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I'm sure the CRTC has its regulatory fingers in the Cell carriers pockets too. I'm still not sure how they justify taking my money and passing it off to Canadian artists even though I've burned maybe 3 audio cd's in my lifetime.

Memorex 100-Pack 48x CD-R Disc Spindle (Mfr. Part Number 3202-4581)
USA = $37.99 ($48.38 CDN)
Canada = $79.99 CDN

(Future Shop is owned by Best Buy BTW)

What I've hinted for my xmas list is

Some CDRW for screeners
A girlfriend
And a gift certificate

What I probably will get

Blank VHS tapes
Socks & Underwear
deodorant
Wierd chewy candy that I give away to guinea pig vistors

• Rio Karma (20G) for day to day use, Rio Cali (256mb version) for the gym (Wow just did a currency conversion, and even with the exchange it's about $100CND cheaper to buy this in the states (assuming the $169USD pricetag seen on froogle.google.com)
• AOpen DRW4410 DVD Writer (at under $100 US it'd be cheaper than the above items :)
• Linux compatible Serial ATA card for my fileserver (the Silicon Graphics chipsets don't seem to do linux RAID, but according to some of the forum posts it is possible to get it working). This is just an interim solution until I upgrade the whole box and put in a motherboard with a SATA chip, so just looking for something that works :)
• A couple of big ass SATA hard drives to go with it.
• Aliens Quadrilogy DVD
• A USB keychain storage device... 64 or 128 megs of storage to keep important files safe. According to a recent Linux Journal article, they are the floppies for the new millenium.
• Canon Digital Rebel or...
• Pentax Digital *ist
• Add on bits for my Canon A70 Digital Camera
• Another nice shirt like I got from mom for my birthday
• $1,000,000
• A house that exactly meets what I want (and only costs $1)
• A subscription to Popular Photography Magazine
• A huge and over priced flat panel TV, ungodly expensive reciever, and speakers of such high quality that even the most freakish audiophiles will cry for mercy (this will go in the house I mentioned above).
• CDRs
• CDRWs
• DVDRs (to go with the DVD writer mentioned above)

• Rio Karma (20G) for day to day use, Rio Cali (256mb version) for the gym (Wow just did a currency conversion, and even with the exchange it's about $100CND cheaper to buy this in the states (assuming the $169USD pricetag seen on froogle.google.com)
• AOpen DRW4410 DVD Writer (at under $100 US it'd be cheaper than the above items :)
• Linux compatible Serial ATA card for my fileserver (the Silicon Graphics chipsets don't seem to do linux RAID, but according to some of the forum posts it is possible to get it working). This is just an interim solution until I upgrade the whole box and put in a motherboard with a SATA chip, so just looking for something that works :)
• A couple of big ass SATA hard drives to go with it.
• Aliens Quadrilogy DVD
• A USB keychain storage device... 64 or 128 megs of storage to keep important files safe. According to a recent Linux Journal article, they are the floppies for the new millenium.
• Canon Digital Rebel or...
• Pentax Digital *ist
• Add on bits for my Canon A70 Digital Camera
• Another nice shirt like I got from mom for my birthday
• $1,000,000
• A house that exactly meets what I want (and only costs $1)
• A subscription to Popular Photography Magazine
• A huge and over priced flat panel TV, ungodly expensive reciever, and speakers of such high quality that even the most freakish audiophiles will cry for mercy (this will go in the house I mentioned above).
• CDRs
• CDRWs
• DVDRs (to go with the DVD writer mentioned above)

They list the same prices you gave at their website, though they look like a fairly cheap brand. Does anyone know if there is any significant difference in quality between manufacturers?

What, you mean digital cable boxes like these?

http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/class.asp?logon=& langid=EN&dept=11&WLBS=fsweb5&catid=20 02

>You ever look at that hole that is at the top of your controller and wonder what it is for? That's for a memory card buddy. Being that it is slot shaped, I'd have to say that's a memory card slot

Then why is it the only peripheral I've ever seen anybody plug in there is the Live headset?

Perhaps because the part is perpetually out of stock and totally unpopular?

Perhaps because, as far as I can tell, there's no transfer utility?

What good is a memory card if I can't get the data from the hard drive to it?

Then again, since, as I've said, none of the other dozen people I know with Xboxes own one of these memory cards (that aren't available, even at all of Canada's largest electronics superstores, or at least the ones near me), perhaps there is a hidden menu to copy saved games that will magically show up when I turn on my Xbox. I don't know. I've not seen it yet.

Can you enlighten me? I know there's a lot of hidden stuff in that horrid dashboard software, perhaps this is one of those items.

However, the manufacturers of digitial boxes do not sell to consumers, and cable companies have so far only been renting boxes to customers.

