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Check out your local Wal*Mart like store for stuff like this Fisher-Price edu-toy. My nephew has something a little less complex (and more appropriate, possibly, for your situation) but I cannot remember the name of it, only that it's from Fisher-Price. (:

This might be helpful, too.

1000GB for only $23544.00

There is a company(sorry it is the crack o' dawn here and my Google Fu don't work without coffee) that does nothing but buy and sell MSFT licenses in bulk. They buy them up when companies go tits up. That is how a buddy of mine in LR outfitted a SMB he was freelancing for. Yes, there are some grey areas, but whose fault is that? Microsoft's! I doubt very seriously they would have any luck in court with the byzantine minefield that is the MSFT licensing scheme. I seriously doubt even an army of lawyers could decipher that mess.

That said, again I took a whole 6 seconds total. But in all my years working SOHO and SMB I can't ever remember anyone paying over $150 for MS Office and they did NOT buy the education version! There are OEM, there are those from companies that went tits up, hell there are 50 ways to get MS Office. Just clicking the first link on bizrate has Office Basic 2k3 for $131, standard for $219, and again that took all of 3 seconds.

Now I concede that is you are trying to outfit a huge business(50 nodes or more) then it gets to be a minefield, but that is the POINT. That is how MSFT sells so many site licenses and software assurance programs, which is where their bread is buttered. But since I don't work often with the big corps(I HATE PHBs!) I can't comment too much on that. I work with SOHO,SMB, and churches as well as home users on occasion, so those are the markets I can comment on. And for those markets I can say I don't remember ever paying more than $150 for Office. BTW, where does it say that the link I gave don't have a license? Because I looked everywhere and I couldn't find any. All I could find was the standard "this is OEM" software rules, which means once installed you're not supposed to transfer it to another machine like you can with retail. But since I have found when most of my customers PCs die it is usually HDD failure and they NEVER hang onto the damned discs like I tell them to the whole OEM catch is moot.

But if MSFT Office really WAS $400, then Wordperfect and Staroffice and OO.o wouldn't be so far behind MSFT in the market. And MSFT knows this, which is why they don't go around trying to kill first sale like certain other companies do. It simply isn't in their interests to build a market for the alternative. I really wish there WAS a market so I wouldn't have problems like I do now. Anybody know of a program that will convert publisher files? Because I got a church deacon that was stupid enough to take his PC over to the local college(where they use Mac,dumbass) to get his PC fixed cheap and they wiped out Office and all of his churches stuff is tied up in 2K3 publisher files. That is why I always say I'm like the old commercial "You can pay me now, or you can pay me later" because they always end up paying me.

why don't you try doing the same with Vista and a 6 year old PC, and get back to us.

Ahem.

Getting to install the windows updates properly, though, is something I still haven't figured out yet.... I was a little sloppy with vLite.

I imagine your 6 year old Mac has some type of deal breaking issue as well.

I'd go with a Toshiba Tough book like this one http://www.bizrate.com/laptopcomputers/toshiba-toughbook-mdwd2-tablet-pc--pid619387597/compareprices.html Shop around I just grabbed the first link I could find. You might be able to pick up an older one on ebay on the cheap(ish) I remember back in the day when I was 3-4 playing with a Commodore Vic-20 which was pretty close to state of the art at the time. Toshiba Tough books are great, you can kick the thing down a flight of stairs and it will (probably) still work. :-)

Given that he's using a 7-year old laptop, I doubt that peak performance is the key factor in this purchase.

I'd also not call the OLPC "considerably lower in performance" to the T20 - they're just differently-optimized devices (i.e., weight, battery life, ruggedness), both of which would handle most non-intensive work. Here are the OLPC specs, while here are the T20 specs.

Actually, after looking at the diagram, it is evident the math is not done. A few things come to mind. The most glaring is the wind turbine. Anybody you know of put a turbine in the fireplace flue to get electricity from the heat draft? This is a draft with a large heat change. How much draft do you expect to get from the day/night differential. Don't expect enough juice to power the water pump in a water cooled PC.

Getting the heat to provide the high pressure ammonia to feed the expansion valve is also a problem. Time to do the math.

A good place to start is Modern Refrigeration and Air Conditioning.
http://www.bizrate.com/technologybooks/modern-refr igeration-and-air-conditioning--pid4254146/

Instead of trying to get high pressure ammonia, look up continious cycle absorption cycle refrigeration. Simone returns as a villain. The explosion happens, but nobody is hurt. Claire is killed permanently after being thrown out a window. The key is using vapor pressure to your advantage. Day/night cycles are not going to provide the requried amount of pressurised liquid ammonia for the job.

