I might be cheap as all hell, but I'm (probably) not gonna do Black Friday

Sorry if I haven't been able to blog the past few weeks, work has been crazy still. And now for Thanksgiving, somehow I wound up in Miami....where it's sunny and 80....:-)

Anyway, it's that time of the year again.....

BLACK FRIDAY!!!!


Uggghhhh. I don't like Black Friday. See one of my first posts as to why.
I'll admit tho, I will try to make it out there tomorrow morning. But only for one thing and one thing alone: Pants.

Yes. I need new jeans. Old Navy has a deal on Black Friday where you can get the new Lego Rock Band for free if you buy $20 worth of stuff, which isn't hard at Old Navy. If anything, you could go to an old navy, then take the game to Gamestop and sell it to them for $25, and you just got yourself a free pair of pants.

And that's pretty much it. Well, maybe somewhere else depending on where I get dragged to with my friend here in Miami...

A bit of a warning for those of you who go out or are planning on spending themselves into the red this year:

-Compare online before you buy in store. Some things are actually cheaper online than on black friday. Blu-Ray players and bluetooth earpieces come to mind.
-It's a good Black Friday for video games. Gamestop has a 360 Elite with 3 good games for 300, or PS3 120gb with 3 good games for 300. While you could get this on Amazon (or something close to it), you could have this one RIGHT NOW.
-Avoid big box retailers like Walmart. With so many people fighting for so few items, it's just not worth the hassle.
-Go in groups with friends and keep cell phones on to keep track of each other.
-In regards to the friends, make sure they are the kind of friends that do not like shopping. That means they'll get what they need, pay for it, and leave. No hanging around and dealing with the crazy people.
-If you can't deal with it, just stay at home. Is it really worth getting push around and waking up at an unGodly hour just to save 30 bucks?

More to follow later. Happy Tofurkey day!

Gaming prices have hidden costs

Sorry for the lateness in posting. Work got insane and I had end of the year deadlines for work....

So just recently Walmart had this crazy deal for a Microsoft Xbox 360 for $200 plus $100 giftcard. People were talking about it all over the internet. Great deal but it brings to light one of the issues I have with the 360 which is both a good and bad thing: buying seperate components.



Let's compare the game consoles:



Wii

With the wii, there is only one version and one version alone. You do not get a hard drive, wireless is built in, that's it. Very simple and straightforward. $200 nets you the standard gear and lets you fully enjoy all your crappy minigames.



PS3

Yes, there are multiple version of the ps3 in the beginning, which was REALLY ANNOYING, and certain versions had variations, such as the number of usb ports, flash reader, and I think the very first one did not come with wifi. I'm ignoring the backwards compatibility at this point, as I think Sony has dropped the idea as a feature, even though I still use mine to play PS2 games on a regular basis. However, they did not cripple their systems to monetize them later. The one without wifi cannot ever have wifi built into it, same with the usb ports (although you can buy or get free usb hubs), and the hard drive can be swapped out for any 5400 RPM notebook hard drive. They cut out features to save on cost. At this point though, I think the only difference between the newest version of the PS3 is simply hard drive size. But you can buy the smallest version and it'll play your games and do stuff just fine for $300 even.



360

This is what bugs me: they sell different versions with different features and allow you to upgrade your slightly inferior systems at a price. Take a look at the Arcade unit. It has no hard drive to store data, so your save games need to be on a card and games will take longer to load instead of being installed to your console, no wifi to connect so you'll need to have a cable actually plugged into your hub/router. Both the Wii and PS3 have wifi, why not the 360????



Now, let's take the $200 arcade unit, with the $100 discount. You'll need an additional $60 to $120 for a hard drive to install games, save files, etc. In addition you'll need another $100 for a wifi adapter unless you can plug it in to your router. Also, you'll need to shell out another $50 for online service. It's not cheap, and it might be worth it, but it's not the homerun people have talked about. Also, be on the lookout for cheap systems on craigslist and the like. Recently Microsoft has banned many users for pirating games, rendering their systems unable to connect online at all to download patches, new content, or play online. So that cheap 360 elite with controllers may not be a good deal for you...

I'll try to get another post up soon, I'm stuck here an extra day, possibly two, and I'm not going anywhere with 2ft of snow everywhere outside. Stay smart, stay cheap.

Why rebates suck and HDTVs are mad cheap now

The comic above pretty much sums up my feelings about rebates. I've been seeing them a lot lately and it's been pissing me off. Back in the day, I used to do them for a lot of things, from computer parts, to tvs, lcds, everything.

The concept behind a rebate is simple (I'm using an example from a purchase I made):
1. Pay the MSRP now for a keyboard, which is 90 bucks (old school Logitech MX Cordless Duo Elite Keyboard and Mouse...props to my bro for that one)
2. Store gives you a rebate or the package comes with a coupon for 30 bucks.
3. Send the manufacturer (in this case Logitech) the coupon along with the cutout of the barcode on the side of the box and your reciept to show you bought it.
4. Wait 12 weeks
5. Company sends you check for 30 bucks
6. Cash it in and you saved 30 bucks from your original purchase!

Why does this work? Companies will often do this to give you an incentive to purchase their product over a rivals. They know that their product will depreciate over a certain period of time so the value of the item will be less later anyway, so they'd rather have you you to pay the current amount and give you back that difference later just to claim a sale. This is the economical explanation at least. However, this isn't the best way to make money obviously since it cuts into your company's bottom line. That's where there darkside of the equation comes in, as according to this article from consumer reports, 40% of all rebates are never claimed. Companies take advantage of these people to make some of their money back. So what do they do to try to fluff out their margins on this? A couple things:
1. Make the time frame really short on the consumer end. Sometimes you only have a window a week or two to send it out. Let's face it: we have more important things to do.
2. Make some weird or somewhat difficult requirement. Or maybe you threw out the box and therefore lost the UPC code. After all, who keeps the box after they open something? Sometimes you have to go online and fill out a form to print out to send along with your coupon.
3. Make you wait a really long time and hope you forget about it. This goes back to the 40% number, but it could even be more sinister. Seriously, some companies will say that they've "lost" your paperwork and hope you've forgotten it until after the deadline has passed.

A few years back the Wall Street Journal did an experiment to try to buy different items and see if the rebates come back. You can find the article here. The result? Out of 5 rebates, only ONE worked without requiring intervention by the reporter. Check out the graph below from the article:




Sucks huh? So what can you do to protect yourself?
1. Don't play the rebate game. When looking at prices for stuff, ignore the rebates. You don't want to deal with the hassle and whatever money you might save you might not get.
2. Do the rebate ASAP. The longer you wait, the more likely you're gonna lose out on the money.
3. Keep track of your rebates in a spreadsheet. That way, when the time is ticking, you'll know when you need to call them and pester them about your rebate.
4. Keep copies of EVERYTHING. Document, document, document.

I stay out of the rebate process nowadays. Getting too lazy to try to save that much, plus I don't deal well with customer support. But it's still an option if you think you can pull it off. And sometimes, well, it's hard to say no to a $100 rebate on something you really want, like an external Hard Drive.

A quick note about HDTVs: DAMN THEY ARE CHEAP. I thought 800 was a good price point for a mainstream priced 42 inch tv. But I'm starting to see mainstream brands (toshiba, sharp, etc) start to dip into the Vizio price range of 600-700. Crazy.

I'll get around to writing more articles soon. Having a bug (NOT THE FLU), and Uncharted 2 out for the ps3 does not help things. Also, Modern Warfare 2 comes out next week. And I preordered the Night Vision Goggle Edition. I kid you not. Until the next article (hopefull next week in between games of MW2), stay smart and stay cheap.