Если гарантия действует год, Вам не стоит выбрасывать чек и коробку от дрели.

If the warranty is valid for a year, you shouldn’t throw away the receipt and the box from the drill.

Breakdown of Если гарантия действует год, Вам не стоит выбрасывать чек и коробку от дрели.

• и: and
• не: not
• год: the year
• если: if
• вы: you
• от: from
• чек: the receipt
• коробка: the box
• дрель: the drill
• гарантия: the warranty
• действовать: to be valid
• стоить: to be worth / should
• выбрасывать: to throw away

Questions & Answers about Если гарантия действует год, Вам не стоит выбрасывать чек и коробку от дрели.

Why is there a comma after год?

Because the sentence starts with a subordinate conditional clause: Если гарантия действует год (If the warranty lasts a year), followed by the main clause Вам не стоит…. In Russian, an если-clause is normally separated by a comma from the main clause when it comes first.

What grammatical role does Если play here?

Если introduces a condition (an if clause). The structure is:

• Condition: Если + clause
• Result/advice: (то) + clause
  The word то (then) is optional, so you could also say: Если гарантия действует год, то Вам не стоит…

Why is it гарантия действует (present tense) if it’s about the whole warranty period?

Russian often uses the present tense to express a general fact or rule. Гарантия действует год is a general statement meaning “the warranty is valid for a year / lasts a year,” not necessarily “it is acting right now.”

What case is год here, and why is there no preposition like в течение?

Год here is used as an “accusative of duration” (time span without a preposition). It answers “for how long?”:

• действует год = lasts (for) a year
  You can also say:
• действует в течение года (more explicit/formal)
• действует один год (emphasizes “one year”)

What does действует mean in this context?

Literally действовать means “to act/function,” but with documents/agreements it commonly means “to be valid / to apply.” So гарантия действует = “the warranty is valid.”

Why is Вам in the dative case, and why is it capitalized?

Вам is dative because this is an impersonal “advice” construction: “to you, it’s not worth…” / “you shouldn’t…”.
It’s capitalized because Вам can be written with a capital letter as a polite/formal you (like addressing a customer).

What is the construction Вам не стоит + infinitive?

не стоит is an impersonal way to give advice meaning “it’s not worth (doing)” / “you shouldn’t (do).”
Pattern: (кому?) + не стоит + infinitive

• Вам не стоит выбрасывать… = “You shouldn’t throw away…”

Common alternatives:

• Вам не следует… (more formal “you should not”)
• Вам не надо… (more direct “you don’t need to”)
• Не выбрасывайте… (imperative “Don’t throw away…”)

Why is the verb выбрасывать imperfective and not perfective выбросить?

Advice and general recommendations often use the imperfective infinitive for a general action: не стоит выбрасывать = “it’s not worth throwing away (in general / as a rule).”
Perfective не стоит выбросить is much less natural here; you’d use perfective more in specific “one-time” situations with different constructions, e.g. Не выбросьте чек! (“Don’t accidentally throw away the receipt!”).

Why are чек and коробку in different forms?

They’re both direct objects of выбрасывать, so both are in the accusative:

• чек (masculine inanimate): accusative = nominative → чек
• коробка (feminine): accusative ends in -у → коробку
  So the difference is just gender/declension, not meaning.

Why does it say коробку от дрели (with от + genitive)?

от + genitive can mean “from / belonging to / associated with” in everyday speech: коробка от дрели = “the box from the drill” (i.e., the drill’s box).
Other possible wordings:

• коробку из-под дрели (very common for “the box/container that the drill came in”)
• коробку для дрели (a box intended for a drill; could be any drill box)
• коробку дрели (less common; can sound like “the drill’s box” in a more “owned by” sense)