November 11th, 2009

ZDNet's Ultimate Black Friday 2009: Deals, steals & specials guide

Posted by Andrew Nusca @ 9:02 am

Categories: Black Friday, Consumerism, Feature, Gadget Gal's Daily Deals, Holiday Gift Guide, Toybox Highlights

Tags: Sony Corp., Nintendo Co. Ltd., Sony PlayStation 3, HDTV, Digital Camera, Microsoft Xbox 360, Microsoft Xbox, LCD, Camera, Nintendo Wii

Black Friday is almost here.

Yes, it’s that time of the year again — the time when retailers across the U.S. mark down products to bargain levels to kick off the holiday shopping season, move goods off the shelves and move the year’s profit needle from red to black.

And, you know, force Americans to wake up at ungodly hours after the previous day’s Thanksgiving meal to make financial decisions far too early in the morning.

But fear not. ZDNet’s Ultimate Black Friday guide for 2009 will digest all those rumored sales specials for you by gadget category — so you can find the electronics and gadgets you’re looking for in one spot.

It’s the gift that keeps on giving…until you pass out.

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November 9th, 2009

Walmart sells Lexmark wireless multifunction printer for $59

Posted by Andrew Nusca @ 12:32 pm

Categories: Consumerism, Printers, Walmart

Tags: Wal-Mart Stores Inc., Wi-Fi, Lexmark International Inc., Printers, Hardware, Peripherals, Andrew Nusca

If you’re looking for a new printer, scanner and copier — perhaps one that operates wirelessly — this deal’s for you.

Walmart is now selling the Lexmark X4650 wireless all-in-one printer for $59.

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November 4th, 2009

Walmart unveils 15.6" HP Pavilion G60 laptop for $298

Posted by Andrew Nusca @ 2:11 pm

Categories: Computers, Consumerism, HP, Laptops

Tags: Hewlett-Packard Co., Wal-Mart Stores Inc., HP Pavilion, Laptop Computer, Notebooks, Hardware, Notebooks & Tablets, Andrew Nusca

To heck with netbooks. Walmart’s got plenty of retail weight to swing around, and that’s manifesting itself in the form of a $298 HP Pavilion G60 laptop.

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October 22nd, 2009

Microsoft enters PC retail, sells Windows 7 systems on its website

Posted by Andrew Nusca @ 6:59 am

Categories: Consumerism, Microsoft

Tags: Sony Corp., Dell Computer Corp., PC, Lenovo Group Ltd., Microsoft Corp., Web Site, Laptop Computer, Netbook, Laptop Category, Desktop Category

In a break with its past, Microsoft has begun selling computers and third-party software on its online store as part of a larger effort to get today’s Windows 7 launch rolling.

Microsoft has previously indicated that would sell PCs at a pair of handful of brick-and-mortar stores (in Scottsdale, Ariz., and Mission Viejo, Calif.), but the online store has seen an overhaul and now offers products beyond Microsoft’s own lineup of software and services.

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October 12th, 2009

New Windows Phone ad an alternate universe where Office is your friend

Posted by Andrew Nusca @ 1:05 pm

Categories: Best Buy, Consumerism, HTC, Mobile, Cell Phones and Smartphones

Tags: Advertisement, Phone, Microsoft Office, Microsoft Windows, Telecom & Utilities, Operating Systems, Software, Andrew Nusca

I caught this new Windows Phone ad on television the other night and thought, “weird.”

I think it does a pretty good job of reminding non-business users that yes, they can use Microsoft products on a phone. The personified icons are effective in reaffirming the familiar.

Like it or hate it, there’s one flaw in the advertisement, though: consumers won’t understand that Windows Phone is not a device (in this case, the HTC Pure), but a platform.

But hey, Best Buy will help you out with that, right?

September 14th, 2009

Can ultrathin laptop David beat the netbook Goliath?

Posted by Andrew Nusca @ 2:45 am

Categories: Computers, Consumerism, Laptops, Netbooks

Tags: Apple Inc., Laptop Computer, Netbook, Brooke Crothers, Netbooks, Nettops & MIDs, Hardware, Andrew Nusca

Are netbooks too portable, inexpensive and popular to beat?

Brooke Crothers writes on his CNET blog that the netbook’s popularity is perhaps too great to overcome by the burgeoning ultrathin laptop market, and takes Apple COO Tim Cook to task for bashing netbooks in April for being too cheap, “junky” and slow for the upmarket Apple brand.

That Apple’s got a tablet PC in the pipeline is hardly a question at this point. But Crothers wonders: with lots of reliable, polished netbook models on store shelves, will a lack of a netbook take a bite out of ultrathins — and Apple?

