Black Friday Deals
 

So, what super-hot deals are you looking forward to? What stores are you going to, and what time will you get there? I've never really even been out of the house on Black Friday before, so I'm excited about giving it a try. I'm willing to sit out there all night for my spot in line, but I can't figure out what to do with my chair when the doors bust open for business.

Re: Black Friday Deals
 

Chair? Wimp. ;)

(Personally, I wait until a little later in the morning--this usually yields good results.)

Honestly, I haven't seen any of the deals, since we don't get the Sunday paper. So hopefully my mom saved the flyers from the paper, or they'll put out a bunch later this week.

Re: Black Friday Deals
 

I haven't seen any ads either, but there's a few websites that have supposedly gotten a hold of them and are listing what deals there are doing to be. Don't the official Ads come out on Wednesday or Thursday? I didn't see anything too fantastic in today's paper.

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Gah! You're not supposed to tell anybody about those! How am I supposed to get my Walmart laptop if everyone goes to get one?

Re: Black Friday Deals
 

http://blackfriday.gottadeal.com/
http://www.bfads.net/

Re: Black Friday Deals
 

what is black friday huh? Someone fill me in please?

Re: Black Friday Deals
 

Black Friday is always the day after thanksgiving, it is when the X-mas gift buying season really starts, and stores celebrate by having huge one time sales.

I have to work black friday :( I have to be at staples at 5:30 am to open up at 6:00 am. I don't think we will be too busy cause they just opened a best buy 3 days ago.

Re: Black Friday Deals
 

Black Friday is the bussinesst shopping day of the year, the day after Thanksgiving. It gets its name becuase its the most profitable sale day, which brings retails out of the red (lost money) into the black (profit).

See: http://blackfriday.gottadeal.com/History

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The Best Buy near my house brought in $500,000 last year on black friday alone.

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I am disappointed that Radio Shack is not offering some promotion for the Vex kits and accessories. It seems like they're not taking advantage of a great opportunity to get the kits under more trees and menorahs and things this holiday season.

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Black Friday. My favorite day of the year. Oh I love shopping... :D

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You WILL be busy. If the Best Buy is next door in the same place, you will be even busier.

I know I've planned what I wanted and driven to a CompUSA that was 20 minutes further then the one closest to me because it was much closer to a Best Buy. I ended up with all that I wanted from both places, and was done with my shopping before 7:30am. :D

Wetzel

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My brother is trying to convince me on this Black Friday plan where we wouldn't get more than 3 hours of sleep Thursday Night. I think he's crazy.

Re: Black Friday Deals
 

Just think of it as a FIRST weekend sleep schedule.. 3 hours is more than enough. :p

Re: Black Friday Deals
 

haha exactly what i was thinking. our team needs a few more kits and i was hoping they would hav some crazy sale like....$75.99

Re: Black Friday Deals
 

The foolish Americans have never heard of Boxing day, so they concocted this pale imitation in its stead. (To make matters worse, they scheduled it after their Thanksgiving holiday, which is obviously on the wrong date.)

Re: Black Friday Deals
 

Boxing Day eh??
Is that when people like Tyson, Holyfield, and Foreman are praised?

:rolleyes:







(And, no.. I'm not serious. This "foolish American" has heard of Boxing Day before)

Re: Black Friday Deals
 

Walmart has links all over the yahoo home page

on black friday they will be selling an HP Pavilion AMD sempron, with 256MB, 40GB HD and wireless network adapter

for $378 ! starting at 5AM.

EDIT: I forgot to mention, its a laptop!

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I've found some nice 4 and 5 megapixel digital cameras under $200 online now, but the best deals will obviously be in the store at 5AM tomorrow.

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There's a full Celeron system for $150 at Best Buy tomorrow.

I'm tempted, but I really oughta save my cash. (And besides, I don't have much of a place to put it in my room.)

I've got my brother going to Circuit City tomorrow with the sole purpose of getting a digital camera for $70 after rebate. 5 MP, to boot. :D

Re: Black Friday Deals
 

BestBuy has a similar laptop for $379 and a desktop with monitor for $150 no rebates and no subscriptions required.

Circuit City has a laptop for $200 (with 512 RAM!) but it requires a year AOL subscription (eww) which will run you another $180 minimum.

Keep in mind you'll have to be like the 1st or 2nd person in line to take advantage of these deals.

Re: Black Friday Deals
 

Which one? I need to try and find a friend who drives to go out with me tomorrow to get my Christmas gift (from my mom). She wants to get me a digital camera, but works tomorrow, therefore....good bye at any chance of a *great* deal.

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I have my game plan all ready for tomorrow....im ready to rumble! *puts on face paint*

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CompUSA in Manchester, CT was pretty crazy. I wasn't able to get the bluetooth headsets I was aiming for, but I did get my 200gb HDD.

Surprisingly, I ran into a whole bunch of other FIRST people there. What are the odds? (Although, given the number of people there I guess it can only be expected.)

People were already camping outside of BestBuy and Circuit City at 1:00am as I was driving home. They must have some pretty good deals, because it was 21 degrees outside!

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I just got back from CompUSA here in Syracuse. I also got my 200gb drive :D . The line was really long.

My friends bought a case of Bawls high caffeine drinks at CompUSA and wanted to wait the rest of the night outside of Best Buy. The mall looked pretty dark in the Best Buy direction, so we got in the car to go to the other side of the mall. The skydeck parking next to it (it's on the 3rd floor of the mall) was closed because maintenance was working on the ice, so we just went home.