Study and learn continious cycle absorption cycle refrigeration then redesign and eliminate the expansion valve, & turbine. Add a light weight inhert gas to the entire system to make distilation of ammonia possible and stop uncontrolled reasorption into water.

After looking at the diagram, it is evident the math is not done. A few things come to mind. The most glaring is the wind turbine. Anybody you know of put a turbine in the fireplace flue to get electricity from the heat draft? This is a draft with a large heat change. How much draft do you expect to get from the day/night differential. Don't expect enough juice to power the water pump in a water cooled PC.

Getting the heat to provide the high pressure ammonia to feed the expansion valve is also a problem. Time to do the math.

A good place to start is Modern Refrigeration and Air Conditioning.
http://www.bizrate.com/technologybooks/modern-refr igeration-and-air-conditioning--pid4254146/

Instead of trying to get high pressure ammonia, look up continious cycle absorption cycle refrigeration. The key is using vapor pressure to your advantage. Day/night cycles are not going to provide the requried amount of pressurised liquid ammonia for the job.

Study and learn continious cycle absorption cycle refrigeration then redesign and eliminate the expansion valve, & turbine. Add a light weight inhert gas to the entire system to make distilation of ammonia possible and stop uncontrolled reasorption into water.

Exactly. That's why I prefer keeping an inexpensive and replaceable laptop cooler around. I just grabbed one of these and it works, and I don't need to worry about working the fans on my laptop.

I have to seriously disagree with your assertion that FM radio is all the quality you can experience in a car. Hell, my shitty Hyundai Elantra has transformed (with +$1000 of equipment) into a great audio environment, and even in the other cars I drive there's a HUGE difference just between FM and CD.

One of my friends has an excellent setup and has a 1/8" adapter to connect his iPod. The difference between FM-transmitted audio (via iTrip or similar) and the direct RCA connection is phenomenal, whereas the difference between FM transmitting in my mom's shitty old minivan and the direct-line CD changer is less, although still noticeable - and that's just a stock Chrysler stereo running to damaged paper cones. And you can bet your ass that the CDs sound much, much better than even the best FM stations.

I agree that HD radio is overrated, but you certainly can get much better audio quality than FM in a car without soundproofing your entire car. In fact, your argument that you'd have to soundproof a car until it's dangerous indicates a total lack of knowledge about either car stereos or good quality audio. It is common to use expensive damping material in car doors to increase sound quality to very high levels, and does not pose any risk to the driver - you can still hear perfectly well what's happening around you.

Sound dampening insulation like DynaMat is meant to reduce generic road noise, not to soundproof a car. And high-quality 5.1 car stereo setups are certainly doable for under a few hundred dollars - one model of Acura ships with a DVD-Audio capable stereo. More to the point, the idea that a stereo FM signal is adequate sound quality is just plain silly - even laymen can tell the difference between a CD and an FM signal. If HD Radio improves audio quality to just CD quality, it will be an improvement.

(Although from what I hear, it doesn't really. HD Radio definitely kind of sucks. But it's silly to assert that FM is good enough. And as for the price, a simple Google Search demonstrates that HD-capable aftermarket CD players can be had for as little as $105, and easily in the $100-$200 range (which is the low-end market for aftermarket players))

An older DIY design is here, and Riptide's videos as well. Build costs are estimated at 140 and 200 dollars. One more here.

The main problem with the InventGeek design is that it doesn't appear to have any tactile feedback. You need the subtle height differences to be able to read with your feet. Also, you want the standing surface in the middle to be solid metal (unless you're going to play Pump It Up, as that provides further feedback.

It also doesn't use any vertical crossbeams in the pads, leading to sensor and support disparity. This is why the base is generally built out of wood, or a bit more metal. That keeps the right side of the left sensor feeling the same as the up, down, and left sides. As it stands, I wouldn't be surprised if stepping on the right side of the left sensor crushed the pad material for a permanent button-down signal. Or if the acrylic began to bow there.

For that matter, generally you want Lucite or Lexan for the deck. Hard as hell, and going to take it for a while. But people have successfully used other things.