Not sure about US, but in Canada, cable companies do sell, and non-cable companies

They just repackaged all their cables so they can try to justify selling them for $30 for 10 feet.

Let me guess, was it Best Buy/Future Shop?

This cable goes for $30 at Future Shop, the only difference between it and a regular cable is they electroplated the hood as well. The price is about 3x what is reasonable and what you pay anywhere else.

I did some searching online and it was apparent it's a fairly common problem related to the "inverter" component. Either the wire's loose and just needed to bere-seated, or the inverter itself (a tiny board) has gone bad and needed to be replaced.

I didn't feel like pulling any stunts, and laptop was only a couple of months old, so I decided to take it back where it was bought from (Future Shop on St. Catherine st. in Montreal, Canada - Same parent company as Best Buys in the States).

The technician there looked at it, scratched his head, said he's never seen this problem before, and that he'd have to ship it to HP for them to take a look. He took the laptop, gave us a slip of paper, and said he'd call us when it's ready fr pickup.

I completely forgot about it until, OVER A MONTH LATER, my girlfriend mentioned that she still did not have her laptop. A call to Future Shop got us "we don't know where youre laptop is . . . call us back in a few days"

A few days after we call, and we're told "oh, your laptop has been here for a while.. come pick it up"... "Where was the phone call we were told we'll receive ?" ... "I don't know".

So between Future Shop, HP, and possibly even a few border crossings, it takes over a month to replace a $60 inverter or a 10-second wire re-adjustment.

In Canada MYOB software was sold to Intuit.
They now no longer support any payroll tax table updates and a bunch of other things that basically make the software useless. However, even with these horrendous omissions, they are as of today, still selling the software at full retail in stores across the country.
Lucky customers purchasing this software and want full functionality now have the option of .... well buying different software. This helpful advice came strait from a support call.
This is FRUAD and these clowns should be charged criminally. I will never by an Intuit product for as long as I live.

According to Nielsen SoundScan, which tracks album sales, 681 million were sold in 2002, down from 785 million in 2000.

But if you look here for instance, you'll see that the article starts with "Christmas 2002 may wind up being a season to forget for some of the country's biggest retailers". Times are tough all over. I went shopping at 3 differnt malls on Christmas Eve, and I had no trouble finding parking, and I know that the malls were completely dead before Christmas too.

Best Buy announced that it would close 107 stores...

I've got a sneaking suspicion that Best Buy's decision to close 107 stores isn't completely linked to Kazaa et al. Also, I want to know where on Kazaa I can download a new TV, DVD player, and accessories for my new cell phone.

Also, with regard to Best Buy, how many of the stores that they closed were because they'd bought Future Shop and were duplicating in the same market? IIRC, they're closing a couple of stores in and around Bellingham, WA, since the Future Shop is about 2 blocks from Best Buy.

-- Ray

Future Shop, too.

And, just in case any of our American friends are ever looking for some political support for consumers in the future, I should point out that "Future Shop stores are a division of Burnaby-based Best Buy Canada Ltd., a wholly-owned subsidiary of Best Buy Co., Inc."

By the time you're old enough to immigrate here, Canada'll have the same facist IP laws as the US and UK. There was an open discussion paper... thing a while ago about a Canadian DMCA. As it stands right now, our cost of blank CD's is rediculous. Future Shop (a Canadian electronics retailer) advertizes blank CDR's at $50 for 100 cd's.
Not a bad price (shitty CD's, but I just found the first ad for them I could find). Factor in the CDR tax, and it ends up costing you over $100 for them.

This tax is funneled straight into the **AA's, in a misguided effort to "compensate artists" for "illegal piracy"
Now, IANAL, but I don't think you can tax an illegal activity, or else Revenue Canada'd be down on East Hastings (drug riddled area) busting every dealer for not reporting income. If they're taxing it, it must be legal now... I'm going to go burn a whole bunch of IP law violations

Eventually, Canadas parliment will cave to corporate money (though I don't know why, the Liberal party doesn't need to campaign, they're going to win anyways) and make a restictive, evil law like the DMCA. When that day comes, I too will emigrate. I don't know where to though...

(either that, or bloody revolution. YAY!)

An interesting note...

My LG 24x10x40x will burn a full audio CD in 2.5 - 3 minutes. This drive also will not underrun - ever. I have yet to produce a single coaster (and I've gone through about 150 blank CD-Rs since I've bought it). It might have something to do with the fact that it has an 8 MB buffer, which is something you don't see on most CD-RW drives.

The beauty part? I got it at Future Shop for $79 (Canadian) after rebate about 6 months ago.

LG has really gotten their act together apparently.

