far as I can see. I accepted the inevitable and clicked the box.

Third - this morning I got notification from DHL that "about $48" is owing on the package for taxes etc. I have not yet clicked the link to get the documents so I don't know the exact breakdown, but doing a rough calculation on the actual cost ($677 CDN thanks to our crappy dollar value compared to USD) then the federal tax (GST) at 5% would be just under $34. With provincial tax (7%) the total would be over $80 so it looks like GST plus handling fee. I'll know more when I pay.

[sunnyboy010101]

OK. Just paid DHL. Total $48.08 CDN. Taxes were $29.18 and processing fee was $18.90, all $CDN. That means only federal tax (GST) and less than my estimate. No duty because it never touched USA soil. The tariffs on stuff coming/going between USA and Canada is too fluid for even the bankers and accountants here to manage, but I'll take it!