Fry's Visits

2007-11-17T02:38:00.000-08:00

Guess who's back? Minor update to be followed soon by something more substantial.

Black Friday is approaching and I'm starting to see all of my favorite gadget haunts load up on inventory for the unwashed masses that will get in my way post Turkey day. I heard on NPR that consumer electronics are the way to go this holiday season assuming you aren't buried under a balloon ARM or CC debt. What does that mean? iPods for everyone!

I'm guessing Olevia LCDs, GQ laptops, and other assorted 3rd tier electronics on sale for Fry's on Friday. Are they going to do something with HD-DVD ala Wal*Mart's $99 Toshiba A2? Probably not... but hey, maybe they'll drop the A3 under $200?

Been picking up most of my holiday game releases at stores other than Fry's. Why? Fry's has been aggressive with AAA this year, selling many at their magical $37.99 mark. Great if you can line up on Tuesdays, not so great when you can't and they're OOS for the next 2 weeks.

Kane and Lynch... the only other worse possible date would have been 9/25.

2006-01-30T08:58:00.000-08:00

Reposting in order to get rid of comment spam... new posts soon.

Trust me, I've been a complete consumer whore these past few weeks, I just haven't blogged about it.

I'm staring down a stack of Fry's receipts. Here's a rundown (details to follow):

9/26/2005 - $6.48 - Cheapest trip ever. MobilePC Magazine
9/16/2005 - $238.14 - Another Seagate 400GB
9/16/2005 - $279.26 - Seagate 400GB & XBox Burnout Revenge
8/29/2005 - $54.11 - RF wireless keyboard/mouse (same day)
8/29/2005 - $67.84 - Bluetooth USB, Pemmican, USB extension cable, switch, Cup O Noodles
8/12/2005 - $109.28 - ATA Raid adapter, Dogtown & ZBoyz, Harry Potter 3, Retro Gamer
7/29/2005 - $151.52 - Logitech Bluetooth Headset, Iron Giant, Bluetooth USB
7/26/2005 - $22.31 - Paycheck, Face/Off, Mamba candy

Once again I amaze myself. Also, you may be wondering why I picked up those hard drives? Well, I've been busy putting together a file server... here is the result:

Yowza.

2005-07-17T17:10:00.000-07:00

Yep, been to Fry's a bunch of times. Nope, I haven't been posting.

Baby steps... I'm going to update with my latest trip and then fill in a few of the previous trips as I sort through my receipts later this week.

I'm back to the "Fry's on Friday" trips, even though the random 1 Day Only Wed/Tues deals are enticing. Not a lot in the flyer actually attracted me, save for noticing that they were using the new Harry Potter book as a loss leader ($13.99 on Saturday) and this is the third week they've been pimping a relatively expensive Intel dual-core CPU/MB combo.

The 400GB Seagate is on sale yet again. I've somehow managed to fill another drive, but I'm holding off on getting anything new until the SATA drives start dropping a bit.

Went with J, so I decided to make it a quick trip. Their selection of mini-fridges leaves a lot to be desired, but I guess it's not a big product (no pun intended) for the American market. I have seen that Europeans / Asians have a much greater selection of smaller "dorm size" refrigerators due to space concerns. Regardless, passed on what was available. Also browsed past the wine storage units.... maybe for the next place.

Ended up grabbing what I came in for, ink for my Epson Stylus Photo R200 printer. Strangely they only had 3rd party cartridges for the R2/300 series AND they were completely out of Cyan. Picked up the magenta, light magenta, yellow, and light cyan carts produced by a company called Print-Rite. Haven't given them extensive testing, but so far so good. Plus they don't have that weird 'paint' smell that I've gotten from carts I've ordered from Ink4Art. Cost was approximately 30% cheaper than the Epson branded stuff.

Oh, one "store has changed" note. The video cards have been pushed back to behind the computer section, similar to the Sunnyvale store. What was there is now filled with laptop bags. Probably a good choice in terms of consistency, but if an employee is trying to get a laptop buyer to load up on accessories as well, he has to lead his/her customer through TWO aisles to get the bag and then portable mouse/portable power adapter, etc. And given the layout of the store, the employee will have to basically lead the prospect away from the cash registers to get to the next area. Not a great strategy IMHO. Why not put all the laptop-related goodies in the same area (on either side of the aisle)? Oh well, I guess Fry's never really was a place for great store layout... just thinking about ways they could increase their bottom line.

And yes, I do realize that this is based on the assumption that the Fry's employee actually helps a customer find accessories for the laptop.

Total Time Spent: 10 minutes
Total Money Spent: $35.96

2005-05-22T19:23:00.000-07:00

A few trips to Fry's... spending amounts to be confirmed once I find recepits:

5/20
Nothing like spending a romantic 40 minutes at Fry's. No, I'm not kidding. Somehow my special someone managed to stick by me for the better part of an hour at the Palo Alto Fry's. Fortunately for me, she embraces my inner (?) retail / technology geek and kept herself sufficiently entertained.

Anyway, it's their 20th Anniversary Sale and the parking lot was pretty packed. Of course, the two things I went there for, the Sharp XR-1S projector ($650-150 rebate) and Audigy 2 ZS Gamer ($100 - 60 rebate) were both sold out. Not really surprising. What *was* surprising was that they still had the Olevia 27" LCD TV ($700) in stock. Lots of people looking at it, including me. In the end I passed as a) I have a 24" LCD on the way (Dell 2405FPW) and b) I'll save some pennies for a larger 50" plasma to go with the HTPC. Oh, cute incident: J took a look at a Daewoo 42" plasma, excited and actually looking to buy it. Unfortunately she had been looking at the price for the stand and not the screen. If the moment were a cartoon, you would have seen little hearts leaping from my head.

Quick swings through other areas didn't really reveal much. They don't have docking cradles for Treo 650s or Jabra 250 bluetooth headsets in stock. Buffalo networking endcap was understocked and the LCD video was off.

Lots of other random deals, including one on the 400gb Seagate. $230 - 40 MIR. I finally jumped on this as I desparately need more storage for the machine in the living room. I also grabbed all of my missing MST3K DVDs and Mean Girls, which I've been told is pretty interesting. Also bought a 1gb SD card for the new Treo and a bag of PREMIUM CUT Teriyaki Pemmican. What makes it premium cut? I have no idea. I sense no difference and, in fact, it tastes worse. Given the new 'shiny silver blocky extreme' font, I suspect they're just trying to lure in more buyers with the same product.