My only gripe? Digital Audio Extraction peaks at about 8x. My friend's El Cheapo 48x10x48x CD-RW drive sucks, but it does DAE at about 24x.

What are you complaining about? The reviews say it's 5/5!

Yeesh!

of this thing in Canada - $99 US, $169 CDN at Future Shop.

But I can get the Sony Clie PEG-SL10 with 4x the RAM, Palm OS 4.1, and a 320x320 screen (the Zire is 160x160) for $60 CDN more, plus a way nicer layout, etc.

This thing needs to be $60 US, $100 CDN. It's a rip-off at this price.

>On the price of a new PC Windows XP adds about $100.

That's home edition. Its so castrated, I, a home user, am entirely angered after purchasing it.

I decided to set up a samba domain server to make my life of logging in between my laptop and my XP desktop easier. I like to keep settings between logins, and I like to keep my bookmarks between sessions. I also like a little privacy.

Lack of Domain support in XP Home Edition makes this impossible. Removing this feature is like selling a door that cannot have a deadbolt added to it. No thanks.

And, over here, in most shops (such as future shop) Windows XP Professional is $500. Blech!

Microsoft has consistently proven their ability to control their marketplace. Now that they must compete with a free and popular alternative it is interesting to see how they play their cards. When I wander stores and see Windows XP (Professional) selling for CAN $400 (note, these links may not work due to session tracking, check out Future Shop (Canada) for price details) and Microsoft Office for CAN $600 I am forced to ponder the corporate strategies involved. How long can I be a pawn milked for my money by a company that attempts to force overpriced products down my gullet? I am lucky enough to see the writing on the wall. Linux is the only competitive product capable to compete with the Microsoft phenomenon/monetary-monopoly and it is FREE.

As a frequent computer user I lean to the side of software written by people who write it to make a better product before considering the money they may make. Cheers to Linux.

Microsoft has consistently proven their ability to control their marketplace. Now that they must compete with a free and popular alternative it is interesting to see how they play their cards. When I wander stores and see Windows XP (Professional) selling for CAN $400 (note, these links may not work due to session tracking, check out Future Shop (Canada) for price details) and Microsoft Office for CAN $600 I am forced to ponder the corporate strategies involved. How long can I be a pawn milked for my money by a company that attempts to force overpriced products down my gullet? I am lucky enough to see the writing on the wall. Linux is the only competitive product capable to compete with the Microsoft phenomenon/monetary-monopoly and it is FREE.

As a frequent computer user I lean to the side of software written by people who write it to make a better product before considering the money they may make. Cheers to Linux.

Microsoft has consistently proven their ability to control their marketplace. Now that they must compete with a free and popular alternative it is interesting to see how they play their cards. When I wander stores and see Windows XP (Professional) selling for CAN $400 (note, these links may not work due to session tracking, check out Future Shop (Canada) for price details) and Microsoft Office for CAN $600 I am forced to ponder the corporate strategies involved. How long can I be a pawn milked for my money by a company that attempts to force overpriced products down my gullet? I am lucky enough to see the writing on the wall. Linux is the only competitive product capable to compete with the Microsoft phenomenon/monetary-monopoly and it is FREE.

As a frequent computer user I lean to the side of software written by people who write it to make a better product before considering the money they may make. Cheers to Linux.

http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/proddetail.asp?sk u_id=0665000FS10004633

Price: $89.99

And that's NOT including the ungodly 7% PST (Provincial Sales Tax) and 7% GST (Goods and Services Tax) which get tacked on to the sticker price.

$89.99 + 14% = $102.59

And that isn't even for the collector's edition. No wonder piracy is so rampant. Screw you, Blizzard. I'm going to wait until the title drops to AFFORDABLE levels.

Of course, we know that Blizzard just inflated the price because they know people will pay it. Grr.

The currency is not that important really, the fact remains that, according to you, "a" GF4 costs nearly twice as much as a Nintendo GameCube is BS. The list price for the GC is 250 USD, the list price for a GF4 Ti4200 is 200 USD, list prices for (crappy) GF4 MX cards are way lower.

OK, seeing as I'm really bored at work right now, I will prove that you are very wrong.

GeForce 4 - Ti4400

Game Cube

My original point is still very valid. At least in Canada, a Nintendo GameCube is almost half the price of a card which isn't even NVIDIA's top of line model.

The currency is not that important really, the fact remains that, according to you, "a" GF4 costs nearly twice as much as a Nintendo GameCube is BS. The list price for the GC is 250 USD, the list price for a GF4 Ti4200 is 200 USD, list prices for (crappy) GF4 MX cards are way lower.

OK, seeing as I'm really bored at work right now, I will prove that you are very wrong.

GeForce 4 - Ti4400

Game Cube

My original point is still very valid. At least in Canada, a Nintendo GameCube is almost half the price of a card which isn't even NVIDIA's top of line model.

