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does it state in fluff if anyone has gone beyond the galaxies borders?

-did they find anything?
-did they come back?

Wasn't there this really old probe that picked up Ork signals?

Szarekh, the leader of the Necrons.
He found the Tyranids.
He came back to wake all the Necrons up because he wants them to ditch their strong, metal bodies for soft, squishy, edible ones.

The silent king did, none others I know of have left milky way.

As mentioned above

- The Silent King left the Milky Way (self imposed exile for what happened to his race), and he encountered the Tyranids in the inter-galactic void. This prompted a short BSOD, and then he turned around and returned to the Milky Way to try to unite the Necrons so that the Necrons could save their galaxy from the oncoming Hive Fleets.

- At least one Imperial Probe has "left the galaxy" and the tech adepts responsible for the project were depressed to find it transmitting back Ork signals from wherever it ended up. It is worth noting that it is unlikely that this probe made it to another galaxy, but rather either ended up in the farthest flung outer-planets of our galaxy (beyond the halo stars) or found Orks hanging out in the inter-galactic void. [i](edit, does anyone actually have the citation for this? It is brought up every now and then, but the source is never cited)[i/]

- People often say that the Old Ones may have traveled beyond the galaxy themselves, but again no real source for this is cited and it is likely just speculation.

There are a few chapters that operate around the halo stars, but is that still clashed as the milky way?

I know of at least one Human ship from the Dark Age of Technology that did so. I read it in a book that contained Blood Angels as well, I really can't remember the book name...

Anyway, apparently an ancient DAOT Scout ship had spent millenia travelling to another galaxy and came back. When it came back and its crew came out of stasis, the crew were tortured and slaughtered as heretics by the imperium because they didn't believe in the God-Emperor. The AI of the Scout Ship knew what had happened to its crew and so it left, and roamed around before going dormant and letting space debris form all around it into a space hulk. Then the Blood Angels woke it up when they boarded the space hulk. Then after a series of events, it broke away from the space hulk and left again to roam around.

 Otto Weston wrote:
I know of at least one Human ship from the Dark Age of Technology that did so. I read it in a book that contained Blood Angels as well, I really can't remember the book name...

Anyway, apparently an ancient DAOT Scout ship had spent millenia travelling to another galaxy and came back. When it came back and its crew came out of stasis, the crew were tortured and slaughtered as heretics by the imperium because they didn't believe in the God-Emperor. The AI of the Scout Ship knew what had happened to its crew and so it left, and roamed around before going dormant and letting space debris form all around it into a space hulk. Then the Blood Angels woke it up when they boarded the space hulk. Then after a series of events, it broke away from the space hulk and left again to roam around.

What's the name of that book? I'd like to read it.

 kinratha wrote:

 Otto Weston wrote:
I know of at least one Human ship from the Dark Age of Technology that did so. I read it in a book that contained Blood Angels as well, I really can't remember the book name...

Anyway, apparently an ancient DAOT Scout ship had spent millenia travelling to another galaxy and came back. When it came back and its crew came out of stasis, the crew were tortured and slaughtered as heretics by the imperium because they didn't believe in the God-Emperor. The AI of the Scout Ship knew what had happened to its crew and so it left, and roamed around before going dormant and letting space debris form all around it into a space hulk. Then the Blood Angels woke it up when they boarded the space hulk. Then after a series of events, it broke away from the space hulk and left again to roam around.

What's the name of that book? I'd like to read it.

Just been looking around and I found it. 'Death of Integrity'. Also it's not Blood Angels but Blood Drinkers... I keep getting all the Blood Chapters mixed up

Xyptc wrote:
- At least one Imperial Probe has "left the galaxy" and the tech adepts responsible for the project were depressed to find it transmitting back Ork signals from wherever it ended up. It is worth noting that it is unlikely that this probe made it to another galaxy, but rather either ended up in the farthest flung outer-planets of our galaxy (beyond the halo stars) or found Orks hanging out in the inter-galactic void. [i](edit, does anyone actually have the citation for this? It is brought up every now and then, but the source is never cited)[i/]

Can't remember the source at the moment, but the probe was never said to have left the galaxy. Given it wouldn't have an Astropath on it, and the Admech still get signals from it, it probably hasn't gone very far.