Total Time Spent: 40 minutes
Total Money Spent: ~ $560

5/something
I've been setting up a HTPC with Windows Media Center Edition 2005. I initally tried to just install the ATI HDTV Wonder but the product is finicky with just a digital tuner save for some software hacks, so I ended up getting the Hauppauge PVR-150 analog tuner to accompany the digital card. Seems to work okay. Not much else to report on this trip.

Total Time Spent: 10 minutes
Total Money Spent: ~ $120

5/something-earlier-than-the-post-above
Ran in to get a birthday gift for a friend. Got Season 5 of Star Trek the Next Generation on DVD. It's actually getting more difficult to find them nowadays.

Total Time Spent: 5 minutes
Total Money Spent: ~$110

2005-04-24T15:14:00.000-07:00

Quick visit to Fry's on Friday before dinner at the Fish Market with my super lady. Initially I went looking for the Mystery Science Theater 3K DVDs, but they didn't have any in stock. I've had somewhat mixed results looking for DVDs at Fry's lately, for some reason their movie shelving doesn't really facilitate browsing very well.

They were also sold out of Wipeout for the PSP. Interesting development though, they had JAPANESE PSP games on sale with a sticker identifying it as a Region 2 that would play in the US system. Pretty bold move and I wonder what the import shops thought when they saw it. I see a lot of customer service headaches if they continue bringing in imports.

So, I had a Nintendo DS at launch, but ended up returning it because it sat in it's box for literally 2 months. I just didn't have a hankering for Super Mario DS I guess. Anyway, now that Yoshi, Wario Ware, Zoo Keeper, and a few others are out, I decided to pick it up again. Snagged a DS, Wario Ware, and the on-sale Zoo Keeper. Rounded out the game purchases with the bargain bin Jeopardy for the Playstation2.

Big (400gb) drives are still not on sale. The computer case aisle seems more garish every time I walk past. Of course, I have an understated Lian Li 6070A, so if you know what that is, you know where my style loyalties lie.

Took a quick swing past the iBooks. I find it ludicrous that they would offer a model with only 256MB of RAM. The user probably isn't going to be happy with the performance and think that all Macs are slow, when in reality they would see a significant improvement in speed if they just bumped up the memory. Either that or the only people that buy it are part of the "I am hip b/c I have a cute stylish Mac that I don't know how to use except for web surfing" crowd.

Rounded out purchases with a copy of the latest Mobile PC mag. Now with shiny sticker proclaiming "The World's #1 Moble Tech Magazine". Does that include the potentially hundreds of thousands they gave out for free at trade events? Just wondering.

Total Time Spent: 30 minutes
Total Money Spent: $239.18

2005-04-14T20:44:00.000-07:00

Pretty uneventful visit yesterday. I went in and the aisles had little tags on the shelves... further investigation revealed that an army of RGIS (inventory specialists) contractors armed with scanning guns had invaded the store. I'm facinated as to how you can manage to inventory a store, down to the last bag of Pemmican, while remaining open. Anyway, it was tough to shop as a lot of boxes had been flipped around (especially in the game/dvd areas) and there were often swarms of people around trying to scan the item you were looking at.

There was a Kodak LS743 4MP digital camera on sale for $99 (no rebates). Not a bad price, but actually holding the camera revealed that it's pretty 'cheap' looking with very few manual features. Good for the point and shoot, but a little too much on the chinsy side for me.

Not a whole lot else to report. I went in looking for the Lexar JumpDrive Lightning but they didn't seem to carry it. Maybe next time.

Total Time Spent: 25 minutes
Total Money Spent: $0

2005-04-04T23:39:00.000-07:00

An update on the actual day of a Fry's visit? Perish the thought!

Okay, a little background... I'm putting an HTPC in the living room. Pretty standard specs, 3000+ Athlon64, 1GB RAM, big drives, etc. The one problem is that the All-In-Wonder totally farks up the machine when I try to install the Catalyst drivers. I'm chalking it up to a crappy (Gigabyte NForce3) motherboard. I went to pick up a new card, but balked at paying way too much for a sub-par (GeForce FX 5500 PVR card) graphics card. $230 for 2 generations ago? No thank you. Also, I don't think I noticed it before, but the shelves at Fry's are DOMINATED by ATI. I run Radeons in most of my machines... but competition sparks innovation.

I also looked for separate TV cards, but they were out of the Hauppauge 250 and many others. Diamond's 550 intrigued me, esp since it came with BeyondTV and hardware MPEG2 encoding, but I passed as I have read nothing about it.

2.2GB USB drives by Emprex were only $80. Was seriously considering it, but I've heard bad things about the transfer speeds.

Also wanted to get Wipeout Pure for the PSP. Wouldn't ya know it, they were out. In fact, there were only a few games on the shelf... they looked cleaned out. Only things there: Tiger Woods, NFS, Gretzky Hockey (1 copy), and Activision's Spiderman 2. No Monkey Ball for XBox either. Doom3 XBox for $36.99 but I passed since I finished the PC version and wasn't super entertained. "Special" edition for $60.

Quick lap around a few other sections. I noticed that nearly ALL of their PCs had game demos running. Need For Speed Underground and Republic Commando seemed prominent. I wonder if this is a new push for selling their branded Fry's PCs? The Earthlink display changed as well... it was really dusty and one of the computers was missing. Classy.

400gb drives still pricey... 500gb on the way. Buffalo networking has a new end cap display with an LCD screen and some woman talking about Buffalo tech support or some such nonsense. I didn't watch it. Buffalo is probably excited I noticed it. Little do they realize I notice everything (and run on their products anyway).

Adaptec has a new Easy Media Creator 7.5. Better DivX support, which was my main complaint. I don't know if I'll upgrade.

Not much else to report... Oh, they got rid of the 'bubble wrap padding' craziness and gate near the front door, where there's a path between the return aisle and the cashier aisle. It's much more open now. No idea why. Maybe it's supposed to look better?

Total Time Spent: 35 minutes
Total Money Spent: $0

2005-03-31T22:50:00.000-08:00

Huzzah! The PSP launch date! Fry's, in their infinite wisdom, decided to make you buy a bundle if you wanted Sony's new pocket (well, cargo pants pocket) rocket. Since the games they were offering were going to be what I would buy anyway, I decided to give them my business... that and as I passed by the San Carlos Best Buy there were about 100 people in line.

The doors were going to open at 8am and I was pleasantly surprised to find only about 20 people in line. A few people looked hard core, others looked like they were sent there by the kids. Bundles advertised included the system, Need For Speed Underground, and either Lumines or Metal Gear Ac!d (not a typo, stupid exclimation point is part of the title). Upon arrival, they also had a bundle that was all accessories (hideous fanny pack, UMD protectors, car kit, and 'power pack' battery).