While all three box manufacturers are stuck at $199 USD (while Japan, the EU, and Canada sell them for less)

I heard about that "better" price drop in Canada, but was dismayed by my visits to FutureShop Canada and Walmart (in person.) All systems cost $299 Canadian, only $10 (Canadian) cheaper.

For those in Canada, Future Shop sells systems as follows:

GameCube: $299
Playstation2: $299
XBox: $299

Now's a good time for buying a system..

I tried this at Future Shop and they refused to even accept it back. I pointed out that I refused to accept the license agreement and it said that I could return it to my place of purchase but they did not agree. I couldn't be bothered to cause any more fuss but if I get bored one day, I may try it again and get them either to pull off all copies of the software they are selling (because they are refusing to honour the agreement) or give me a signed document stating that I am not bound by the EULA.

The name you are looking for is Future Shop. That chain is one of Canada's largest electronic retailers, and had been making inroads into Best Buy's territory in the USA. The details of the buy-out are here. Last I heard, the deal was still pending approval of the Canadian government's competition bureau and/or SEC blessing.

Oh, I also forgot to take your "The-US-is-the-internet" arrogance into account, too.

Such moduals exist in a limited sense, at least for the Handspring Visor. Check out the Gameface for the Visor.
For the URL impaired, it is basically a joystick & button pad that clips over the Visor for gaming.

Anyone know if they have a similar version for the PocketPC?

I had a look at the Xbox at a Future Shop. They are charging $600Cdn($377US). One of the store clerks was trying to set up a demo machine but it was too big to fit in the kiosk case they had for it. I asked him about playing DVDs on it and he said you could but you had to spend another $50 for the DVD controler and $25 for the cable to connect it to the TV. It comes with one game controler and to add extras would be another $50 each. So now I'm looking at shelling out $825 + $120 in taxes. I said no thanks and walked on which is what I suspect is most Canadians will say.

I noticed the other day that http://www.futureshop.ca [Lazy Link] has had their site taken over by MS for the XBox. Now I dont mind advertising, but, having something pushed in my face like that when I could be shopping for something like the GC kinda upsets me. I know major retail stores do tend to play favorites with certain companies but this is over the edge I think. So, do you think stores should be monopolised (heh) like this?

Actually, the other day I was at FutureShop, and they were selling computers that included XP but marked with a "Windows XP with Intel Pentium IV Optimizations". I'm not sure you can just buy a version with the -O2 but I won't be surprised if they will sell an upgrade cd later on that replaces the binaries to P4 optimized ones. Because people will buy them and get ripped off...

Saw an add last night from Futureshop. Along with your purchase of Windows XP, they're offering 128MB Ram, and McAfee Virus Scan. You can see the promotion on their website. I find this quite funny. If you're going to run XP, you need more memory and a virus scanner!

Expensive, multisystem NTSC VCRs can also play PAL tapes (it works both ways! :-). Here's an example.

The difference between VCR and DVD machines is not just the intent of "region coding", but also the legality of defeating it. I can't find a region-free DVD player in any normal shop in Canada. I, however, can walk into Future Shop (think Circuit City, Best Buy) tomorrow and buy an NTSC and PAL compatible VCR (I wonder if it can play SECAM tapes?).

Thanks for the tip... A&B sells online to people in Eastern Canada, right?

>$18 in eastern Canada

You wish! At one place considered by some to have good CD prices, Future Shop, most CDs (except the top 10 / on sale) are about $20.

Are CDs made in the west and couriered out East? :)

a hell-hole Canadian version of those big box stores

You wouldn't happen to be referring to Future Shop, would you?

--

I know that Future Shop will refuse to take back the product. And we know that Microsoft normally won't either. So what can I do?

Can an EULA possibly be enforcable if it is impossible for me to reject it? Is it up to the retailer to ensure that I am able to reject it? Or is it up to the manufacturer to refund my money if I will not accept the license? Anyone know?

.. but because Milennium is coming out soon, I can't locate any links for the 98SE upgrade. However, here is a link showing the price of the 95/98 -> ME. $129.99. (The full version of ME is $279.99)

In short, I'm not a KarmaWh0re. I'm just stating fact.


------------
CitizenC

.. but because Milennium is coming out soon, I can't locate any links for the 98SE upgrade. However, here is a link showing the price of the 95/98 -> ME. $129.99. (The full version of ME is $279.99)

In short, I'm not a KarmaWh0re. I'm just stating fact.


------------
CitizenC

If you're in Canada, the product is available at Future Shop but I beleive they are selling it for $329 CAN $.. equiv to about $225 US$.

Do a product search and lookup Apex or AD-600A