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The small ones that I used aren't online. Here is a big one but it'll give you an idea of what I tore appart. Go to the store inperson to see the size of the small one that put out like 400cmfs with virtually no noise. Keep in mind that most of these are thermally protected but I bet you cant get years of contiuous duty out of them.

You don't seem to have a problem with any type of corporate abuse if you're buying your music for $0.88 a song.

http://www.walmart.com/music

Maybe that's because a new car is over $10,000 for about the cheapest cars out there, while you can easilly find a computer for around $500. Even a Mac. That, and cars are much more of a necessity for most people than computers are. Without a computer, the average person can't check their e-mail or play solitare. Without a car, they can't go to work, go shopping, pick up the kids from soccer practice, get a haircut, etc.

http://www.walmart.com/catalog/product.gsp?product _id=3212103

Just $568 (+ S&H) gets you the base 1.1 GHz AMD notebook with Windows and a "bonus" 128 MB memory-module" (which you have to install yourself.)

Not a bad deal, in my estimation, even if you intend to wipe the drive and install Linux (assuming that Linux drivers are available for all of the included devices. As I don't intend to do so, I won't research whether, in fact, they are or not.)

They already have.

Little Johnny woke up early to get ready for school. Johnny was a nice boy, loved by his parents, respected by his friends, and likened by his teachers. Like all other good boys, he hated Microsoft(R) and all it's products including Microsoft Windows (TM) and Microsoft Office (TM). He ran Gentoo on his home computer, and used StarOffice for all his homework.

Johnny walked off to the bus stop after kissing his mom goodbye, whistling a little tune to himself. His bus was late again, the third time this month. Johnny didn't like being late for school. It made him feel guilty. So he decided to walk to school, as it was no more than a 15 minute walk away. The bus would take longer anyway, after picking up all the other stupid little kids. Annoying little twitches...they wouldn't know the difference between Gentoo and Knoppix if it stared them in their pimply little faces.

Little Johnny made good time. Before long, he reached the Wal-mart across which his elementary school was. It was just 8:36. It was still 24 minutes before school, and it would take just 45 more seconds to cross the road and enter the school grounds. He liked being early. It gave him time to catch up on the latest geeky news on Slashdot and get a First Post or two before classes began.

Johnny was halfway across the street when a Chevy Avalanche zoomed up and squashed him on the pavement. Little Johnny was no more.

What is the moral, that we, as self respecting geeks, can learn from Little Johnny's short but noble life?

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Always look right and left before crossing the road.

FREE 3-month CNR Service for 1-click install of over 1,900 software titles and automatic updates
CNR Service subscription lets you 1-click install over 1,900 software titles in categories such as Business, Education, Games, Internet, Design and more. Automatic updates and management included!

If Wal-Mart.com's return policy is the same as its stores, it doesn't hold a candle to Costco's.

It takes a gutsy business to promise to refund almost everything it sells, in any condition, ever, in cash (even if you pay with a credit card, as I usually do). They've made a lot of money from me because of it.

It's not near as bad as the extremely weak Linspire one they had a while back.

Here //last one accidently modded troll so here it is again.

Balance 14.1" Laptop, 1.1 GHz AMD Athlon 4

Remove windows and you got your self a sub $500.

Little Johnny woke up early to get ready for school. Johnny was a nice boy, loved by his parents, respected by his friends, and likened by his teachers. Like all other good boys, he hated Microsoft(R) and all it's products including Microsoft Windows (TM) and Microsoft Office (TM). He ran Gentoo on his home computer, and used StarOffice for all his homework.

Johnny walked off to the bus stop after kissing his mom goodbye, whistling a little tune to himself. His bus was late again, the third time this month. Johnny didn't like being late for school. It made him feel guilty. So he decided to walk to school, as it was no more than a 15 minute walk away. The bus would take longer anyway, after picking up all the other stupid little kids. Annoying little twitches...they wouldn't know the difference between Gentoo and Knoppix if it stared them in their pimply little faces.