And if you're going to buy metal, you want a Cobalt Flux. Unless you're more casual / like your knees, at which point get an ignition. Most of the 150 metal mats will leave you disappointed, especially compared to the Cobalt. Though I've heard the 200 ninja is ok too.

Isn't mwave.com better than Newegg?

I thought their customer service was supposed to be better.

As for customer service, Newegg has better customer ratings at ResellerRatings.com and BizRate. Anyone know if these are reliable store rating sites? Here's links to Newegg's and Mwave's store rating pages and RR and BR:

• Newegg at ResellerRatings.com
• Mwave at ResellerRatings.com
• Newegg at BizRate
• Mwave at Bizrate

Isn't mwave.com better than Newegg?

I thought their customer service was supposed to be better.

As for customer service, Newegg has better customer ratings at ResellerRatings.com and BizRate. Anyone know if these are reliable store rating sites? Here's links to Newegg's and Mwave's store rating pages and RR and BR:

• Newegg at ResellerRatings.com
• Mwave at ResellerRatings.com
• Newegg at BizRate
• Mwave at Bizrate

Try searching for a review of a commerical product like a TV by model number. Google will fill the search with places selling the product, not with reviews. If Eopinions or Amazon does not have a review, you're screwed. You'll be buying blind. Okay genius, what keywords do you enter? If I wanted to find reviews on the Sony KDL-V40XBR1, I personally would type in "sony KDL-V40XBR1 reviews".

I tried your search. And I wasn't impressed with the results.

1. http://www.pricerunner.com/sound-and-vision/vision /tv/456966/reviews - No user reviews posted, no editor review posted
2. http://www.bizrate.com/marketplace/product_info/ov erview/index__cat_id--11520000,prod_id--346857528. html - two users reviews posted, no editor review posted
3. http://reviews.cnet.com/Sony_Bravia_XBR_KDL_V40XBR 1/4505-6482_7-31470102.html - 24 user reviews, editor posted review
4. http://reviews.designtechnica.com/review3148.html - 2 user reviews, editor posted specs
5. http://www.audioreview.com/PRD_343744_2728crx.aspx - no user reviews, no editor review

This is similar to what I've experienced recently searching for reviews on Google. I can eventually find them, but I usually need to use a much more complex search that removes keywords stores usually use. The next time, I'll try Yahoo and see how it goes.

Or maybe not. The same search at Yahoo turned up shopping.yahoo.com twice in the top 5, and a similar lack of reviews.

Staticice.com.au finds it for $A855.

Adding the GST of 10%, I'd expect an Australian price of (574*1.1)/.762 = $A829. A markup of about 3%. And does the newegg price include sales tax?

Then again, newegg is expensive: bizrate found it for $US530 - au markup of about 12%.

http://www.bizrate.com/buy/products__cat_id--46010 3,keyword--xfx%20geforce%207800,sort--5.html

The real rip-offs in terms of markup can be found on things like the powerbook.

I like meta-site BizRate.com, since the customer ratings and predicted shipping cost will assure I get a good price and customer service. It lets you quantify the experience along with price. Froogle is great, but is a disorganized mess, no ranking system and no idea what shipping will be.

Lately I've been buying music software and hardware, and http://www.bizrate.com/ has been good for me.

Twice recently I took quotes I got off of Bizrate into Guitar Center and they were willing to beat the price - but if not I had a decent deal available over the net - most recently I got a Presonus Firebox firewire audio interface for my laptop.

Doug

It exists. Just because you can't see them at Best Buy yet doesn't mean they aren't out there.

From Saeco of course! Saeco. Saeco, mm, mmm good magic espresso!

This is going to be said by a lot of people here...

There's nothing Linux (or any other OS, for that matter) can do to allow you to get a good-quality image out of a half-assed trans adapter on a flatbed scanner.

I have seen ok images come out of a trans adapter... but those were large-format negatives, and they were still only really good for comps.

Repeat after me:
There's no replacement for a slide scanner.
There's no replacement for a slide scanner.
There's no replacement for a slide scanner.

I bought a dimage slide scanner, and I haven't looked back. If you're serious, $250 is not expensive.