One of the managers stepped out to view the line and proclaimed "oh wow, we have plenty"... obviously expecting a much larger crowd. We entered in and were ushered over to the DVD aisle to get a quote. Of course, we passed by pre setup racks of accessories (high margin fun) and as we waited we were serenaded by songs of employees saying things like "the battery life sucks... buy a power pack". How often is it you hear salespeople telling you about how a part of something sucks that you're waiting in line to buy?

I did end up getting the screen protectors as well ($9.99 for two... I feel dirty). Since I pretty much knew I wasn't going to have time to play, I didn't get any other games besides NFS and Lumines. Wipeout and a big Memory Stick Duo will be mine next trip.

Overall impressions? It's pretty amazing. The screen is phenomenal, even though I have a few of the notorious dead pixels. Doesn't bother me that much and I figured as much since it's a Sony product that there would be defects. I like the video and music functionality and overall I feel it's a pretty good deal for $250. In a way, I wish it were smaller. As I said earlier, this isn't exactly something you shove in your pocket, unless of course you're wearing Hammer pants.

Total Time Spent (including waiting in line): 20 minutes
Total Money Spent: $384.83

Oh yeah, there was also a trip BEFORE the PSP trip (a few days earlier). Interesting tidbits:

There was a FURIOUS customer over by the computer repair bay. He sounded as though the technician behind the bench had just slapped him in the face. Apparently he brought in his inkjet printer in for repair. During the repair process, they replaced his ink cartridges. Result? You guessed it... the ink cost more than the printer itself. Hot. Razor blade sales model, my friend.

I was tempted to pick up the new Plextor dual-layer DVD burner since MaxPC basically stated that it'll do all that and a bag of chips. Then I realized that a) I have no need at the moment and b) well... no b)... just a).

I did, however, end up picking up a 512MB USB thumb drive (PNY Attache). Cheap at $35. It came in SUPER handy that weekend when I had to shuttle files from multiple machines that weren't networked, though I wish I would have gotten the 1gb model. Oh well, next time.

I couldn't resist a rebate item... Antec NeoPower 480w power supply. Yes, I was excited about a great price on a PC POWER SUPPLY. It's an amazingly stable and quiet PS and with a $50 rebate, only $50 + tax. It'll be perfect for that new mega PC on the drawing board. I also debated the 400gb drives, but right now the only models they have sport 8mb cache... I figure if I'm going to drop that coin on a huge drive, I might as well wait for 16mb SATA II models.

More couples looking at pr0n. Maybe it's easier for them than the shady places on parts of El Camino. I got the new Incredibles DVD, which has some awesome bonus features, and a roll of packing tape for a friend who's moving.

Games wise there wasn't anything really exciting. I did notice that it's pretty hard to find an XBox lately. Rumor has it that M$ has stopped production in anticipation of the XBox 360 (or XBox Next, or XBox "Bill Gates Love Machine"). Not sure of the validity, but it is certainly scarce on the shelves... that and I haven't seen the PSTwo (slim PS2) at Fry's in a few months.

That about does it... Final thoughts? They didn't have any of the new Sprint phones in stock. The return line had NOBODY in it (scary sight). They had the Canon SD500 in stock.

Total Time Spent: 30 minutes
Total Money Spent: $166.89

2005-03-29T21:53:00.000-08:00

Updates coming, I'm just being lazy. I got a PSP. Do you know who the person in the picture is? If you do, you're a geek.

A Picture Share!

2005-03-18T18:59:00.000-08:00

2005-03-13T00:00:00.000-08:00

Lots of trips to document, but a few of them were so long ago that I've forgotten some details. I'll try to recall best I can:

2/12/2005 - Interesting trip with a female friend. I wonder if Fry's has done any studies as to what percentage of their customers are female? Given the no-frills service and questionable store layout, my guess would be somewhere around 70% male. Anyway, I didn't make my normal rounds as I doubt others (especially women) are as interested in how much the video card aisle has changed.

Ended up grabbing Season 1 of Arrested Development and a bag of Turkey Pemmican. Sounds like a party to me!

Total Time Spent: 15 minutes
Total Money Spent: $38.44

3/4/2005 - Part of my game-buying spree. I intially went to pick up the new slim PS2, but they were sold out. Apparently this has been a pretty common occurance. Aren't there 20 mil PS2s out there? Who still needs one?

The ATI HDTV Wonder is soon to be discontinued, so that crazy box probably won't be gracing the shelves anymore. Publicly it's due to the DRM issues, but I still think it's due to retailer backlash for creating a stupid box.

Grabbed Resident Evil 4 for the GameCube for someone else.

Also walked out with Star Wars: Republic Commando for the PC at the "Fry's AAA release price" of $37.99. I also snagged another copy of Amplitude for the PS2 for a friend and a copy of Mobile PC mag that had a list of the '100 top gadgets'. #1? The Powerbook. Seriously.

Total Time Spent: 15 minutes
Total Money Spent: $80.07
Total Money Spent (for someone else): $54.11

3/5/2005 - Yes, the next day. And this one is a doozy. I ended up going to TWO Fry's locations. A friend of mine (male this time) was in the process of building a new PC and needed to grab some parts. Specifically, cases and a high-end video card. First stop? Sunnyvale Fry's. It was a beautiful day and, of course, the store was completely packed.

I think I've mentioned it before, but it bears repeating... the Sunnyvale Fry's is a MUCH more shopper friendly environment. I want to buy more. I'm not kidding. Nintendo DS systems were on sale for $129.99. I'm sure they sold out quickly. They also had two Ultracade machines (emulator cabinets) set up with the volume set REALLY high. The sweet sounds of Capcom's 1942 echoed through the store.

Friend got the ridiculously expensive Silverstone tower case (~$299.99) and an Antec power supply. Feeling outclasses, I ended up picking up Pinball Hall Of Fame for the XBox. It's not that good.

Total Time Spent: 20 minutes
Total Money Spent: $21.64

3/5/2005 - Since they didn't have the 6800 Ultra in Sunnyvale, we stopped at Palo Alto on the way back up. PA didn't have them either. Having shopped at Fry's twice in the past 12 hours, I didn't stay long.

Total Time Spent: 10 minutes
Total Money Spent: $0

2005-01-24T22:35:00.000-08:00

Most boring... purchases... ever...

As a large portion of my consumer goods purchases occur at Fry's, it is only fitting that when I also need more domestic items, I try Fry's first. This evening I headed over to pick up one of those domestic essentials for today's professional man... an iron. Yes folks, the old Black & Decker I had before finally started to shed its teflon all over one of my shirts and it was time to bring in the cavalry.