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September 3rd, 2009

Smartphones to eclipse desktop PC sales by 2011

Posted by Andrew Nusca @ 2:13 pm

Categories: Acer, Asus, Blackberry, Computers, Consumerism, Dell, Desktops, Laptops, Mobile, Cell Phones and Smartphones

Tags: Desktop, Mobile, Smart Phone, Smartphone, Desktop Computer, Sales Strategy, Sales Force Management, Advertising & Promotion, Handhelds, Sales

Smartphones will surpass global PCs in sales by the end of 2011, another milestone in the development of more portable computing.

RBC analyst Mike Abramsky estimates that shipments of both devices will approach 400 million per year at that time, PCWorld reports.

The shift has traditional computer manufacturers scrambling to enter the mobile space. While Apple already has a leading position in the market, Dell, Acer, HP, Microsoft and Google all have their eyes on the mobile arena.

Meanwhile, sales of the desktop PC continue to slump, having already been surpassed by laptop sales in Q3 2008.

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August 27th, 2009

Gadget Gal's daily deals: Sandisk Sansa media player, Compaq Presario and Lenovo notebooks

Posted by Jennifer Bergen @ 8:15 am

Categories: Best Buy, Computers, Gadget Gal's Daily Deals, Laptops, Lenovo, MP3 & portable media players, Toybox Highlights

Tags: Compaq Presario, Sandisk Sansa, SanDisk Corp., Lenovo Group Ltd., Compaq Computer Corp., Media Player, Sansa Fuze, Notebooks, Flash Memory, Hardware

A 4GB Sandisk Sansa Fuze, a Compaq Presario notebook, and a Lenovo 16-inch notebook. Here are your daily deals for Thursday, August 27, straight from the Gadget Gal:

1. Get the Sandisk Sansa Fuze 4GB Media Player for $32.99 today only at Woot.com. The refurbished Sansa Fuze has a 1.9-inch LCD screen, an FM tuner, a microSDHC slot, Rhapsody DNA integration, photo and video support, a voice recorder, and FLAC and OGG playback. It has a list price of $79.99, and comes in black, red, or pink.

[read the review] [find the deal]

2. Get the Compaq Presario CQ60-418DX AMD Dual Core 15.6-inch Notebook PC for $380 at Best Buy. The notebook has an AMD Athlon X2 QL-62 Dual Core 2.1GHz CPU, 3GB DDR2 RAM, 250GB SATA hard drive, Altec Lansing speakers, and Windows Vista Home Premium with SP1. It also qualifies for a free upgrade to Windows 7. The deal is valid through August 29, 2009.

[find the deal] [compare prices]

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August 18th, 2009

Good riddance: Digital music sales to surpass CDs in 2010?

Posted by Jennifer Bergen @ 11:55 am

Categories: Apple, Best Buy, Consumerism, Offbeat news

Tags: Sales, Digital Music, Digital Media, Personal Technology, Consumer Electronics, Jennifer Bergen

Does anybody actually buy CDs these days? I don’t mean going onto iTunes and buying an album. I’m talking about an actual plastic-case CD. An don’t even get me started with vinyl albums. Apparently, digital music sales are doing so well that it’s projected they will surpass physical music sales by 2010. According to data from the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, via Ars Technica, not only will they surpass physical sales, but they’ll make physical media obsolete by 2016.

This information may come as no surprise with recent news from the NPD Group stating that iTunes holds 25 percent of all U.S. music sales. CDs made up 65 percent of sales in the first half of 2009 — the other 35 percent came from digital sales, which is a 15 percent increase since 2007. IFPI started measuring digital music sales in 2004, which at that time, only constituted two percent of total music revenue.

So, it’s clear that digital is the way music is heading, and it will most likely be the No. 1 format sooner than you think. Personally, I’m fine with that. I used to love having CDs, but I find now that the minute I get a CD, I burn it into my iTunes library so I can put it on my iPod, and so that it shows up on my Last.fm when I listen to it. Also, I can rate albums, put certain songs into playlists, etc., etc. You can’t do any of that with a clumsy CD. They get scratched eventually, and then you can’t play them. I find it annoying every time I have to move and lug around boxes of CDs. Even if I put them into those big CD books, they still weigh a ton. So, I’d be happy to be rid of those monstrosities.

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August 17th, 2009

$299 laptop specials keep back-to-school shoppers happy; would you buy over a Netbook?

Posted by Andrew Nusca @ 4:03 am

Categories: Best Buy, Computers, Consumerism, Laptops, Netbooks

Tags: Graphics, Laptop Computer, Netbook, Netbooks, Nettops & MIDs, Notebooks, Hardware, Notebooks & Tablets, Andrew Nusca

Specials for fully-featured notebook PCs with $299 price tags are helping laptops stake out ground against the popular 10-inch Netbook segment in a tough economy.

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