Little Johnny made good time. Before long, he reached the Wal-mart across which his elementary school was. It was just 8:36. It was still 24 minutes before school, and it would take just 45 more seconds to cross the road and enter the school grounds. He liked being early. It gave him time to catch up on the latest geeky news on Slashdot and get a First Post or two before classes began.

Johnny was halfway across the street when a Chevy Avalanche zoomed up and squashed him on the pavement. Little Johnny was no more.

What is the moral, that we, as self respecting geeks, can learn from Little Johnny's short but noble life?

.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Always look right and left before crossing the road.

Little Johnny woke up early to get ready for school. Johnny was a nice boy, loved by his parents, respected by his friends, and likened by his teachers. Like all other good boys, he hated Microsoft(R) and all it's products including Microsoft Windows (TM) and Microsoft Office (TM). He ran Gentoo on his home computer, and used StarOffice for all his homework.

Johnny walked off to the bus stop after kissing his mom goodbye, whistling a little tune to himself. His bus was late again, the third time this month. Johnny didn't like being late for school. It made him feel guilty. So he decided to walk to school, as it was no more than a 15 minute walk away. The bus would take longer anyway, after picking up all the other stupid little kids. Annoying little twitches...they wouldn't know the difference between Gentoo and Knoppix if it stared them in their pimply little faces.

Little Johnny made good time. Before long, he reached the Wal-mart across which his elementary school was. It was just 8:36. It was still 24 minutes before school, and it would take just 45 more seconds to cross the road and enter the school grounds. He liked being early. It gave him time to catch up on the latest geeky news on Slashdot and get a First Post or two before classes began.

Johnny was halfway across the street when a Chevy Avalanche zoomed up and squashed him on the pavement. Little Johnny was no more.

What is the moral, that we, as self respecting geeks, can learn from Little Johnny's short but noble life?

.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Always look right and left before crossing the road.

This is not always the case.

Of course he is the largest contributer to charity. He is also the richest man on Earth.

Ignorance or blind hatred, I'm not sure and I don't really care.

Many, if not most, rich people give almost nothing to charity. The Waltons (some of them) are worth 1/4 of Bill, but give almost nothing to charity.

In other words he doesn't feel the difference. On the contrary giving away money gives hime a sense of achievement, some kind of warm feeling, etc.

I'd probably feel the differnece if I gave away 1/5 of my money to charity. And you know else gets a warm feeling? The thousands or millions who will get innoculations because of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. What bastards.

Essentially this guy is taking money that I've earned to give to his ideas of charity for his own ends, and this is simply not a kind of thought that I enjoy.

Yes, the way he gives to charity makes me mad too. MS makes Union Carbide, Nike, Walmart, Lockheed, and Halliburton look like angels.

In fact that machine is an example of consolidation of function, creating a lower price; it has integrated Ethernet, graphics, and audio. What we now think of as the processor used to be several chips with individual function.

Wal-Mart Offers $498 Linux Notebook

= 9J =

Pretty impressive for an also ran.

What is an also ran?

there are other's too - about a half dozen WMA sites like Wal-mart but they all hav ethe same half baked catalog, poor browsing, and add to value to the shopping experience.

Walmart is major, but they are unloved foons. You are enticed with 88 cent downloads (with DRM up the wazoo of course) and an iPod-like white headphone logo. "(Y)our tunes (y)our way" -- find the hidden motto here. If you try to enter the Walmart site and do not have IE -- well tough. Foons.

This $500 Apple is still insanely overpriced.
GotApex? has a "headless Dell" on their site for $449.

Here are the specs:
2.8Ghz P4 w/800Mhz bus
256MB DDR2 SDRAM
40GB S-ATA
2 year on site warranty

Of course, if I don't get modded to hell, there will be a dozen replys from the Apple "amen corner" telling me that the Apple is a better deal, etc.

