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My bad for the prices, that was used ones ;-(. As for CRTs, you can find some for around $120 (Here).

eMachines at $400
Compaq at $430
HP for $530

So that sums up to $520 for the eMachines one. Oh! And where do you find iMacs for $699? I'm just out of an Apple store and the iMacs start at $799 (as you can see Here).

So that rolls up to $280 difference. More than half the price of the PC.

To those whining that $55USD is too much... try doing a little leg work before bitching.

Microcenter has a coupon to purchase it until 8/8/04 for $46.87.

Circuit City has it online for $44.99 with free shipping.

Best Buy will price match (in store purchase only) for the difference plus 10%.

What does this mean? You can easily pick up Doom 3 for less than $46USD. Quit your whining and start playing!

In addition if it's a quality game, $54 dosen't seem like a whole lot of money. I spent $70 of paper route money to get Phantasy Star for my Sega Master System. A heck of a lot of money, but I played the hell out of it and I didn't feel ripped off in the least bit. The game was ahead of it's time and the people who made it deserved to get paid for what was probably a couple YEARS of work. I feel the same way with Doom 3. My copy is in the mail, at $45 I don't feel boned at all.

CircuitCity.com is cheaper than NewEgg.com?? WTF

A modern marvel that might help next time.

PC4000 (DDR500) RAM and faster) is here, and it's a lot faster than anything they reviewed. Even if your CPU/Mobo don't support more than DDR200 or DDR333, you can get lower latency (i.e., 2-2-2-2 BIOS timing options will be usable at lower frequencies) and be ready for upgrades using faster RAM.

I just picked up two 512MB sticks of this amazing stuff to go with my AMD64 3200+ from, of all places, Circuit City (because it is only $129 each, cheaper even than newegg, which is usually a great deal for RAM and has amazing reseller ratings.) Though I just noticed there's a new $40 rebate on newegg's $299 price (for 1GB), making the net $259, or about the same as I paid at CC. Then again, I hate rebates.)

No shipping and insta-pick up at Circuit Shitty (though newegg is usally free for fedex saver), even with MA 5% sales tax it's a steal.

Sorry, I digress -- I'm full of gin, tonic, and Italian food. Back OT -- they got their best RAM up to 275MHz FSB (DDR550). The Kingston I got works stable up to 325MHZ (DDR650!!) and it's not much more (a few cents/MB) than the reviewed RAM.

Just thought I'd share all I recently discovered before someone runs out and buys the best of this review. I think it took so long to write all that review text and compile/plot the data that they missed the new goodies!

>>Businesses like BestBuy take returns in the first place as a courtesy
>>to customers, because it's something people expect from large stores.
>
>Well, close. It's because of competition.

Which is exactly why I avoid places like CompUSA and their stupid restocking fee return policy. I'll gladly pay extra elsewhere (e.g., Fry's, Circuit City) than put up with a 15% restocking fee because the item purchased is incompatible, poor quality or doesn't work well.

How about $4.99 (after $25 in rebates) for a Microsoft 802.11b router, with a 4-port switch?

I guess Microsoft is not doing so well in the networking hardware market. Must be hard to compete with all the manufacturers using Linux to run their access points.

I am soon to be a rich man!

I found some here.

Not sure why this warrents an ask slashdot when a quick search found this:
Gateway Stores
Circuit City
Dell Direct Stores
Or if your feeling artistic:
Apple Stores

But yes, I agree with you, AMD cannot neglect the desktop market, unless it makes AMD64 cheap enough that it can put them in all computers (which I think is their inevitable goal). Hell, once eMachines starts stocking them in Computer City, I think they'll have achieved it.

The Mobile Athlon64 3000+-based eMachines M6807 latpop is available at Circuit City and Best Buy (M6805).

The Athlon64 3200+-based Compaq s6900NX is also available at Circuit City.

The Athlon64 3200+-based eMachines T6000 is available at Best Buy.

That good enough?

But yes, I agree with you, AMD cannot neglect the desktop market, unless it makes AMD64 cheap enough that it can put them in all computers (which I think is their inevitable goal). Hell, once eMachines starts stocking them in Computer City, I think they'll have achieved it.

The Mobile Athlon64 3000+-based eMachines M6807 latpop is available at Circuit City and Best Buy (M6805).

The Athlon64 3200+-based Compaq s6900NX is also available at Circuit City.

The Athlon64 3200+-based eMachines T6000 is available at Best Buy.

That good enough?