They had a pretty big selection, from the $20 "might totally f-up your shirt because there is no temp control" job to a super deluxe cordless wonder. I probably would have gravitated to any one of them that had a digital display, but apparently LCDs are not seen as necessary in today's high-tech clothes-flattening-appliance world. Ended up splitting the difference and getting a Panasonic NI-C76SR, probably because it looked okay and had a neat retractable cord.

As an impulse, I also picked up one of those "magic touch" hair trimmers. After attempting to use it this evening I have come to two conclusions:

1) This device does not cut hair... even if you put a hair directly on the blades.
2) There is a reason you don't hear it operating in the commercial, because it sounds like you just started up a wood chipper in your bathroom.

Stay very far away.

Other observations... they finally got SLI-capable PCI Express video cards in stock. Granted, they had no motherboards that support this feature, but it's nice to see them on the shelves anyway. The Palo Alto store also reorganized the motherboard rack. I must say that it's much nicer than before, with the new ABIT Fatal1ty board prominently displayed.

Given the purchases I had in my hand, I found it necessary to get something remotely technical. Ended up getting the latest Mobile PC Mag. Oh, that reminds me, for some reason one copy of every adult magazine was spread out over the non-blacked out racks. Very strange to see "Perfect 10" next to "Modern Bride", or is it?

Total Time Spent: 15 minutes
Total Money Spent: $60.59

2005-01-08T01:19:00.000-08:00

Once again I have emerged from my cave to give an update on my latest Fry's exploits.

Black Friday: Yup, missed it again. To be honest there didn't seem like that many insane deals, save for a few items over the $1K line (which were great deals, but only if you were willing to drop the coin). What I found most strange about the ads during the holiday season were the "Gifts Under" pages. Basically they would have a bunch of items "Under $20" progressing to "Under $1000". There was the usual assortment of webcams, PDAs, and the like... but there were also bizarre suggestions like Adobe After Effects in the under 1K section. Nothin' says I love you like the gift of software.

Today's visit: Went with a co-worker who went on a rampage (DVD burner, Apple AirPort Express, and a 4G iPod case). They didn't have Harold and Kumar go to white castle in stock, so I ended up just doing a lot of people watching. Two particular groups of customers:

The "smart friend". Three guys in the DVD burner aisle. One of them insisting to the others that DVD-R was the only DVD burning standard that works in home DVD players and the others following like sheep. Okay, -Rs are traditionally more compatible with home players, but +R does not neccessarily mean completley incompatible.

The "couple that needs to spice up their love life by buying porn at Fry's". Regular-looking middle age couple (white guy, Asian woman) caught crusing through the pr0n section. The woman kept looking around as if suddenly Ed McMahon would pop out saying she won the sweepstakes while standing in front of a bunch of "Ebony Action" DVDs. Guy seemed kind of into it and would often ask for her opinion by showing her the back of the case. She did not seem interested. Magic 8-ball says "Outlook not so good".

Other than that it was a pretty uneventful visit. The return line was the shortest I think I've EVER seen it (1 guy in line) and the webcam aisle looked picked clean. Was that a really popular gift for the holidays? Do you really want Uncle Bob showing his naughty bits on the net with a webcam you gave him? May that thought haunt you forever.

Happy New Year!

Total Time Spent: 20 minutes
Total Money Spent: $0 (w00t)

2004-11-18T20:13:00.000-08:00

Games! Games! Games!

Okay, I'm consolidating multiple Fry's trips because I haven't had time to update in a long while.

All of the video game companies see fit to release AAA title after AAA title right during Christmas. For those of us that are addicts, this time of the year is especially hard on the wallet. Example:

November 9th (hmm... wonder what I could have gotten?): Halo 2 Collectors Edition, 2 XBox S-controllers (for multi-player fun with my other XBox), and the VEG Lite VGA adapter (since returned, as it's quality is awful). $189.39

November 10th (THE NEXT DAY?!): Katamari Damacy (PS2, finally in stock) and Mobile PC Magazine. $28.12 Whew, a light day.

November 16th (Take a wild guess #2): Half-Life 2 Collector's Edition, Ratchet and Clank: Up Your Arsenal, and Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. $183.99

November 17th (Gah, next day again): Metroid Prime 2: Echoes, Paper Mario. Can't find the recepit, but I believe it came to $97.40.

Okay, comments... Yes, I did buy Paper Mario and San Andreas late. That is, assuming you believe that a week or so later is 'late'. I considered Need For Speed Underground 2, but the fact that you have to drive to the shop/races/etc. turns me off a bit. Plus, it's not like I don't have other things to play.

Amazingly I haven't bought any real computer equipment lately. I'm still waiting on the Socket 939 boards with PCI-Express, and will upgrade once those come out. HL2 runs surprsingly well regardless, so maybe that $ can be put elsewhere.

The store itself hasn't started getting crazy busy yet... but it'll come. Based on my repeated visits, I can tell that there are a lot of new people. Best of luck surviving the holiday season boys & girls!

A Picture Share!

2004-10-22T13:32:00.000-07:00

Since it's hard to see.. this is an overclockable NVidia 6800 Ultra that REQUIRES water cooling. Talk about your niche market! That and it's $599.99. Um, who the hell is buying this at Fry's?

2004-10-10T22:08:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the lack of updates. Fear not, I've been visiting Fry's regularly (and buying a ton of crap I don't need), just haven't had a chance to blog it.

Here's a taste. I think that they're currently clearing out inventory to make room for the shiny new products that come out at Christmas, so Fry's held a series of 'One Day Only' sales where you would have to buy X for $X. I ended up taking advantage of two of the deals to fill out some holes (and lost DVDs/games). DVDs, 4 for $20: Manchurian Candidate (Sinatra, not Denzel), This Is Spinal Tap (because I can't find mine), Ronin (car chase), and Die Another Day (because I couldn't think of another one to get that I didn't already have). Games, 3 for $30: Wind Waker (can't find the disc), Pikmin, and Animal Crossing (might as well for the memory card). Um, also grabbed an XBox wireless controller for $17.99 as an impluse.

There were actually a number of very good deals, but I figured I did enough damage... last thing I need around here is another PC.

Total time spent: 15 minutes
Total money spent: $72.52

2004-09-04T10:08:00.000-07:00

Media mania!