Xyptc wrote:
- People often say that the Old Ones may have traveled beyond the galaxy themselves, but again no real source for this is cited and it is likely just speculation.

The old Necron codex mentioned that the Old Ones had intergalactic pathways.

The Carcharodons were tasked with seeking out enemies of the Imperium outside the borders of the Imperium.

Does that mean they explored beyond the borders of the galaxy?

Or does it just mean they stayed in the galaxy but traveled areas held by Chaos or Xenos?

 AWesker1976 wrote:
The Carcharodons were tasked with seeking out enemies of the Imperium outside the borders of the Imperium.

Does that mean they explored beyond the borders of the galaxy?

Or does it just mean they stayed in the galaxy but traveled areas held by Chaos or Xenos?

Almost certainly the latter. Having a whole chapter dedicated to fighting an enemy that may never show up seems pretty wasteful. Also, given how long it takes to travel within the galaxy, and the amount of distance between our galaxy and the nearest other galaxy, I'm pretty sure The Carcharodons would be lost forever if they actually went out seeking enemies from beyond our galaxy.

To answer a couple of previous posters questions:
The Halo Stars are still a part of the galaxy. They're an unexplored group of stars that are on the fringes of Segmentum Obscurus. There is also The Halo Zone, which is a similar area on the fringes of Segmentum Pacificus. The light from the Astronomican doesn't reach these areas, which is why they're mostly unexplored.
http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Halo_Stars#.U92P0fldWSr
http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Halo_Zone#.U92P3fldWSr

I'm pretty sure the info about the probe that detected only Orks came from an old Ork codex (not surprising, really). I remember reading it a long time ago. 3rd Edition, maybe.

 AWesker1976 wrote:
The Carcharodons were tasked with seeking out enemies of the Imperium outside the borders of the Imperium.

Does that mean they explored beyond the borders of the galaxy?

Or does it just mean they stayed in the galaxy but traveled areas held by Chaos or Xenos?

It could be both. The Imperium doesn't control everywhere in the galaxy so they could have stayed in the galaxy or left it. Depends on what your fluff is.

Pretty sure I remember reading direct reference (in one of the Badab War books, but I don't have a citation handy) to the Carcharodons operating outside the galactic disk.

This could count for the scale fail thread, but given the timeframe for intragalactic travel, it's completely infeasible for any race except perhaps the Old Ones or the Necrons to have visited other galaxies. The only race that could conceivably have traveled the intergalactic void recently is the Tyranids (and they almost certainly did, unless you buy into some of the wackier theories about them being the Old Ones' ultimate weapon). The Carcharodons, the Orks broadcasting the extragalactic signals, and the Craftworlds that have departed the galaxy couldn't have gone beyond the immediate neighborhood given the technology available to them.

Considering that Warp Travel can involve temporal distortions, and otherwise defies all known laws of physics, it is theoretically possible to make a Warp jump from this galaxy to the next.

Beyond the galaxy is a fun mixture of completely barren planets that were eaten by the Tyranids millennia ago and bunches of alien empires. Far beyond the influence of the Imperium and the guiding powers of the Astronomicum, I think the area beyond the galaxy would have many smaller empires and a great variety of different stuff.

As far as Chaos goes, I'd imagine that the Chaos gods have most of their focus inside the galaxy in their tussle with the Imperium. There might be the rare planet of Chaos-worshipers or demons, but nothing resembling the Chaos presence near the Imperium.

Humans are probably sparser the further you get from the galaxy. There are likely some people marooned through warp-jump accidents or long-forgotten groups from the Dark Age of Technology, but most species are probably Xenos. This is because canonically, the human race originated from Earth and there's no major events where many humans migrated from the galaxy.

You could argue that the Tyranids have devoured all reality outside of the Galaxy, but that's quite unlikely. This is because this is a massive (infinite?) amount of space we're talking about, and the Tyranid Hive Fleets being defeated by various human and xenos forces shows that they have a quite a lot of evolution to do yet. Remember, the Tyranids are being drawn to the Astronomicon.