I just checked out the customer reviews at Circuit City and although the majority are positive, quite a few complained that the mouse or more often the keyboard didn't work. Seems like Gyration has some quality control problems. Also, you'd think that they could do a good job on the wireless keyboard since that's so common but perhaps they included a cheap one to help keep prices down. Would have been better to just sell the mouse separately.

High quality DivX/Xvid or a 400 Disc DVD changer.

I went through the very same thing myself a few months ago. I got the most help and best ideas from Circuit City. The sales person, who was not comission-driven, happened to be a college student at the local Fine Arts school nearby. He really knew his stuff and gave up a lot of great information about which products they had. Yes, we could save a few bucks buying on the Internet, but with the horror stories posted here, not for me, thanks!

I can walk into the local mall and buy a minidisk at Target, Best Buy, and Circuit City.

You used to be able to get DAT recorders at MARS Music (before the chain went bankrupt last summer).

These are just US places. From the minidisc web sites, like MiniDisco it seems the things are even more popular outside the USA.

The question that I have is, how much will it cost? When I can get a portable DVD player with 7" widescreen for US$250, unless this GBA thingy is really cheap, I just don't see much of a place for it.

This Zenith from Circuit City is what I have, and it has an "Autoplay" option, which will automatically start the main movie when the disc is put in, skipping menus and such. Quite handy.

From one armchair analyst to another:

I've used my PS2 to play DVDs. It's akin to using my Dreamcast to surf the web; It just isn't worth the effort. Granted I don't have a PS2 DVD remote kit, but the navigation system is terrible out of the box. Better chalk up an extra $15 for the PS2 remote once you realize that it's practically needed.

You're right though. For sixty more than the price of a Gamecube, you can get a DVD player. Heck, you can even get one much cheaper than that if you want. Think about that, a $30 that comes with a remote! You'll pay that much for the Xbox remote alone.

The GC is capable of doing 480p for those HDTV owners. I'm also thinking that anyone who spends the big bucks on an HDTV set will get a decent DVD player instead of relying on their game console to do it for them.

From one armchair analyst to another:

I've used my PS2 to play DVDs. It's akin to using my Dreamcast to surf the web; It just isn't worth the effort. Granted I don't have a PS2 DVD remote kit, but the navigation system is terrible out of the box. Better chalk up an extra $15 for the PS2 remote once you realize that it's practically needed.

You're right though. For sixty more than the price of a Gamecube, you can get a DVD player. Heck, you can even get one much cheaper than that if you want. Think about that, a $30 that comes with a remote! You'll pay that much for the Xbox remote alone.

The GC is capable of doing 480p for those HDTV owners. I'm also thinking that anyone who spends the big bucks on an HDTV set will get a decent DVD player instead of relying on their game console to do it for them.

Sure, while everyone's complaining about the $0.50 price tag per game, only one other person (so far) has mentioned the actual sales cost of the console -- $2,772(!!)

Considering the game itself can be played on a cpu less powerful than that in today's cell phones or children's toys, a 20" TV can be had for $69.99, the rest of the cabinet is particle board and laminate, and there are no incremental R&D costs to amortize, why the hell are they charging so much?

Given the state of arcades in the US, I think they'd sell more if they charged $699 (still a robbery) and went after the niche of geeks wanting one in their living rooms.

This is ridiculous.

Isn't it just a $200 version of something you can buy for $2.99?

dave

--->Tech stuff and NYC

You obviously haven't been to a US Circuit City store in a few years. All the new DTV compatible screens are 16:9. I can't say they outnumber the 4:3 screens yet, but there are plenty.

You obviously haven't been to a US Circuit City store in a few years. All the new DTV compatible screens are 16:9. I can't say they outnumber the 4:3 screens yet, but there are plenty.

I know you want to build one (not saying you shouldn't if that's what you really want to do). It's an interesting idea for a project, but for $1000 you can buy a downright outstanding receiver (and it'll be a hell of a lot quieter, (generally) smaller, less parts to fail (ie, current cheapo harddisks, etc.!)).

If you're looking for a system to record video, yeah, a PC might be cheaper than other systems (and, if you get the right software, less restrictive), but, otherwise... It seems like an AWFUL lot of money to replace outstanding items that cost less or the same.

The cards cost so much money because the typical audience to use them are EXTREMELY high end workstations (and everything workstation is a rip off since is sells in such low volume, ya know?).

Take a look at what $1200 bucks (the cost of one of the sound cards you're looking at) can buy you.

Take a look at what just $500 bucks can buy you!

How about a nice Harmon Kardon receiver.