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Staying in bed and avoiding the mall altogether sounds like a good deal to me.

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With 20/20 hindsight, this might just be the best idea.

I got to Staples at 4:30 AM for a 6:00 AM opening. The waiting outside wasn't bad, but waiting for an hour and a half in the checkout line was.

On the up side, I got my 512 MB flash drive ($10), HP digital camera ($80), 512 MB SD card for the camera ($15), and surge protector (fuh-reebie!). And I bumped into my AFJROTC instructor while getting breakfast. Woot.

Re: Black Friday Deals
 

Oh I was so disturbed by the sales. I got out of bed early and went to the stores and they had NOTHING! I mean, these were the kinds of sales I'd been seeing all year long! I only saw 2 things below 50% off! How disappointing...

Re: Black Friday Deals
 

I went out with my dad. We started at a sporting goods store that the website thinks is obscene, got some stuff there. Then we went over to Staples. Stood in line for awhile, got 512CF, 512 USB drive, DVD-R spindles, network card(I can now do 100mb :D). Then over to Best Buy. Got a few DVD box sets, a DVI-HDMI converter, wireless box so I don't have to tether my laptop at home. We also found one of the door buster desktop computers sitting in a random spot in the store. We ended up deciding not to take it, but I was surprised that Best Buy let a computer sit out in the middle of the store.

I had fun.

Wetzel

Re: Black Friday Deals
 

Ive never gone shopping on black friday before, so I had to check it out today.

Got up at 4AM, got to the shopping plazas about 4:40 here in rochester, NY.

The parking at Best Buy totally filled their lot, and was spilling over into BabiesRus and Targets parking. Needless to say, thousands of people were standing in line to get the 20 loss-leader laptops that were in the paper.

I drove over to Walmart and got there just after they let everyone in. All the loss-leader stuff was gone by then, and the store was so full of customers with shopping carts that nobody could move in half the store (literally) - shopping cart gridlock.

I had to check it out for myself. Conclusion: Black Friday @ 5AM = Mass Insanity.

This morning was a real education in human nature.

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I got a wireless mouse at staples for $14.94. Sweet

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I work at staples here in maryland. i got to work at like 520 and there was a line of atleast 80 people there for the opening at 6 am. it was a freaking zoo in there. . . we sold out of the flash and SD cards in 45 mins, good thing i got mine at 530 am this morning. :D :D

Re: Black Friday Deals
 

My one experience with Black Friday happened in 2001. Best Buy had none of their "door-buster" specials on the floor. You had to stand in line at the computer section and tell this punk behind the counter what you wanted. [NOTE: "Punk" opinion formed after the purchase, not prejudged.] Then he started adding items onto the basic list . . .
"A USB printer cable."
"I don't need that, I have one."
"But you need an A-B USB cable."
"I already have one."
"Does it have gold plated connectors. We cannot guarantee that this setup will work if you don't have the correct cables."
"Look, I don't need any additional cables, I just need the monitor, printer and computer. Can you just bring the boxes out and I can leave."
"I have to go through these forms and make sure you have everything you need to make this work. Is your USB cable gold plated."
"Yes, it's gold plated", I lied.
"Okay, you'll need a surge supressor to protect your warranty."
"I already have one."
"But it needs to be 1600 joules."
"It is", I once again lied.
"You see, if your surge supressor isn't 1600 joules, and something happens to this system, we cannot honor the warranty or any extended warranty."
"Look, once I walk out with this system, you will never see it again. If it needs any repair, I'll buy what I need and install it myself."
"You really shouldn't do that, you will void your warranty, and you should have an expert work on any repairs you need."
"It's a stinkin' PC!!! People are building them everyday from components!!"
"Then why don't you build your own?"
"Because I want this system, and I don't want to buy additional items I don't need."
"But you do need these items on this list."
Yada . . . yada . . . yada . . .
I finally just shut up and let him add everything to the cart, cables, supressor, CD's, NAV, etc. I did refuse the bloated extended warranty (another 5 minute lecture on how wrong that decision was).

Once everything was loaded in the cart, I took everything except the monitor, printer and computer out and stacked it all in a blank spot on the shelf.

First and last time dealing with the Black Friday phenomenon. It would be troublesome enough dealing with the crowds, but when you have stores and clerks trying to force unnecessary purchases onto customers it becomes maddening. I will never do the Black Friday dance again.

It's definitely much more relaxing to stay home and have a slice of leftover pumpkin pie for breakfast.

Hope all who went out today had much easier experience than I had, and that you actually got the items you were trying to purchase.

--Bill

Re: Black Friday Deals
 

OK, I have officially been dragged into the 21st century (screaming and kicking the whole way).

Im posting this with my new Compaq notebook. Went on sale today at Circuit City: AMD sempron, 512MB ram, 60GB HD, wireless, DVD player w/CD writer, 1024 15" display, lithium Ion battery: $649 (NO rebates - instant savings, what we use to call "on sale!")

Ive been an electrical / HW / SW engineer for 21 years, and this is the first notebook PC Ive bought new (had a 133pentium thinkpad I got on ebay cheap for a while, not real usefull).

Ive always thought of laptops as being flimsy, expensive and somewhat of a show-off toy, but last month the sale of laptops exceeded the sale of desktop computers for the first time in history, so I guess its about time I got with the program :^)