sracer

Both the Hitachi and RCA seem to be nice. Be careful of the "LED" reference on the Hitachi. It is an LCD TV (with LED edge-lighting). The RCA supports 1080i whereas the Hitachi only does 720P. I plan on trying to snap up the RCA as a 2nd monitor (and TV). If I get skunked out of one, I'll try for the Hitachi @ Radio Shack.

ok. So when they stopped handing out snow globes is when Black Friday went "mainstream"? The elitist attitude of the OP is repeated by other people in other niche hobbies.... and with that, the implication that the definition of "going mainstream" is anybody who joins in after I do. The whole sentiment is pretty silly. And blaming retailers for the added exposure is even sillier. As if none of the Black Friday campers brag about their scores to anyone who will listen. How many times do friends and family have to hear about the $50 computer or $75 entertainment system before they join in?

I find it ironic that someone using the Apple app store icon as their avatar is complaining about ANYTHING going "mainstream". LOL When exactly was that time when you remember that "only the most hardcore" knew Black Friday as Black Friday?

Fair play? They should do one ticket person period.

When to show up depends greatly on the location of the particular store. Here in the middle of Arizona (Prescott), if you aren't on line by 2pm Thanksgiving day then you will NOT be getting any doorbuster item. (That is if the previous 6 years are any indication)

Last year's BF "bargains" were the weakest since the last recession. Despite any spin about the recession being over, all true indicators are that the recession is deeper than last year with no signs of bottoming out. Given that, I expect the deals to be even weaker this year than last. Retailers know that when the economy is bad, there is little to no "coattail effect" on doorbuster items. Bargain hunters get in, get the doorbuster only, and get out. As for the non-doorbuster bargains, those prices are no more special than their regular sale prices. That's my prediction and I'm stickin' to it.

One thing that I haven't seen mentioned in this thread is that with the nook you can take your nook to any Barnes and Noble store and freely read any ebook (while you are there in the store). That's a nice little bonus above the Kindle.

So, did anyone else pick up the TomTom 125SE GPS @ Sam's Club for $57?

I did, though it wasn't Delstar when I picked it up on BF... it was an Augen. I ended up returning it within an hour. I was fully aware that it ran Windows CE. I'm a software developer of 30+ years and a mobile platform developer for 10. I've worked with various versions of WinCE and Windows Mobile. The WinCE on this netbook is the absolute worst that I've seen. They've included 3 media players. Although it claims to have wifi capabilities, it does not support encrypted (WEP, WPA, etc.) wifi. As I expected, it has a very basic version of Pocket Internet Explorer. It had trouble with any website more complex than the classic Google search webpage. My expectations of the device were absolutely rock-bottom... I was interested in experimenting with the "office suite" that comes preloaded. This device fell short of my expectations.

As someone who lives on computers (software developer of over 30 years) my own personal experience mirrors the consensus everyone here.... that there are no clear-cut better or worse machines. I've had higher end HP dv9000 die within 6 months. I've had numerous Dell machines go casters-up as well. The only consistently good machines that I've seen have been the BF specials (regardless of maker)... eMachine, HP, Compaq, Acer, Gateway, and Toshiba. All that those systems needed were a RAM upgrade. Obviously YMMV.

It is safe to say that considering that wide variety of first-hand experiences, that it is going to be difficult to narrow things down. Having said that, here are my impressions... Nikon. Stay away from low-end inexpensive Nikons. I've seen serious pincushion and fisheye problems with their lenses. As you move up their product line, the cameras improve significantly. Polaroid. Seems to get praise rooted in brand nostalgia than due to the technical merits. Definitely a case of you-get-what-you-pay for. Kodak. Pretty inconsistent across models. Some are decent, some are horrendous. Panasonic. Not the first name that comes to my mind for digital cameras, but their Lumix series is surprisingly good. IMO, the best deal is: Panasonic ZS1 10MP for $199 @ Costco.

Nice. Getting in line here at 9pm will guarantee a 100th spot in line.

If we're going to play the game of semantics, then it would be NOTEBOOKS not laptops. But that is silly. The reason why I pointed it out was in the context of the comparison spreadsheet that was posted a few posts prior to smooth3d's claim. That spreadsheet includes those WinCE smartbooks. There is no differentiation in the spreadsheet between notebook, laptop, netbook, and smartbook. Someone examining the spreadsheet and hearing the claim that all notebooks support flash/java might incorrectly assume that those WinCE devices were included.

Not true. The two Windows CE-based notebooks available on Black Friday cannot play flash or java games.

No they can't. Try it. It may be on a per-store basis, but try lining up now and you will be told that you can't do that.