This is at Circuit City's web site alone. If you look around the Internet you are BOUND TO FIND much better for the money than that!

I know you want to build one (not saying you shouldn't if that's what you really want to do). It's an interesting idea for a project, but for $1000 you can buy a downright outstanding receiver (and it'll be a hell of a lot quieter, (generally) smaller, less parts to fail (ie, current cheapo harddisks, etc.!)).

If you're looking for a system to record video, yeah, a PC might be cheaper than other systems (and, if you get the right software, less restrictive), but, otherwise... It seems like an AWFUL lot of money to replace outstanding items that cost less or the same.

The cards cost so much money because the typical audience to use them are EXTREMELY high end workstations (and everything workstation is a rip off since is sells in such low volume, ya know?).

Take a look at what $1200 bucks (the cost of one of the sound cards you're looking at) can buy you.

Take a look at what just $500 bucks can buy you!

How about a nice Harmon Kardon receiver.

This is at Circuit City's web site alone. If you look around the Internet you are BOUND TO FIND much better for the money than that!

I know you want to build one (not saying you shouldn't if that's what you really want to do). It's an interesting idea for a project, but for $1000 you can buy a downright outstanding receiver (and it'll be a hell of a lot quieter, (generally) smaller, less parts to fail (ie, current cheapo harddisks, etc.!)).

If you're looking for a system to record video, yeah, a PC might be cheaper than other systems (and, if you get the right software, less restrictive), but, otherwise... It seems like an AWFUL lot of money to replace outstanding items that cost less or the same.

The cards cost so much money because the typical audience to use them are EXTREMELY high end workstations (and everything workstation is a rip off since is sells in such low volume, ya know?).

Take a look at what $1200 bucks (the cost of one of the sound cards you're looking at) can buy you.

Take a look at what just $500 bucks can buy you!

How about a nice Harmon Kardon receiver.

This is at Circuit City's web site alone. If you look around the Internet you are BOUND TO FIND much better for the money than that!

saw an ad in the sale flyer this weekend for circuit city for the game. they are offering a $10 gift cert w/ the sale of the game in store. online it appears they are just doing free shipping (i suppose their page might change tomorrow when the game comes out)...

anyone else see it somewhere cheaper or w/ a better addon?

The answer is none. None more wrong.

You're right. I think James bond would have something along the lines of this, only 5 times smaller and equipped with a built-in single-shot pistol and one button on the side that "hacks" the wireless network for him.

I've seen 4-way and 8-way trackballs in mice available. I've seen some models available at .

The trackball is actually fully directional. When used as a scrollwheel, the direction you spin it is treated as motion in one of 4 (or 8) directions. It can also be used to control the mouse pointer, but that disables the use of the optical mouse base as a mouse.

I've thought about getting one, but I'm waiting until it can be used as two independent mice (and driver independent). I'd think it would be good for gaming if you could control motion with the mouse and aiming/head movement with the trackball simultaneously, independently, and accurately. Be able to run any direction and fire at any other (within reason for your avatar's abilities). Running in an arc instead of predictable straight lines while still able to maintain your aim on the target.

I've also thought about a GUI that could handle two pointers usefully. For example, instead of grabbing the edge of a window to resize it, the user could just grab two points anywhere on the window and adjust/move it that way. It would free the user from the implicit paperweight model in current GUIs.

Most of the computers sold at the Best Buy's and Circuit City's of the world are the $400 (after rebates) models.

Today, thousands of Radio Shack and other electronics stores were all raided by the US Marshalls service for selling and/or manufacturing "anti-circumvention" devices as prohibited by 17-USC-1201 - the DMCA.

Early reports indicate that the items that are causing these retail outlets such grief are commonly known as patch-cables.

According to Harvey Buttnut, well known computer geek, these patch cables can be used to pipe the analog audio from a CD player into the audio input of a computer - allowing the computer to make a recording of the CD with minimal quality loss and no more copy protection.

Lawyers for Sony Corp. at the law firm of Dewey, Cheatham and Howe confirmed that it was their investigation that led to the raids on these stores. Apparently, the lawyers' son had accidentily purchased a DRM protected CD from a music store and wanted to play the content on a portable MP3 player.

The thing that this gentleman forgot to account for was the loss of sales to electronics manufacturers. He's focused on the media companies, which are only a part of the equation. How many portable TVs end up at sporting events, fishing trips, etc.? Though I haven't been able to find hard statistics, Circuit City carries five models and Casio even has a section for portable TVs on the front page of their website. I don't think he understands what a lobbying power the electronics industry is. Without broadcasts, every one of the portables out there would be useless and a revenue stream for manufacturers would dry up. How about anteanna sales and such for companies like Recoton? I'm sure they would join the fight ageanst any legislation destroying the boradcasts.

