Traditionalists might balk, but the holiday shopping season is already underway. Skeptical? Head to your local department store and you'll be inundated by Christmas trees and ornaments. Bargain hunters, though, know that the real deals are more than a month away.
Black Friday, traditionally, is when retailers truly slash prices. Early birds can save hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars off of their holiday bills. Switched.com checked with a few elves, who gave a sneak peek at what you can expect deal-wise this year.
Blu-ray Players and Movies: Blu-ray is shaping up to be the biggest door buster of this year's Black Friday. de Grandpre expects at least one retailer will offer a Blu-ray player for just $49. Look for bargains on Blu-ray films as well, with last year's hit titles (such as "Iron Man") to fall as low as $5.
Laptops: With the proliferation of Netbooks this year, it's never been easier to find affordable portable computing, but Dan de Grandpre, CEO of DealNews.com says it will get even cheaper on Black Friday. Look for well-equipped Netbooks to sell for $199 – and basic 15" laptops to go for as little as $249.
HDTVs (Pretty big): The holidays are typically the best time to buy a new TV – and Black Friday is the time to do it. If you're looking for a normal sized set, you're in luck. Piper Jaffrey analyst Mitch Kaiser says he expects to see 32-inch LCD sets for as low as $299. GottaDeal.com is estimating 37-inch plasma and LCD sets will fall to $399 or less.
HDTVs (Really big): Need something bigger? How about a 46-47 inch LCD set for $599 – a 25 percent savings? Or a 52-inch LCD for $999? Dealnews says you can expect both. Plasma deals will be a little harder to come by, but a 50-inch set should run roughly $899.
HD Camcorders: You've wanted to shoot your child's school play in HD for a while, but haven't been able to spring for the pricey camcorder. This might be the year. Low-end, flash-based 720p models could drop as low as $60 (though you won't be able to zoom with those). Expect a high quality 1080p HD camcorder for $349.
GPS: While navigation systems have dramatically expanded their reach this year – even making it onto the iPhone – there's still a market for car-based systems. Dealnews predicts you'll be able to find a no-name entry-level system for $49, while a Garmin or Tom-Tom brand will be as low as $69.
Digital Picture Frames: Showcasing your digital pictures consistently gets cheaper. This year, skip the 7-inch screens and focus on the 8- or 9-inch ones, which should be available on Black Friday for as little as $30.
Monitors: Computer monitors might not be the sexiest of gifts, but they're usually welcomed with open arms – and they'll be cheap this year. Name brand 22-inch LCD models may go for as low as $99, while 24-inch models will drop below $150.
Memory: Don't know anyone who needs a monitor? External hard drives are always popular, since they're an easy way to back-up data. Dealnews expects a 1TB drive to fall as low as $49 this year. Gottadeal is looking for 8GB flash drives to hit $15.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
DarkLight said 2:26PM on 1-29-2009
LEDs are the future, and they produce very high quality light too
IMO, we should have skipped CFLs altogether.. I've been using LED lighting for a while, and if you do it yourself, is not expensive at all when you consider the long-time savings (meaning that big companies could have made them consumer-friendly for cheap, they just didn't want to... Of course, everyone likes cash cows)
Oh, just prepare yourself for seeing some WHITE light... There's no -ish tone to speak of here, if you want color, you'll have to paint the walls (Ok there are warm LEDs, but they're less efficient and cost a lot more)
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Jamus said 2:27PM on 1-29-2009
Oddly enough, this past weekend I saw two odd packs of LED lights at Sam's Club: directional 40watts (for can or recessed lighting) and omnidirectional (for lamps, etc..) 40 watts. Here is the kicker... a 3-pack was $14. I started to get one just to see how they looked.
Sam's club item numbers are 116205 and 116198 if you want to check them out.
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DarkLight said 5:18PM on 1-29-2009
The thing is that those are made out of a bunch of old obsolete-style LEDs glued together... It's almost a scam, those are not any more efficient than CFLs, and while ideally they do last for a long time, in reality they don't, expect the LEDs on it to stop working one by one in a not too distant future (or at least be notoriously dimmer)..
You need to look for the ones with special high power LEDs, they usually only have one LED, or at most 3 LEDs
These LEDs look like this: http://freenet-homepage.de/DJNebel/BilderWeb/Cree1.jpg
And the bulbs look like this: http://www.led-spot-light.de/images/71007ww.jpg (LED inside, huge alluminium thing outside)
When you see one, you'll be astounded at it's light output. If you look directly at it your eyes will hurt :-)
Jim said 9:27AM on 2-09-2009
I also saw the LED bulbs at Sam's Club. They were packaged to replace a 40 watt bulb and they used 1.5w themselves. It didn't give the light output on the package. 3 for $14 and change.
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