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)
iphonerulez said 2:08PM on 3-13-2009
IE8 is right up there on the best list with Vista and the Zune. The best Booby Prize list.
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Nefreteri said 4:03AM on 3-14-2009
IE 8 is the WORST browser Microsoft made.
I ran it on a virus-free, updated, computer with plenty of hard drive space and it froze up on me and task manager couldn't even end the process due to it trying to restore a page and "Looping" continuously.
Yep. It's really fast.
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Brian said 4:06AM on 4-12-2009
I don't know what's wrong with your computers, but in my experience the other browsers aren't noticeably faster loading individual pages.
I'm running the Windows 7 (7068 beta, 32 bit) with IE8, chrome, and firefox. (E8400 / 3GB / GTX 260) MLB.com loads up equally fast on all browsers.
Chrome seems to have the easiest time going from one page, to another, to another, and so on. Nothing slows it down and it's task manager has been useful when adobe reader or flash crash the browser. I don't know if IE8 for Vista closes individual windows, but IE8 for Windows 7 does. In the last week, one page crashed for me (Quicktime caused the crash), and IE8 wisely killed only the one tab.
Sure, it's popular to hate anything Microsoft, but you're really running out of reasons. Vista is fixed, Zune is a great iPod alternative, and IE8 is a medeocre browser. They're not awful, they're just not the best.
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James said 12:13AM on 4-20-2009
While it is fun to hate Microsoft, that's not what this article is about. It's about Microsoft saying that IE is the fastest browser when everyone, and I mean everyone knows it's not faster. You yourself called IE a mediocre browser and all benchmarks go to support your claim, but Microsoft is saying it is the best.
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Yaro said 2:45PM on 4-28-2009
"Sure, it's popular to hate anything Microsoft, but you're really running out of reasons. Vista is fixed, Zune is a great iPod alternative, and IE8 is a medeocre browser. They're not awful, they're just not the best."
Vista - Still broken for most users even after SP1 "fixed" it like you claim.
Zune - HAHAHAHAHA. Just as crappy as the iPod. I'd rather not have an overpriced, DRM-encumbered, proprietary media player, thanks. There's better players out there than both.
IE is worse than mediocre: It's insecure, unstable, and non-standards-compliant.
Anyone who pays attention to Microsoft's business practices and has used alternatives to their products will easily tell you that Microsoft is two things: 1. Evil. 2. Sucks.
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Zain said 5:52PM on 5-01-2009
No doubt Its the worst browser of alll!!!
Not because its just slow, they still cant figure out the CSS compatibility issues with millions of sites out there, which run absolutely perfect on any browser except IE.
C'mon Microsoft ! is this what you call your "Best browser"?? :s
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Ortanith said 5:24AM on 7-04-2009
Vista works fine never had a problem with it.
Zune is equal to the Ipod in performance which is not saying much.
I don't use IE because I have a preference but for the sake of it I loaded IE8 and loaded MLB.com it was only slightly slower then FF 3.5 which is what I use mostly atm.
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