Without having any hard numbers, I'd guess the average home's screen size has gone up in the last few years. I know I didn't start opting for the widescreen until we got a big tv, and I had the screen real estate to enjoy the movie without squinting.

Who spends that kind of money for stuff like this? Presumably the same folk who spend $50K for SUVs loaded with off-road features they'll never use.

This device + a recliner = (drool...) laziness. Then all you need is this and this, and you won't have to move for days.

Some people are better at math than others. I'm not. It's much easier for me to add 15 + 5 = 20 than 15 + 5 = N then N * 0.06 = X then N + X = H. Hell, I probably have even that wrong... do you see what I mean now!?!?!

Your argument for buying online that you suck at math? You should get a calculator. You can buy one online for six bucks here.

I heard a song the other day by someone named Norah Jones which I very much liked. I decided to stop by Best Buy and buy it. The CD cost me $11.99.

Then I was looking at the list of upcoming releases, and thought I'd stop back next week and buy the new Tori Amos album. It too is only $11.99.

Then I thought of a couple of other albums I didn't yet have I wanted. For instance "Heart Shaped World" by Chris Isaak, I checked and it is $9.99. Also "Warning:" by Green Day, I checked and it is $15.99.(Wow that's the first one I've seen close to your price range)

Then I thought... You know, I really need to broaden my horizons and stop listening to off beat music and pick up some top-40. So I looked up the latest album from Eminem. I found it for $12.99. Then I decided to find Pink, her album is $13.99.

I've been buying music since 1987 when I purchased my first CD player. Back then the first CD I bought was the Top Gun Soundtrack, and I paid $16.99 for it. Now if you go look at the historical value of the dollar, you'd find that $16.99 in 1987 is worth $26.48 today. But I'm not paying $26 for my music, I'm paying an average $12-14 for it, or about half the price. You should also note that in 1987 I could buy a Cassette for about $6-7, today they are $10.

Basically it seems like you have two problems.

First, you don't understand what the value of money really means. In 1987 I was working as a student and receiving $4/hour. Want to take a guess as to how much students receive now for working on campus?(Try $8-10/hour) It's called inflation, go look it up.

Second, if you are paying $16-20 for your CDs, then you are a really really stupid consumer and PT Barnum was correct. There are many places to buy music cheaper than that.

And as far as DVDs go... You know what, just quit yer whining and go back to playing Nintendo. (BTW, want to take a guess as to what I paid for Atari 2600 video cartridges?)

Prices for Digital TVs should be comming down as soon as Apex releases their Digital Televisions. They were the ones that created the ever popular DVD/MP3/VCD/SVCD Player at well under $100. They haven't been making the best quality equipment, but at the prices they are likely to be pushing (most likely under $800) they will drive down the prices of most other HDTV monitors.

Since the Apex DVD Players hit the market, there has been a huge influx of Sub-$100 DVD/MP3/VCD/SVCD players...among them Magnavox and Hitachi...Even most high-end players now have the MP3/VCD/SVCD capabilities.

They have already released some very nice Flat Screen TVs at very cheap prices. Apex has only been around for ~3 years, and just Recently got into the TV market, but it looks like they are stiring things up.

http://www.circuitcity.com/ewebIMa/detail.jsp?BV_S essionID=@@@@1428767154.1021909585@@@@&BV_EngineID =ccdjadcfelmdfmlcfngcfkmdffhdffk.0&bookmark=bookma rk_0&oid=50241&catoid=-8039#specs

I've heard this question from *loads* of folks... and my answer is always the same. Just get a DVD player with MP3 play capability! You can get great units for both in-dash car operation and/or home audio use
Here's some links:

Samsung Player
Apex Player ($70!!!)

Have a good day!

And what is this new.net thing?

It's an alternate DNS that works by installing a DLL that hijacks all name-resolution requests. If some software needs to know the address of foobar.com, the DLL checks first to see what address info new.net has on hand. If new.net can resolve foobar.com, it returns the address. If it can't, it passes the request on to whatever was previously configured for DNS. Removing it is a pain in the ass; the procedure involves fairly involved registry editing (let's just say it's more involved than getting your Windows box to talk to your Samba server).