The annual "harrumphing over the ethics of selling a doorbuster ticket" is misplaced. Best Buy set the rules, and except for stores that expressly prohibit scalping, it is "acceptable". If people don't like how Best Buy has things set up, complain to Best Buy. Trying to establish some mythical ethical standard is a bit silly. I don't like how Walmart does their Black Friday events, I expressed my opinion about it to them, and refuse to participate until they change things. If people feel the same way about Best Buy, then do the same thing. This sense of entitlement is quite puzzling.

Sure they'll be controlled. The problem will START when people show up BEFORE the store is ready for people to line up. They're going to have people circling the aisles like vultures waiting for the carcass. So there will be a mad dash to line up when the line is officially started. Then as the time gets closer, more and more people will crowd around.... those in the front of the line will get antsy about line-jumpers. And because the "camping" will occur indoors, people are going to show up earlier than if they had to stand outside. In the best of stores it would be a difficult situation, the fact that it is walmart just compounds it.

You mention Best Buy as if their plan is better. It is not. It encourages scalping of doorbuster tickets. A one-ticket total per person will eliminate the incentive for people to camp out in hopes of scarfing up one ticket for each item and scalping them for $20 a pop. Every year one must start camping earlier and earlier. 4 years ago, one could arrive at the local Best Buy at 11 pm Thanksgiving evening and be guaranteed to be no further back than 20th in line. Last year, the 20th person in line arrived at 1pm Thanksgiving day. Virtually all of that due to scalpers. The problem with Walmart's new plan is that it doesn't eliminate the circus atmosphere... simply moving it indoors and distributing it across a few departments. Sure, they'll hand out tickets, but if they don't have an orderly process for fairly distributing those tickets there is going to be problems again this year. With these 24 hour stores, people will be "camping out" at registers Some people think that Walmart is simply too slow to respond to the issues. I believe that it is deliberate... to hold off as long as they could with the circus atmosphere that strips people of their dignity for the sake of some black friday publicity.

Exactly. Traditionally, they used to offer a tower + monitor + printer for under $200. You are unfortunately, correct.

Not too difficult. Especially if you use tools like DriverMax. I bought a 2nd harddrive for my Sony Vaio NW (which normally runs Win7) and installed XP on it. It was a bit tricky finding all of the drivers, but I managed it. (the biggest hurdle is integrating AHCI SATA drivers into the install CD... not a problem for techies, but for the average person it is a bit tricky) There are 2 large issues with going from XP to Win7 that the Microsoft fans won't tell you... first is that the driver model of Vista/Win7 is significantly different than XP and that perfectly fine peripherals like printers and scanners may not work unless the manufacturers provide Vista/Win7 specific drivers. The 2nd is application compatibility. Vista/Win7 no longer provide 16-bit app support. Older programs and games (mostly educational ones) will no longer work. It is all well and good to want the latest and greatest, and Win7 certainly looks pretty... but the cost of moving to Win7 can be much greater than simply the cost of a license. Do your research. Also, claims about how much better Win7 is than XP in terms of battery life on notebooks is turning out to be urban legend. The remedy? Turn off the glitzy Aero effects... which make the sexy Win7 look like WinNT. Performance-wise and battery-life-wise, a system that runs Win7 nicely with run XP blazingly fast.

Blame Best Buy for their policy, not the people who lined up early. Ah, the 21st century of entitlement in the US is alive and well. Sorry, but if you are n+1 in line (n = number of tickets for an item) You should have ZERO expectation of getting that item. It is absolutely reasonable to expect that everyone ahead of you wants the item that you want. I'm puzzled. You sound like you've done BF before and yet you are surprised by the circus atmosphere around it. The dash-n-grabs at walmart, the ticket scalping at Best Buy... they are all orchestrated by the companies specifically for that effect. Have a little dignity... don't act like consumer paupers at the gates of the local Baron, waiting outside the manor gates for the scraps from last night's banquet.

Yes, your opinion is your opinion. As for the morality of it, I don't see where selling tickets is moral or immoral. You are free to call those people lowlifes and scum, but that says just as much about you as it does about your opinion of them.

The Celeron processor prevents this from being a GREAT deal. But for the price of a netbook, you get a full-sized notebook. It's a good deal. For a 10 yr old, it will be fine.

Are you accounting for the fact that the K-Mart netbook doesn't run Windows (XP/Vista/Win7) or Linux, but Windows CE? The included browser in WinCE doesn't support flash, nor the complex javascript that many advanced sites use. Expect to be only able to browse sites as simple as google's classic search page. More advanced sites like iGoogle and Facebook will most likely not work. It's a great move on K-Mart's part. It allows them to advertise a very low price that will catch the eye of the non-techie, getting them into the door.

Tip #1: Self-respect is more valuable than any Black Friday deal.