Stopped in to pick up an LCD projector and a bunch of movies to have a mini film festival. Turned out that the Palo Alto store was pretty much sold out of every projector in the house (at least in my price range), so I ended up splurging on some DVDs and games to help fill some holes in the DVD collection. I've actually owned a few of these movies on LaserDisc:

Movies: Scarface Anniversary Edition, Basketball Diaries, Dark City, Glengarry Glen Ross, Logan's Run, Twin Peaks Season One, The Thirteenth Floor

Games: Xbox ESPN NHL 2K5 (only $13.99!) and Street Fighter Anniversary Edition for the PS2.

Magazines: The new issue of Mobile PC magazine.

Quite a haul, as you can see. I was pretty amazed at what's getting released onto DVD nowadays. Alf?

In other news, they have the ATI HDTV Wonder in stock, but the box is so unweildy that it's hidden off on top shelves and in corners. What is going on over in the product packaging section of ATI? I'm sure that retailers hate the box. If you haven't seen it, it's this enormous wedge with a football player on it. And when I say enormous I mean from back of the shelf to front of the shelf 18" wide 'wedge-so-you-can't-stack-them' enormous. I've heard some mixed reviews, and I guess I'm going to wait until the dust settles before making the plunge.

Not much else to report... they seem to have quite a few stacks of refurb PCs. Most likely for the back-to-school crowd. The NVidia 6800s are also starting to proliferate in the video card aisle. A little aside on that... I noticed an ATI X800 box was opened up... shouldn't those things be spider wrapped?

Enough of this retail product presentation and loss prevention seminar.

Total Time Spent: 45 minutes (mostly LCD related)
Total Money Spent: $153.37

2004-08-15T21:07:00.000-07:00

Quick post:

Had to stop in to get an international laptop power adapter for a friend's upcoming overseas trip and while I was there I figured I should upgrade my computer to 1GB of RAM. Fortunately, they had a bundle set up (2 X 512MB PC3200 DDR SDRAM) that fit my needs. Oh, also picked up Roxio's Easy Media Creator 7. Not super happy with it as it doesn't do everything I need it to do.

Looks like the Garden State soundtrack is sold out everwhere. Ended up piecing it together from my own music collection and iTunes.

Total Time Spent: 20 minutes
Total Money Spent: $335.54

2004-08-05T22:38:00.000-07:00

Had my first truly awful experience at Fry's on Tuesday!

Went in to pick up Doom 3 (on sale for $44.99) and an Athlon 2500+/MB combo. Got there and there was a big empty space where Doom3 was supposed to be. :( To make matters worse, they were also sold out of the combo. Ugh. I haven't really had issue with many of the staff (save for the cashier in the 2nd post ever), but in this case I really felt as if I was treated rudely. After I asked for the combo, the associate said it was sold out almost as if it was the 3rd time I had asked her. How was I supposed to know?

Anyway, thanks to an awesome co-worker, I now have a copy of Doom 3 in my hand at the on-sale price. She took one for the team and got them for us after today's shipment.

Still debating Fry's on Friday. Let's see what's on sale first...

2004-06-27T11:20:00.000-07:00

Big Huge Mega Update

Okay, I finally got most of my Fry's recepits together, so here's a big update on what I've been up to:

4/23 - Had to get moving supplies so I snagged a 3M packing tape gun and a few rolls of tape. Of course, I couldn't resist picking up a Maximum PC (why don't I just subscribe?), Wario Ware for the GameCube, and Star Trek 3 Special Edition. Total Money Spent: $73.01

5/7 - After the move there were a lot more DVDs and games to store, so I bought another Atlantic DVD tower and some coax connectors for the DirecTV wiring. Total Money Spent: $55.51

5/17 - Figured out that I needed a lot of new cables to hook up the AV equipment in the new house. Component video and optical audio cables were the order of the day (Monster). Total Money Spent: $114.70

5/22 - The inside of my computer case was a mess with virtually no airflow. The Radeon 9700 Pro paid the price during a session of Painkiller. To aid in keeping my new card (Radeon 9800 Pro) alive, I outfitted the motherboard with new Vantec rounded IDE and floppy cables. Total Money Spent: $25.95

5/22 - (Yes, the same day) The network situation in the house was getting a bit ridiculous (dropped wireless signals, no way to connect the TiVo/Xbox, lack of security, etc.) so I migrated to a Buffalo wireless system. To help out the signal a bit I got the WLE-NDR antenna for the router. In addition, I had to get a new microwave (Daewoo KOR-630A) and a few cans of compressed air to clean out the newly cabled case. Total Money Spent: $121.21

Wow, that's a hell of a lot of money spent! $390.38. I won't even hazard a guess as to the time spent right now. I can say that in the past few weeks I've gone in but haven't spent any money. To quote Martha Stewart... "It's a good thing".

2004-06-22T09:18:00.000-07:00

As you can see, I've picked up a new camera phone (Toshiba VM4050) since my last post and will snag shots of interesting products from time to time.

I also have a huge stack of recepits that I need to go through and record. I'm afraid... they weren't one-off Pemmican trips, they were "get new toys for the new house" shopping extravaganzas.

A Picture Share!

2004-06-21T14:06:00.000-07:00

Wow.

2004-04-16T23:19:00.000-07:00

Quick stop into Fry's on a Friday. I initially went in to pick up the WD 200GB 8MB 7200rpm cache drive for $139.99, but when I got there the 250 was on sale (unadvertised) at $179.99. I figured I can always find a use for the extra 50 gigs and went for the 250.

I kind of wandered around for a bit, looked at new mice & some digital cameras. I've been considering picking up the Canon SD10 cuz it's all tiny and hip-looking. For some reason, I never realized that it doesn't have a viewfinder. Is this a big deal? I don't know.

I took a look at PDAs as well. No, I'm not getting it to get organized... I'm thinking about getting one and pulling the 4gb CF drive out of a MuVo2 and making myself a portable video player. Do I really want to drop 600 bones to figure out if it works for me? No.

I shoulda bought two more 250s... then my home machine would have over a terabyte of storage. Mmmmm... terabyte.

Total Time Spent: 30 min
Total Money Spent: $194.84

2004-04-04T16:56:00.000-07:00

Okay, so 2 weeks ago Fry's had a 'Grand Opening' sale to celebrate the arrival of the new Concord store. They had INSANE deals for just one day, so I stopped by Palo Alto Fry's during my lunch break...

MADNESS. People were pratically parking in people's driveways. The line was so long they had this poor employee wearing a backpack with a balloon tied to it to signify the back of the line. I managed to snag one of the refurb XBoxes for $99.99 and a GBA SP + Konami Arcade Classics (sucks) for $77.99. Apparently they had 27" TVs for a hundred bucks and practially everyone had some iron on sale for a buck or whatever after rebates. I don't remember all the specific deals, but there were definitely people on treasure hunts going from area to area to pick up the 'deal'.