I'm sure there are people who consider GIMP to be completely usable, better than photoshop, etc etc. I can't really speak to that. I use photoshop about 5 hours a day, and on those occasions where I have tried GIMP, I was not favorably impressed. It struck me as being a program designed by people who have never actually had to use that sort of software. I'm not denigrating the project, but I won't sacrifice speed, flexibility, quality and my own sanity in order to make some point about open source. ...but like I said, photoshop pays my mortgage. I'm not unbiased.

m-

Absolutely! You can find an assortment of options here. :P

Another camera we tested that is "plug and play" for recent 2.4 and all all 2.6 kernels are camera based on the se401 module. In our next release of LavaRnd, we will be adding support for Kensington VideoCAM PC Camera model 67014. This camera is already supported as a normal webcam ... we are just getting around to making it a reference LavaRnd entropy source because someone donated one to the project. These cameras seem to sell from $25 to $41 US. Specs suggest that models 67015 thru 67017 should work as well as model 67014; although we have only tested the 67014 model.

When properly "mis-tuned" and lens capped, these webcams make good entropy sources. And of course, they take reasonable pictures when they are used as they were originally intended to be used. :-)

Our list is by no means complete. There are others we are sure. If anyone has another other well supported webcams, please chime in ...

Apple makes these things, called personal computers called Macintosh computers. Up until the G4 version of the Macintosh (or "Mac"), Apple used the Apple Desktop Bus for keyboard connections.

So yes, opposed to a USB keyboard.

An "Apple keyboard" is a keyboard manfacutured by Apple Computer Inc. Keyboards made for the Macintosh, therefore, would be called "Macintosh keyboards," or simply, "Mac keyboards."

Much like the usage of calling keyboards for (traditionally) Windows-based IBM PC clones "PC keyboards," "Windows Keyboards," or "keyboards that don't have a place for your one-button mouse to plug in."

As for one that you like, there are many to choose from.

Keyboard preferences are subjective. As much as you want me to, I cannot tell you what you like.

We're talking about cordless, not cellular. You furriners need to read for comprehension.

Pot kettle black.

Someone apparently doesn't know that 900mhz cordless phones exist, and all of them are wi-fi friendly. I myself have a Panasonic 900mhz digital spread spectrum phone and have no problems at all with my wi-fi when using it.

Do us all a favor and pick up one of these, and make sure you wash your hands.

Has anyone got a suggestion for a laptop with

I doubt you're going to find one.

16" or larger screens

Not to mention the fact that 17" LCD makes for a huge laptop that won't fit in most bags. (I'd rather have a hi-res 14-15" LCD with 1400x1050 or 1600x1200 for portability, using an external monitor for the size.)

You are fucking retarded.

From what I understand, Froogle is very different from PriceGrabber, PriceWatch, BizRate, Yahoo! Shopping, MySimon, Nextag and others. You have to pay and provide the XML feed with your products to the search engine (or be a hosting customer of Yahoo! Stores to be listed in Yahoo! Shopping), so really in a nutshell those places are nothing more than databases, broken down into categories with database search enabled. The selection is limited.

Froogle, however, is purely search engine. Just like the Google Web search, you'll be in their database if you happen to sell something, your site has a dollar tag on it next to the product, and you're not hiding your products behind some obscure interface that search engine has no access to.

There's little technological value in PriceGrabber, PriceWatch, BizRate, DealTime, Yahoo! Shopping and others, but there's technology involved with Froogle that gives you much broader choice of vendors.

What I would like to see, although I'd admit it might be asking for too much. But you know those places that give you cashback if you shop online with them? Basically they get the affiliate comissions and then pay you back as part of the deal. eBates and FatCash are the ones I use, but there are more. It would be really nice if the shopping search engines knew that I could get a certain kick back from the amount of sale, and they would display the price like "Seller price - $399, use FatCash for additional 4% ($12) off".

That would naturally involve some kind of cooperation with the cashback site, but that would definitely add some value for the consumer. I don't see any search engine implementing it soon (after all, it would be eBates and FatCash making money off this feature, not the engine), but if Google were to implement similar program, I would sign up for it.

here is a list of MiniDV camcorders under $1.000, with reviews.
I personally have a 1-year-old Sony DCR-TRV950, a 3 CCD camera with excellent low-light sensitivity. I like it a lot, except for the stupid sony stick stuff. Apart from that, the quality is excellent and the camera was under $1000 at the time.

Go get the book. The games and other media can wait.

"full-size Nemo video"

You mean Captain Nemo from LXG? Spare me.

Oh, you meant Disney/Pixar Finding Nemo. Still, spare me.

The only Nemo video I want to scrub is this video featuring Winsor McCay's Little Nemo.