For $468 you get:

HP vx74 17-inch flat screen CRT monitor

Intel Celeron D Processor 340 (2.93 GHz, 533 FrontSide bus, 256 KB L2 Cache)

40 GB Ultra DMA hard drive

256 MB DDR-SDRAM with up to 64 MB allocated to video memory

Memory expandable to 2 GB

Integrated Intel Extreme Graphics with up to 64 MB shared video memory

CD Writer and DVD combo drive (CD-RW/DVD)

Drive Speeds: 48x32x16x48

Front Panel 9-1 reader: Compact Flash I/II - SmartMedia - Memory Stick - Memory Stick Pro - MultiMediaCard - Secure Digital (SD) - IBM MicroDrive, xD

High-speed 56K flex modem

Integrated 10/100Base-T networking interface

HP keyboard, HP scroller mouse

Available Slots: 2 PCI; Available External Ports: 5 USB 2.0 - 1 serial - 1 parallel; Available Bays: one 5.25", one 3.25"

Software Included: Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition with Service Pack 2, Microsoft Works 7.0, Microsoft Money Standard 2004, Intuit Quicken New User's Edition 2004, and much more

Yes, it's a big, bulky CRT monitor. But let's see what we can do with this PC that we can't do with the minimac:

• Type things
• Move the mouse pointer around
• Actually see what's happening on our screen
• Hear sounds
• Upgrade the memory without voiding the warranty or paying an Apple-authorized dealer's salary
• Connect a microphone, or an audio line in (or both at once)
• Connect it to our stereo with the line out
• Add a DX9, 256MB PCI graphics card for under $100
• Attach a USB printer, webcam, etc, etc to our USB ports without buying an additional USB hub. (Because the 2 USB ports on the minimac are taken up by the keyboard and mouse [not included])
• Plug the flash memory from our digicam into the card reader, saving the expense and fuss of a USB digicam cable every time. Even with the xD cards from newer Fuji and Olympus cameras.
• And so much more

And what are the advantages of the Mac? Well, first of all, it's not a fair comparison. Because to kit out our Mac with all the things we really do need (monitor, keyboard, mouse) we're already several hundred dollars more expensive. But let's go with it anyway.

• We get a small, stylish computer.
  Well, that's great if all we care about is show. If you think it makes you look cool, well, I think it does too-- among people who don't know shit.
• It doesn't use much power
  Who actually cares about this? I mean, if you're so anal that you're counting the watts of your home PC, by all means, buy the mac.
• It's quiet.
  Did I mention the HP comes with speakers?
• It has OSX.
  Great. So it has an OS that you'll be expected to pay something like $100/yr. to keep up to date (if you average it out), and probably doesn't run the software you want to use.

  • I am tired now. You guys wore me out.

    Yeargh!

I envy koreas achievements as well, my local monopolists just keep prices up despite amazing international examples, even by at&t and mci; I live in Mexico :)

http://www.silicon.com/networks/broadband/0,390246 61,11035920,00.htm

But I guess we are on our way, 5 or 10 years? who knows, at least companies are making it easyer, here's an offer with a linux box for an extra 10 USD a month from a cable company

http://www.megared.net.mx/maspc.htm

But Id still preffer a nice lap top to go

http://www.walmart.com/catalog/product.gsp?product _id=3504708&cat=179113&type=19&dept=3944

I notice it's out of stock, as in sold out? good for them! :)

According to walmart.com you cannot use the iPod with walmart.com music store:

Important Note: This player is not compatible with Wal-Mart Music Downloads.

So this is not a solution to the problem.

According to walmart.com you cannot use the iPod with walmart.com music store:

Important Note: This player is not compatible with Wal-Mart Music Downloads.

So this is not a solution to the problem.