Last week I went to the Sunnyvale Fry's and it made me realize how incredibly ghetto PA is. It was big, bright, airy, and seemed to have a lot more stuff. I was going to pick up a new wireless router (D-Link DI-524) but passed for the time being. I asked an employee if they were sold out of the IPod mini and he said "Sorry, we're sold out... have been for a month." I guess he went into automatic when I asked about it, but it showed he didn't even hear my full question.

I'm still hemming and hawing about getting a wireless 'game' adapter to connect the TiVo and XBox now that I had to pull the wired connection to them (long story). It seems so random that a bridge would cost 3X more than I can get a router for. Of course, there are very few routers that can go into client mode. I wonder why that is...

Lots of misc trips for magazines, cables, etc... Oh, picked up 'Far Cry' for $29.99 on Friday and it is the bee's knees. Graphics are probably the best I've seen. How did I miss this one @ E3?

Total Time Spent: 2 hours in the past 4 weeks?
Total Money Spent: ~$300

2004-03-01T23:31:00.000-08:00

I've been stopping by Fry's about once or twice a week recently. No real major purchases, just a pack of zip ties here or a momentary pushbutton there. I did, however, take advantage of a little sale that they ran on the Director's Cuts of some Star Trek movies. Snagged Khan and Undisovered country for $14.99 each, which I thought was a good deal.

Waiting for the next $49.99 motherboard/proc deal so that I can get some emulator cabinets built. Also thinking about grabbing some cheap 19" monitors to mount in there as well. GBAs were on sale for $89.99 and Metroid Zero was a nice $24.99.

Interestingly, they stopped posting the MB/proc deals at the Palo Alto Fry's. Now you have to ask the salesperson and they whip out this ratty photocopy of the pricetags. Maybe they want folks to stop taking advantage? I worry that the next time I want to grab a deal they won't have any of the *new* ECS boards around and I'll have to settle for something that someone returned.

Oh, little tidbit, I overheard some employee saying that he had worked 10 days straight... is that even legal?

Total Time Spent: Who knows... hours probably.
Total money spent: Probably around $50?

2004-01-31T19:38:00.000-08:00

Stopped by on Friday. Had to make it snappy b/c I had 10 lbs of frozen chicken wings in the trunk. Anyway, didn't see anything interesting and quickly got outta there.

Total Time Spent: 10 minutes
Total money spent: $0.00

2004-01-18T20:03:00.000-08:00

Two trips to document.

First trip was on January 12th. They were running a deal on Maxtor 120gb drives so I decided to pick up some for XBox modding. $98.99 and there's a $30 rebate. I actually returned the 80 gig I bought on the 7th. Also had to pick up a new soldering iron and some solder. Didn't see a whole lot, but I did run into some students that I had worked with about a year ago.

Total Time Spent: 45 minutes
Total Money Spent: $219.71

Second trip was on Friday. Pretty crowded for a Friday night. Saw that they had a RED Swingline stapler that was billed as 'perfect for your office space'. Cool way of making a commodity item like a stapler generate some premium revenue.

Now that there are a TON of things that need networking next to the TV, I picked up a switch to get them all connected at once. Settled on the Linksys 5 port \ and a patch cable.

One thing I noticed in the digital camera asile was how trashed the displays were. Granted, there are probably thousands of the unwashed pawing their way through the merchandise on a daily basis, but it's so disorganized that great products end up looking like total shite. Frys never was, and will probably never be, the pinnacle of good retail store design.

Total Time Spent: 20 minutes
Total Money Spent: $50.86

2004-01-07T23:36:00.000-08:00

Okay, I've been to Fry's 3 times and haven't blogged anything! Time for an update.

8X DVD burners. Whoda thunkit. Pioneer is up to their A07 which has 8X capability, but there were a ton of other brands in the fray as well. Interestingly a majority of them were 8X +R burners. Who the F uses +R except for HP?

I was going to pick up a TV stand, but spending $200 on one didn't really blow my skirt up. I'll probably head over to Ikea to snag some junky pressboard thing that will disintegrate the first time I try to move it from it's assembled location.

Kind of astounding price... a Duron 1.6GHz and ECS K7VTA3 for $39.99. That is INSANITY. Forty freakin' dollars for a motherboard and processor. Granted, this thing isn't going to be used to render Gollum in LOTR, but it's no slouch. I had to pick one up for an emulator PC I'm building for a friend. Also got the Maxtor 80GB 8MB 7200rpm drive for $78.99 - $30 rebate. Oh yeah, also got a Radeon 7K board with TV out for $39.99.

Not a whole lot else to report. They're still sold out of Double Dash, which is great news for Nintendo I guess.

No Pemmican for me this time.

Total Time Spent: 30 minutes
Total $ Spent: $185.06

2003-12-14T21:35:00.000-08:00

I just started a new job that puts me closer to Fry's so the blogged visits should pick up from now on.

Stopped by on Friday, December 12th. They moved the video cards to the aisle where they used to sell webcams. I forget what was there before, I think it may have been something useless like Serial and Parallel port ISA cards. Regardless, it looks a bit more organized and it's definitely well lit. The entire wall where the cards used to be is now filled with monitors.

I'm itching to pick up an iPod. I walked past the accessories and it looks like Belkin is betting the farm. I'm not sure what the demand is for faux leather iPod cases, but if you want one they're definitely there.

Fry's still doesn't have the armor plated DVDs in stock. Burners look to be coming down in price though.

TONS of new games in the game section... too many to list. They also had an X-Arcade stand up module with Midway Arcade Treasures running on it. Cool stuff to see people gathered around Defender.

Had to pick up a new cell phone headset. Ended up getting the cheapest one I could find, in this case the Sony DRE110. Before you say anything I have to let you know that YES, it is a Sony (evil) product. It was 50% cheaper than the next comparable product though, and I expect to lose it soon. Plus I've got my eye on a Treo 600. Also picked up a roll of clear packing tape. Sorry, no link on that product.

Funny thing at the register. The guy standing next to me had: A bag of beef jerky (not Pemmican, that idiot), Tomb Raider for the Playstation, a random music CD, and... "Young Cherries" (pr0n DVD). Good way to deflect that porn purchase good buddy.

Total Time Spent: 30 minutes
Total Money Spent: $12.43

2003-11-28T18:46:00.000-08:00

Okay, maybe not in the next day or so.