Here are the 2 other dvd players mentioned in the parent and many times below, in the US: At bizrate.com

I got tired of paying $30 per cart for my Epson Color Stylus 777, so I checked out Google and discovered that there are a handful of (Chinese?) manufacturers producing generic ink WITH microchips included. This is important because several Epson printers have chips on their replacement ink specifically made to thwart generic ink manufacturers... my model included.

The old way of refilling these carts was to buy a chip flasher and a bunch of ink, refill the original carts, flash the chip, then reseal the carts... major pain in the ass.

That's no longer necessary.

So I ordered a few carts at around $7 each from eink4u.com and paid $40 for 3 black and 2 color carts with shipping. No problems to report thus far.

Fuck Epson.

Oh, and there are MANY places other than eink4u selling cheap ink. Look around on Foogle, or better yet, go to BizRate.

Check out mini-itx.com. It seems to be a pretty good resource. I ended up buying parts from two of the companies listed in their USA resources page. I do however, have a couple of pointers for you. First, the 600 MHz Eden comes on the Eden-M motherboard which isn't all that well supported on Redhat 8.0 (no clue about 9, obviously) which is why I went with the Mandrake 9.1 beta. You will most likely have to download the ALSA drivers for the sound card (expect to spend some time building those). Second, if you go with a "fanless" case it will most likely require a "slim" cdrom drive. These take a 50 pin connector instead of a 40 pin connector for the IDE bus, 4 pins for electricity, and 4 pins for audio out. Make sure that the case either comes with the adaptor or you order one, they arn't easily avalible in the states (and don't buy one from www.ussa.com, current low price for a slim samsung 24x12x24x8 cdrw/dvd drive on pricewatch their service sucks, go with mwave.com instead. If you don't believe me look at bizrate.). Finally, the 401b WinTV card from Haupage has a funny way to encode sound, an external jumper to the input of the soundcard. This is actually a problem for the EPIA-M since you have a choice between 5.1 sound or stereo + line in + mic and any problems with the sound card affect your ability to coordinate sound and video. If you have a descent stereo you might want to get a different TV Encoder card.

How many do you want??

By the way check out this article (IDE-RAID With Notebook Drives: Quick And Quiet).

You mean these Sharp, Samsung, Hitcahi and Canon ones were a halucination? I guess they're all rebadged Sonys...

Hi8 was a Sony proprietary format. You'd have been better getting a cheap Sony D8 and using that to encode direct to DV. That and a D8 unit can be used as an analogue to DV bridge so you can digitise any video format.

DV Backup is here to answer the original question rather than your offtopic and inaccurate reply.

- semi-legal, prohibitive licensing practices

How exactly are they semi-legal? Prohibitive?

- price gouging

You're going to have to explain yourself here. They charge much less for most all of their products than their competitors. Their desktops are cheaper than those from Sun and SGI. The iBooks and PowerBooks compete very, very well with clone laptops. Final Cut Pro is far cheaper than AVID. The iApps are all free except for iMovie which is a steal at $49. AppleWorks has a reasonable price and is included with all iMacs and iBooks. Keynote is priced reasonably at $99. PowerPoint is expensive.

- market control

Explain. The only control I've seen them wield is as a pioneer of new technologies.

- FUD

Links?

- product tying

Such as?

- hiding software features

Examples?

- employee abuse

Links? Dave Hyatt doesn't seem to complain.

Actually I think /. is a great place to get advice on how. The real problem is getting advice on what.
Might I suggest two general approaches?
First of all, talk to actual customers in fields where they spend money on this sort of thing. Use a group like the American Institute of Architects or the American Society of Mechanical Engineers to reach the people who actually *do* flythroughs and renderings and see what they want from such a product. You may also find that talking to folk at a second-string engineering school (Stevens or RPI rather than MIT or CMU) you'll be able to get plenty of eager beta testers as unlike the more famous places, they don't get as many offers but they've got plenty of brains.
A variation on that would be to check out reviews of products in magazines like Architectural Record, and further, write to the relevant editors (not phone, you want to make it clear that you weren't just bored and calling on a lazy whim) and see what they've got to say.
This page will give you a solid start on relevant organizations and variables.
Secondly, the current situation of having to use five different programs to finish the job is a little silly. I continue to be amazed by the frequency with which I hear somebody say that they do the sketching on paper or with something like Illustrator, then do the technical work in something like AutoCAD, drop in some people from Poser, then export to something like Maya, fix the resulting problems and render there, and then do final changes in Photoshop. Meanwhile stereolithography outputting is moved to something like Lightyear or Buildstation.
Might I suggest a rigorous NURBS implementation with an intuitive basic functionality such that an item can be rough generated with a PowerGlove/Glasstron UI and make it all the way through the process right to render, animation, and outputting of models. I know that it's a lot to ask but, hey, you *said* that you were ambitious. In fact, I suspect that if you can do a system such that you sell a $50 crippleware version through places like Download.com and the serious version elsewhere, you'ld be able to build your user set quickly and also get to market faster.
A side note is that the ability to generate objects for systems like Adobe Atmospherewould finalize the build once-use many times paradigm that I'm talking about. After all, how much overlap is there between these communities? I'ld say considerable, and if gamers can then use the objects they created for one part of their lives in another, they'll be happy campers.
Best of luck to you,
Rustin (former techie for Sweets, Arch. Record, Design-Build, This Old House, Index, Woodworker, etc.)

