OT: The yearly gasp over technology improvements... (changed from low traffic)

[John Esak]

>
> By comparison, we could have gotten a 400-watt for $100 at
> CompUSA.  I said
> screw that, and went over to this other place.  Same place that's given me
> great deals on a number of items, from my IBM UltraStor, to Win98se.  One
> time I had just been to in CompUSA and bought an EIDE cable for $17.
> It was a Belkin.  I needed something they didn't have so I stopped over at
> this other place (they happened to be open--they're only open 10-6, so we
> can't catch them as easily as the major chain), and they sold me a better
> quality cable for $3.  I took the Belkin back to CompUSA unopened
> and saved
> $15.

CompUSA (and a couple others like Circuit City and Best Buy, etc.) is/are
exactly the wrong place to go for anything. I've seen some stuff that would
just blow your mind. A 50' (50 foot!!!) network patch cable for $79. Are you
reading this carefully... $79!!!!!!  These cables are $9 and such online...
This is just outrageous.  Plus, wireless access points and routers... big
items these days are usually TWICE the price at CompUSA and the big
electronic stores as at _any_ online place like TechDepot, CDW, Insight.
Sheesh, anyone call Insight or CDW and buy something. They will immediately
accommodate you and the router which costs $99 at CompUSA will cost $37!
Why anyone goes into the big stores is beyond me. The only time Rick and I
go there is if we are desperate for something that minute... and then we
just have to bite the bullet and knowingly bend over.

While we were at J&K Computer (State Of The Art) in Fairfield the other day
picking up some new computers they just made for us, John P. pulled  little
keychain thumb drive (the USB memory sticks) off the shelf. It was 256 Mb,
1.1 and 2.0 USB compliant... and so small it is barely larger than the IC
itself... $50. I bought two of them on the spot. I mean prices of such
things are getting ridiculous these days, but I would bet this same device
in CompUSA would be in the $90 to $150 range.  (Incidentally, 1Gb thumb
drives are now available everywhere, with 2Gb's also available here and
there for big $$$)  We all lovingly do this thread about once a year... but
this one is going to be hard to beat... a 2Gb storage device the size of a
peanut for 1/4 money than the same hard drive would have cost 10 years ago,
and NO MOVING PARTS to ever wear out... forgetting the awesome benefit of
being able to put the thing in your shirt pocket... regardless of how filled
the pocket was with "other" stuff at the time.  Amazing. I just put our
entire Accounting, Order Entry, Inventory, etc., etc., I mean everything...
along with filePro (both Unix and Windows) on this 256mb device. I can take
it anywhere and run it "on-the-device". The only thing I'm missing are our
archive files... big deal.  This technology is just getting more and more
amazing and more and more useful every day.

John

P.S. - Still, the latest best rewards are happening in the wireless area.
Oh, yes, and also this. Yesterday one of our HP-990 printers went a little
wonky. It's crushing envelopes... Oh my... better buy a new printer. (This
one had been about $399 I believe... it has  duplexer on the back...)
Anyway, I call CDW. What is the replacement for an HP-990?  Oh, it's an
HP-5850. Okay, what does it have?  It has a duplexer, better color
resolution, 21ppm black, fonts (for filePro compatibility, full PCL-3) and,
get this, a network port (wireless!). I'm getting ready for him to tell me
like $499... Nope, $144!!!!  Yikes I said, send me two!!!  He says oops,
sorry sir, I forgot to tell you I can't get the price any lower than the
$144 because there is a $50 rebate going on now!  I nearly fell off the
chair. This printer is going to cost me $94... and people are complaining
about the economy???  :-)

(yes, yes, I know different aspects of the economy are not so good, even
horrible I guess if you've just lost a job, etc. But, on the whole, with the
single exception of gasoline, the consumer is getting one helluva bang for
his buck these days.  Now, if we could only do this in medical care, water
supply and musical instruments... :-)