Anyway, BLACK FRIDAY. I missed it. Unfortunately I'm in New York right now where there are no Fry's. I hear that a few of the stores had over 1000 people in line. Since I couldn't participate in the madness I figure I'll sift through the ad and post my comments instead.

Coming tomorrow... leftover turkey coma.

2003-11-14T21:42:00.000-08:00

I'm still alive. Posts coming in the next day or so.

2003-07-13T14:21:00.000-07:00

Finally, got a chance to visit Fry's again.

I needed a new PC for MAME so I picked up one of the "Fry's Bundle Specials". ECS K7S5A Pro, Athlon (Tbred) 2400+, Cooler Master fan, and a 256MB PC2100 DIMM. Not the most spectacular deal, $89.99 for the proc and motherboard, but it'll do. Not like I need NForce2 for a MAME box anyway.

Shelves were stocked with top o' the line video cards. 256MB GeForceFX 5900 Ultra was $500. I think the closest I've ever spent to that is around $400 for 2 Voodoo2s in SLI mode. Looks like they're also out of the 9500 Pro... Though I find it strange that they sold out at $220.

Compaq has a new widescreen laptop. I think it's a modified version of the new VooDooPC lappy. I think I might take the plunge with a new laptop relatively soon. A fast P4M and the new ATI Mobile 9600 is pretty tempting.

Not a whole lot else to note. Their SFF pc section seems to be getting smaller (no pun intended). Oh yeah, Fry's also just got in a small $30 dremel. Not great for case modding, but inexpensive.

Also picked up a big bag of zip ties.

Total Time Spent: 45 Minutes
Total Money Spent: $152.59

2003-07-03T08:56:00.000-07:00

Heh heh heh... proof that I'm not the only one that's witnessed the legendary Fry's clueless cashier.

Fry's Electronic Employment Application

2003-07-02T06:50:00.000-07:00

Oh, just FYI, I'm going to start linking to all the products I mention in the blog. So ya'll know what I'm talkin' about.

I've also been asked why I think Sony is evil. Here's a list of Sony products I've purchased that have died:
1. Cordless Phone
2. 27" TV
3. Car CD Head Unit
4. Playstation 1
5. CD Changer
6. VCR
7. Cordless Phone (thank you sir, may I have another)
8. Computer monitor
9. CD-R/RW drive

Total Time Spent: 0 minutes
Total Money Spent: $0

2003-07-02T06:41:00.000-07:00

I know it's been a while since I updated. Sorry about that.

Anyway, to answer the burning question... YES, I have been to Fry's since the 3rd of June. I went in there to help out a friend pick out 802.11b stuff. Ended up going with Netgear products and she seems happy with it. Must be their funky "ultramodern, like living in the not-too-distant future"-looking wireless router.

I'm positive I picked up some Pemmican, but I can't find the recepit so I don't remember how much it was. Fear not, I will be returning to the aisles of Fry's within the week. Stay tuned true believers.

Total Time Spent: 20 Minutes
Total Money Spent: Somethin' like $6?

2003-06-03T11:15:00.000-07:00

Almost forgot to document my trip to Fry's last night.

Pretty boring trip actually... not a lot of new stuff save for the new Shuttle 865 system which, strangely, wasn't priced. Other than that it was just your standard Fry's merchandise. I'm still amazed by the number of returned items on the shelves. It's almost like an easter egg hunt. Let's play "find the one video card that HASN'T been opeend". It's not even like they test the merchandise anymore. I think in my many trips there I've only seen them test one thing.

Didn't really think about buying anything. I noticed that one of the XBoxes is now playing Fusion Frenzy instead of Halo. Who's going to buy an XBox for Fusion Frenzy? "Hey, I got it, let's try to sell the system using a 4 player minigame launch title... and only hook up one controller!" Dead to Rights is apparently a Platinum Hits title now. Why isn't Halo? ;) Oh yeah, MechAssult is $29.99.

Total Time Spent: 10 minutes
Total Money Spent: $0

2003-05-23T14:07:00.000-07:00

I was totally spacing at work so I decided to take a lunchtime Fry's visit.

There were some good deals to be had. The NForce2 Shuttle XPC with an Athlon 2200+ was only $299.99 after rebate. I bought another Nintendo WaveBird on sale for $24.99, debated on getting 2. IBM/Hitachi 80gb drives for $69.90. If you can deal with the fact that they're super unreliable long-term, it's a good buy. ;)

Browsed the asiles with all the crazy heatsink/fan combos. If I need a quieter PC I'll pick up the Zalman coolers and heatpipe stuff, but given the noise level in the dining room right now, there's no need.

Also grabbed some Sun Chips and Munchos (which were back in stock). Uneventful visit.

Total Time Spent: 15 minutes
Total Money Spent: $29.03

2003-05-21T19:15:00.000-07:00

Wohoo! New stuff! Always good to see some variety on the shelves. Sure beats the sea of "This item has been returned" stickers that normally greets shoppers. New Sony (evil) DVD+-RW, the 510. Specs look somewhat similar, though I think it writes CDs faster than the previous model (and also probably doesn't choke on cheap media). Also saw the Radeon 9800 Pro. $400. The box is pretty misleading, it says 256MB/128MB. Come on, the card is $400, they couldn't spare the extra couple bucks to print two different boxes? I mean, I would hope the boxes have different UPCs. If not, there's a scam just waiting to happen.

Hard to browse the video game aisles after coming back from E3. Lots of people picking up the Matrix. I love how it got released just as all the people who would write reviews were busy in LA. Well, the reviews are coming out now and it's pretty ugly. That and the Warchavsky (sp?) brothers got like a million apiece + profit sharing from Infogrames (sorry, Atari). I wonder how much Dave Perry raked in? Come on guys, Earthworm Jim and MDK were sweet... now you guys are getting lazy.

The Shuttle XPCs are dropping in price, new versions are probably coming out soon. The SB51G was $240 and the SK41G was $210 after rebate. That's a $100 price cut! If I were in the market for one...

They're still sold out of the Sprint 8100 phone. Other stuff they're sold out of: Munchos and Turkey Pemmican.

Total time spent: 10 minutes
Total money spent: $0

2003-05-12T20:30:00.000-07:00

Wow, it's been a long time since I went to Frys. Finally broke my cherry here in May by going this afternoon... not much has changed.

They did get the new GeForceFX 5600s, but at $250 retail I have no idea who's buying them. NVidia seemed to dominate the shelf, with only a few Radeons around. Maybe Frys is preparing for the 9600/9800? Anyway... I'm also starting to give serious consideration to a 19" LCD, the Samsung with the thin bezel looks great. Once it drops down from $750...