P4 3.0 Ghz
256 MB PC333 DDR RAM, one slot available
40 GB Utra ATA 100 HDD
CD-RW/DVD
Integrated graphics, shared RAM (max 64 MB)
AC 97 Integrated audio
1 PC1, 1 AGP slot free

I love my $60 Philips DVP 642 Divx/Xvid stand-alone DVD Player:
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=20465
http://walmart.com/catalog/product.gsp?product_id= 2598455
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B000 204SWE

When they make a $60 DVD player for other codecs than MPEG2/MPEG4 I'll be interested. Until then, why bother if something is a little bit better? A WMV9 DVD player would probably be another $50 and not worth it (not that they even exist right now).

However, a lot of the 1280x1024 LCD panels are being made with the correct (5:4) physical aspect ratio these days, even the `cheap' ones ($600 range at Best Buy)

Even the $299 one(s). I bought a 19" LCD from Walmart.com with native 1280x1024 and it is 5:4 unless my math is wrong (screen measures in at approx 14.875" x 11.875"). I know, no way in hell is a $299 LCD going to acceptable to most people here but I have absolutely no issues what so ever with the screen quality and there were no dead pixels. I was pricing 19" CRT's and they are very close in price to this LCD so I got the LCD instead. I have no regets. It even has DVI.

Link to the LCD monitor
Link to a FatWallet.com discussion of the monitor

someone asked where the $400 MythTV box is. It doesn't exist, and neither does your idea, because it's not profitable.

Here is a computer for $200 that has everything except the Tuner card which can be had for under $100 if you shop around. It is true that Dell does not sell to individual computers for less than about $450, but they also include much faster than necessary processors, a pile of useless software including Windows, and a lot of other features useless for a PVR. If Dell wanted to, they could build and ship a computer, profitably, for less than $500. They don't because they are not innovators and will never do anything until someone else does it profitably.

If it doesn't make money (or convince someone with a lot of money that it will), you aren't going to see it on the market, period. If you think this isn't the case, stick your nuts out there and try to break the trend. You'll fail, I promise.

There are two types of tech companies that are successful. There are ones like Dell that try to be the biggest, but don't do anything new. They count upon economy of scale and being able to copy those who make new things. The others are innovative companies who do cool things, because invention is part of their culture. They make money because they are first with cool technologies, and because they make new markets that everyone else has to play catch-up to get into. I'll not be starting a new company just now because I already work for a very successful start-up. But any of the big players with marketing power and the ability to buy in bulk and suck up a small R&D investment, can make money selling cheaply made PVRs. It won't be Dell or Wal-Mart. It may or may not be Tivo. Just hope it is not Microsoft, because if it is, they will screw us all again and kill innovation in the PVR space.

Actually, Walmart already is an ISP. Judging by the performance my friend gets, it manages to be worse than AOL.

...can it run Deer Hunter 2003?

You don't happen to have one of these do you?

Whoa! Is that from the new MechWarrior game?

You don't happen to have one of these do you?

1.1 GHz Mobile AMD Athlon 4 processor with PowerNow! technology

128 MB RAM, upgradeable to 640 MB*

40 GB ATA 100/66/33 hard drive

Supports 2.5V/1.25V 200-pin DDR200/DDR266 SO-DIMM module

14.1" XGA TFT LCD with 1024 x 768 resolution

16.7 million colors possible

High-performance, 256-bit 3D graphic engine

Shared memory 16/32/64 MB DDR (user-adjustable in BIOS)

DVD-ROM drive

Two built-in stereo speakers

Integrated Wi-Fi-compliant Wireless 802.11b (11 Mbps) LAN

On-board 1 GB/100M/10M Base-T LAN Ethernet, up to 1 Gbps

56k V.90 modem

Synaptics touchpad with 4-way scrolling button

4 USB 2.0 ports, 1 RJ-11 modem jack, 1 RJ-45 Ethernet jack

Line-out headphone jack

1 microphone in jack

1 external VGA port, 1 parallel port, 1 S-Video TV-Out connector

1 DC-in jack for AC adapter

Universal AC adapter with auto-sensing dual voltage support (AC 100-240V)

BIOS plug & play, ACPI and DMI

Kensington lock and BIOS password protection

4-cell lithium-ion battery pack

Pre-loaded with Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition

Dimensions and Weight: 13"W x 10.75"D x 1.5"H; weighs 6 pounds

Still not the greatest deal, but AFAIK there's nothing comparable pricewise thats brand new?