I print 5X7 prints with my 2.1 Megapixel Cannon all day long at 1200dpi and get 35mm 1hour processing quality prints.

Even if you've got a bottom-of-the-barrel $49 printer, it will do at least 600x600DPI. A 5"x7" print will use 3000x4200 pixels at that resolution, or over 12 megapixels. Dye sublimation will hide the loss of clarity because the process is inherently blurry at the pixel level, there is no set of sharp dots. But if you are looking for great contrasty detail, like nature photography where you want to see veining on a dragonfly wing, you are going to want those pixels. A 2.1 megapixel camera will give you far less than 300x300 DPI on a 5"x7".

Even a (relatively) cheap 35mm SLR like the Canon Eos Rebel at under $250 will easily take negatives with ordinary film that will print a 8"x10" that you will need a magnifying glass to see all the detail.

You could always get a sharp zaurus and use it to play your ogg files.

Sharp Zaurus PDA: $350.

Cheap low-end MP3 CD player at Best Buy: $50.

There are some reviews here. I've used the bulky but natural "virtual vision" goggles they mention, and yes, it's perfect for camcorders and mangles text. TekGear has some more modern displays, all of which look like your eyes are being attacked by a small piece of aluminum. They also carry the "best selling QUGA (?) monocule in the world" a one-eyed machine very close to what you describe except that the resolution is low and you look like a call center employee with the microphone stuck in your eye. There are also some in the Imac family, Bizrate has a list of several. Liteye puts out some sufficiently small displays of reasonable image integrity. Once again, still looks funky but in a funkytional sort of way. Plus, they are more of a parts supplier than a solutions provider. MicroOptical has several, with their tech briefly reviewed by about.com.

If you are looking to purchase one, the two buzzwords to use are head mounted display and wearable display. Hitachi even combined buzz and produced a wearable internet applicance, though only for the japanese and who knows if it was released.

I hope that gives you some ideas. I also hope some people post here who didn't just pick through google :).

It's true that pricewatch alone will often get you cheated. I've found though, that if you check the merchant that pricewatch recomends with a merchant rating service such as bizrate you can minimize this to an acceptable level. just look at the comments for the merchant in question and make sure there are no major blemishes.

Guide to Educated Online Buying

1) http://www.google.com

Your first step should be to research the product/s that you are considering to put in your system. While many products look very appealing a review may shine light on severe problems that you would have never have noticed unless you found out for yourself. There are tons of Tech websites that review products read several so that you are making an educated buy.

2) http://www.pricewatch.com

Pricewatch is hands down the best Street Price finder on the Internet. At pricewatch.com you can find almost anything that you're looking for to build your computer. You should know what OEM, White Box, and Retail mean so that you don't end up with just the product itself and not the box / drivers. Another thing to be aware of is that sometimes the companies set their own warranties. For Example: If you buy a licensed retail version a 3yr warranty is included. If you buy an OEM version the warranty may only be 15days. It's very hard to return a faulty product to a vendor in 15days since most require you to get a Return Merchandise Authorization (RMA) first. Before you decide to buy please see step 3)....

3) http://bizrate.com/ (especially the: ratings guide

Part of making an educated buy is knowing WHO you are buying from. The business-rating guide is a collection of ratings from users who have bought items from a company. By reading their experiences you can get a better feel of whether or not the company is reputable. This is a very important step, there is nothing worse then getting ripped off by a company that is thousands of miles a way.