Socket 423 processors are all on clearance. Since I lack both a socket 423 motherboard and RDRAM I passed. Standard MB/Proc deals, nothing earth-shattering IMHO. I did see something neat in the "As Seen On TV" asile... a rotary meat slicer. Not something I'd expect to find and to be honest, who needs one of those in their house?

They don't sell windshield wiper fluid. I didn't expect them to, I mean I wasn't in Kragen Auto Parts, but considering I could pick up so much other random crap I was somewhat disappointed. Ended up walking out with a bag of Peppered Beef Pemmican (they were sold out of Turkey) and a 7' ethernet patch cable for Joel.

Total Time spent: 30 minutes
Total money spent: $9.21

2003-04-25T20:58:00.000-07:00

Fry's on Friday... nice.

Get some stuff out of the way, picked up and put down: Mini surveilance camera ($29.99), picked up other stuff instead. GeForceFX 5200 ($99.99)... may end up getting this one in the future. Dremel tool ($74.99) Bit too much to spend on a quick Afterburner mod right now.

Hot blonde girl with too much foundation makeup was bitching about having to sell 5 more ISP subscriptions. You're in the COMPUTER SECTION of FRY'S... how many dial up subs could you possibly sell? Oh well, maybe they just felt that we needed more eye-candy than all the gadgets and gizmos. Oh, saw an unopened AIW Radeon 9700 Pro... it'll probably be opened soon. Overheard some guy upset that they were sold out of Soprano's Season 3 DVDs. Went down the "As Seen on TV" asile, the one filled with pocket hair crimpers and other assorted crap.

Joel picked up a 16 port switch for $54.99. I picked up Turkey Pemmican (livin' on the wild side), 3 pack of canned air, and MaximumPC (yes, I caved). Anyway...

Total time spent: 45 minutes
Total money spent: $25.44

2003-04-24T19:51:00.000-07:00

Seven days without Fry's makes one "weak".

The cool camera that you can pan/tilt over the Internet? It's the Veo Wireless Observer. Creative also has this super cheap Logitech pocket camera ripoff called the CardCam Value.

Saw a few of the new GeForceFX 5200s (both PCI and AGP). From what I read, it's a pretty good deal for $100. Doesn't do well in synthetic benchmarks, but very fluid in actual gameplay (AA and DX9 features). I need something to replace the aging MX420 in one of my machines.

Picked up and put down: Mini pocket camera thing ($39.99)... might as well just get a phone with one built in. MaximumPC Magazine ($8.99)... hard to justify spending 9 bucks on a thin magazine, especially since I think that the included CD-Rom is totally worthless. Nintendo Wavebird ($29.99)... don't need another one until Double Dash comes out.

Saw some guy trying to open up pocket-sized mini recorders. I gave him a dirty look. Bunch of savages in this town. Ran into a friend I hadn't seen in a while. He was looking for a HD to use to hack his TiVo. Dammit, now I want another TiVo to hack. Fry's doesn't carry the DTV TiVos from what I could see.

Fry's also doesn't sell condoms.

Total time spent: 40 minutes
Total money spent: $0

2003-04-21T11:28:00.000-07:00

Didn't go to Fry's today, but had to share two separate (somewhat) interesting things I've observed while checking out:

There is a cashier at the Palo Alto Fry's who cannot give correct change. I stood there for a good 2 minutes while she looked at the change cups as though someone just asked her to solve the Riemann hypothesis. She pecked at a few coins, contemplating how to create 78 cents out of the funny metal pieces, finally turning to a coworker who helped her out in disgust. Now, granted this employee was not native to the United States, but one would think that part of her interview process for CASHIER included a section about whether or not she actually understood the American monetary system or perhaps basic addition/subtraction.

Sat patiently waiting for the green blinky light. When I walked up to my cashier a gentleman (customer) was speaking with an employee next to us. He was asking her about her modeling experience. She mentioned that she had traveled occasionally to Europe and the east coast for modeling gigs, though most of her experience was as a booth babe at various import car shows. His prying questions into her experience with either explicit or topless modeling made me feel unclean, but she answered that topless photos were available on the Internet. At this point my transaction was completed and I had to leave. I wonder if this is how pornographers pick up their models? If so, I wonder how you transition from asking about modeling at car shows to whether or not they want to pose with a giant double-headed dildo on "FrysGirlsGoneWild.com".

Total time spent: 0 minutes
Total money spent: $0

2003-04-18T12:50:00.000-07:00

Took a lunch break trip to Fry's this afternoon. No real agenda, though I had just done a recap of how much time I've spent at Fry's this month. Recap so far:

4/15 $21.63 - Floppy Drive, Thermal Paste (why didn't I pick this shit up the day before?)
4/14 $167.24 - Hard Drive, Pemmican, Something Else
4/10 $230.39 - WinXP for Joel, Motherboard, Processor, Cooling Fan (finally after going there FOUR FUCKING DAYS IN A ROW)
4/9 $54.11 - CD-Writer and Pemmican
4/8 -$64.94 - Returned it
4/7 $64.94 - Bought motherboard

Anyway. Went down the webcam aisle, saw this sweet new one that you can control via web browser. Has pan/tilt control as well. $179.99. Walked over to video cards, noticed that just about all of them were opened. Who wants to spend full retail ($400) on an opened AIW 9700 Pro? Radeon 7000 64MB SDR for $50 (MAME cabinet card perhaps?). Tempting, but I've seen it advertised there for $40 before.

Cruised by the DVD writers... when is that damn black face Pine rebadged Pioneer A05 going to go on sale again? They had spindles of DVD+ media, no -. Strange. Zipped past the SFF systems, damn they is sexy. CoolerMaster case is pretty nice, and on sale over at Central Computer for $180. Great MB deal on an Athlon 2400+ and ECS Pro for like $120. Almost bought the TMD Fan, the one that spins the blades via the tips so there's more airflow. Don't need it though, HSF on the proc is doing it's job and I can use the $30 elsewhere. Picked up and then put down the Maxtor 120gb 8mb cache retail boxed drive. $120 - 30 MIR. Do I really need it? No.

XBox Splinter Cell is $35 this weekend. Great deal, but I have tons of games that need to be played. Maybe I'll score a free copy at an industry event. No Family Guy DVDs in sight. Left without buying anything, not even Pemmican.

Total time spent: about 30 minutes
Total money spent: $0

2003-04-18T12:38:00.000-07:00

Welcome. This blog chronicles my trips to Fry's Electronics. What was I thinking, did I get anything, etc. Hope you enjoy it!