Theoretically, there's no reason why they couldn't make it so that what looks like a link to Best Buy takes you to Circuit City's website instead. I had to tweak the Best Buy URL so that it became a username fed to Circuit City's server (which presumably ignored it). With new.net, you could do the same by linking your IP address to your competitor's domain name. A 404 handler on your webserver that knows the general layout of your competitor's website would redirect people to the appropriate page on your site, so that just trying to go to one site's homepage takes you to something completely different, no matter what you do.

(Dammit...looks like /. filters out anything between "http://" and "@". The first link is supposed to be http://www.bestbuy.com%2fHomeAudioVideo%2fDVDPlaye rs%2findex.asp%3fm=1%26cat=32@www.circuitcity.com/ ewebIMa/frame1.jsp?BV_SessionID=@@@@0243569614.101 6223317@@@@&BV_EngineID=ccedadcejfdehhhcfngcfkmdff hdffg.0&upper=head.jsp&lower=frame2.jsp&left=leftc hildcat.jsp&department=TV+Video+and+Camcorders&cat egory=DVD&right=productsearch.jsp. Must've been too many idiots tacking on goatse.cx to the end of CNET URLs or something.)

And what is this new.net thing?

It's an alternate DNS that works by installing a DLL that hijacks all name-resolution requests. If some software needs to know the address of foobar.com, the DLL checks first to see what address info new.net has on hand. If new.net can resolve foobar.com, it returns the address. If it can't, it passes the request on to whatever was previously configured for DNS. Removing it is a pain in the ass; the procedure involves fairly involved registry editing (let's just say it's more involved than getting your Windows box to talk to your Samba server).

Theoretically, there's no reason why they couldn't make it so that what looks like a link to Best Buy takes you to Circuit City's website instead. I had to tweak the Best Buy URL so that it became a username fed to Circuit City's server (which presumably ignored it). With new.net, you could do the same by linking your IP address to your competitor's domain name. A 404 handler on your webserver that knows the general layout of your competitor's website would redirect people to the appropriate page on your site, so that just trying to go to one site's homepage takes you to something completely different, no matter what you do.

(Dammit...looks like /. filters out anything between "http://" and "@". The first link is supposed to be http://www.bestbuy.com%2fHomeAudioVideo%2fDVDPlaye rs%2findex.asp%3fm=1%26cat=32@www.circuitcity.com/ ewebIMa/frame1.jsp?BV_SessionID=@@@@0243569614.101 6223317@@@@&BV_EngineID=ccedadcejfdehhhcfngcfkmdff hdffg.0&upper=head.jsp&lower=frame2.jsp&left=leftc hildcat.jsp&department=TV+Video+and+Camcorders&cat egory=DVD&right=productsearch.jsp. Must've been too many idiots tacking on goatse.cx to the end of CNET URLs or something.)

I have this
NEC LCD1530V 15" LCD Got at circuit city for $320 bucks one day (sale) I use for Q3 and UT and it owrks just fine.

- HDTV sets are *really* expensive. They will remain so until volume grows, so this is a chicken-and-egg problem with no reasonable solution. Most people will NOT buy a new TV to deal with HDTV. TV viewership is falling as it is with more and more channels of tripe. Really high-fidelity tripe is not likely to sell any better.

They'll stop accepting returns on all copy-protected CDs. If you don't like it, go pound sand. Sony stopped accepting returns on opened CDs ~.

If they try that, then it will be back to the ways 37ee7 hax0r k!dd!e5 do it:

1. Buy the CD,
2. Rip it,
3. Shrink wrap it back, then
4. Return the bitch.

Not being a fan of the games, I didn't expect much of "The Spirits Within", boy was I wrong. The animation was nothing short of breathtaking and I was actually surprised by the unpredictability of the plot. In short, the movie far outshined my expectations and I eagerly awaited a sequel.

Now I have to explain to everyone I told about this movie (who were also equally impressed by it) that there won't be a sequel. This is really a shame - we can wipe Circuit City out of I-Openers, but we couldn't make movies such as Final Fantasy profitable for the studio.

I just bought the Hughes Directv Tivo box from Circuit Shitty. $94. Personally, I am paying the $10/month for the Tivo service because I like it.
Remote kinda sucks but the functionality of the unit rules. Plugged the optical TOS Link into the stereo and now I am watching movies in Dolby Digital. Really nice unit.

Go to www.circuitcity.com and search for "GXCEBOTD".

Hmm, well circuit city has hughes direct/tivo for 94 dollars. No mention of contract. All other brands are much more expensive. So I guess they are working on the assumption that you will get or already have directv as this would be of no use otherwise. (I don't think they work with regular cable inputs, I could be wrong)