• 1.1 GHz Mobile Athlon 4 Proc.
• 802.11b networking
• 40 Gig HD (+10 gig improvement)
• DVD-ROM drive

For $50 more they have an AMD 1.1 GHz Mobile Athlon 4 model with a bigger drive (40 vs 30) and DVD-ROM. Sweet! Now I just need an extra $550... :-)

Other "cheap" laptops at WalMart

1.1 GHz Mobile AMD Athlon 4 processor

14.1" XGA TFT LCD screen

40 GB hard drive

128 MB RAM

DVD-ROM drive

Integrated 802.11b wireless networking

This is nice, but here we see a machine with 256Mb, DVD, intergrated wireless and a real AMD processer. Seems that the argument that Windows makes a machine more expensive doesn't play through. I'd love to see these features on a Linux notebook even for the same price!

In this picture of the product, it appears to have a DVD drive.

Are you sure?

Seems to me I'd want to start off in a Wal-Mart tent and get a pile of material delivered from the local Home Depot and build a real house before living in cardboard - isn't that the material of choice for the homeless? Seems to me if you had the rights to erect a stucture on a plot of land, you'd want to have something with at least the illiusion of permanence to call your home.

Now that I look at the images... it doesn't look much bigger than a Wal-Mart tent $69.

You can get a WoW time/game card... This is what I found so far:

Amazon = $26.99
EB = $29.99
Walmart = $29.82

Amazon has a photograph sample.

I am not sure if they are out yet in retail stores (e.g., Walmart and EB). Does anyone know? Also, are there any other stores selling them?

This game is addicting. :)

Don't forget you can get these if you don't want to pay online especially for young people who don't have credit cards or parents won't let them. Ask your friends, family members, etc. for them as Christmas and birthday gifts.

EB = $29.99
Walmart = $29.82

Are there any more U.S. stores that sell these that I didn't list?

This thing is gonna sell out(if hasn't already) this holiday.
Best buy
EB games
Amazon.com
toysrus
Wal-mart.com
All out of stock... Lik-sang and circuit city neglected to put out of stock notices on their respective webpages, but I'm sure they are too ;)
(they had will ship when available notices still)
Also to note, cnet's shopper couldn't find an in-stock DS, Fry's Outpost.com doesn't even have a DS entry on it's site, and if you absolutely must have one shipped out the current high bid for one on e-bay is $207.50 Only a $50 premium ;) better hurry auction ends in an hour and there is only 1 other DS auction on e-bay right now (no, it's not my auction but hey, you can't buy these things anywhere so some e-bayer might as well make some quick dough ;)

It would be trivial to solder a tap to the data leads of the CMOS or across any data recording device/chip. I think a 1 farad filter should do nicely.

a button from radio shack (or thinkgeek even) with the above capactior would prove quite fatal to the data.

Lame.

You a missing out on a great music shopping experience. Apple isn't exploiting a market like some suppliers and retailers do.

Too bad for you.

Actually WalMart does offer their own credit card, and they can collect whatever data they like from customer purchases and accounts. WalMart and Sam's Club are attempting to exclude all major credit cards from their stores except their own, for the purpose of data mining.

I filled out the paperwork for a Sam's Club membership and when the clerk asked for my SSN, I was told it was needed for their credit card. I told her that I had been a victim of identity and credit fraud, I did not want the card, and would not disclose my SSN.

Later I got a letter from the card company telling my that my form was incomplete. I sent the incomplete form back to them with a polite but firm letter stating that I was under no obligation to open a credit account, that their actions constituted fraud under federal fair credit regulations, and that I fully expected my Sam's Club membership to be approved.

Resistance is futile.

The Sit 'n Spin was the source of many a vomit stain in my basement. Maybe I should make my own and relive the good ol' days...