4) Brick and Mortar Stores:

Don't forget regular stores. While some stores may not be the most friendly of places (Fry's Electronics, Best Buy, etc.) they do have occasional deals that are much better than anything you'll find online. So keep your eyes on the newspapers for advertisements.

5) Paying Online / Deals That Are Too Good to Be True

Our final step is to pay for the products. Make sure when you pay that the site has some sort of secure buying system. I realize that some companies are run out of their home and might just use PayPal, BillPoint, etc... Just be careful when you're giving out your credit card number.

Deals that are too good to be true: almost always are. Stay away from people who sell $3,000 items for $400 when everyone else on the Internet is selling them for $2299. It will save yourself a lot of time and headaches if you don't fall prey to people who are running scams.

Building your system yourself is definitely the right choice. Not only does it give you the freedom of choosing the right components it also helps you learn just how your computer functions. It's a really fun and exciting process. Enjoy!

Guide to Educated Online Buying

1) http://www.google.com

Your first step should be to research the product/s that you are considering to put in your system. While many products look very appealing a review may shine light on severe problems that you would have never have noticed unless you found out for yourself. There are tons of Tech websites that review products read several so that you are making an educated buy.

2) http://www.pricewatch.com

Pricewatch is hands down the best Street Price finder on the Internet. At pricewatch.com you can find almost anything that you're looking for to build your computer. You should know what OEM, White Box, and Retail mean so that you don't end up with just the product itself and not the box / drivers. Another thing to be aware of is that sometimes the companies set their own warranties. For Example: If you buy a licensed retail version a 3yr warranty is included. If you buy an OEM version the warranty may only be 15days. It's very hard to return a faulty product to a vendor in 15days since most require you to get a Return Merchandise Authorization (RMA) first. Before you decide to buy please see step 3)....

3) http://bizrate.com/ (especially the: ratings guide

Part of making an educated buy is knowing WHO you are buying from. The business-rating guide is a collection of ratings from users who have bought items from a company. By reading their experiences you can get a better feel of whether or not the company is reputable. This is a very important step, there is nothing worse then getting ripped off by a company that is thousands of miles a way.

4) Brick and Mortar Stores:

Don't forget regular stores. While some stores may not be the most friendly of places (Fry's Electronics, Best Buy, etc.) they do have occasional deals that are much better than anything you'll find online. So keep your eyes on the newspapers for advertisements.

5) Paying Online / Deals That Are Too Good to Be True

Our final step is to pay for the products. Make sure when you pay that the site has some sort of secure buying system. I realize that some companies are run out of their home and might just use PayPal, BillPoint, etc... Just be careful when you're giving out your credit card number.

Deals that are too good to be true: almost always are. Stay away from people who sell $3,000 items for $400 when everyone else on the Internet is selling them for $2299. It will save yourself a lot of time and headaches if you don't fall prey to people who are running scams.

Building your system yourself is definitely the right choice. Not only does it give you the freedom of choosing the right components it also helps you learn just how your computer functions. It's a really fun and exciting process. Enjoy!

It looks like somebody might have hit the jackpot. Especially the guy who got arrested. INAL, but lying to the police to get somebody arrested doesn't sound good. All that damage to his reputation, emotional distress, etc.. Talk to some attorneys--fast--and before saying another word to anyone else.

And everyone, please help prevent this sort of thing happening again by reporting your experience to the on-line rating services. Best Buy, if that's the right company has an 8.2 out of 10 rating at BizRate.COM. 2,000 angry customers can fix that. Although at Reseller Ratings they're already at 1.54 out of 10. Not much fixing needed there. For more info, take a look at:

BizRate: Best Buy Rating 8.2

Reseller Ratings: Best Buy Rating 1.54

There are more rating services, but that's a start.

YMMV

One thing the author didn't touch on is the power of the RIAA. I wonder what kind of leway the RIAA gives distributers in pricing CD's? Rather then looking at CD's, the author should've discussed home electronics. Bizrate is a great example of bargains available online. I once bought a Sony camcorder that retails at the Sony Store for $1,800 - I bought it through Bizrate for $800 - a whole $1000 cheaper!

bizrate rates online merchants and has an extensive database.

should probably contact BizRate and CDUniverse itself to express your concern. I'm not sure whether I was more disturbed by the fact that the cards were stolen and customers were not notified immediately, or the fact that CDUniverse was about to pay the thief without contacting authorities.