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May Your Online Shopping be Merry…and Cheap (AGAIN!)

This is a re-post of an article published a year ago. Tips are still current. Updated.

So called “Cyber Week” is here and it’s expected to set records in profit for companies like Amazon, eBay, and many popular online marketplaces. Here is a list of the best websites to find the best deals during this internet shopping week:

1. Amazon- The biggest online store on the internet, it has everything and it’s always cheaper than real stores. Another plus is that you don’t pay tax on the items you buy.
2. Dealhack- Not a store, but a blog of deals. Updated frequently Dealhack finds the best deals from all of the popular websites around the internet. I saved $150 on a monitor when I used Dealhack.
3. Buy.com- Think of it as the “Electronics” section of Amazon. They have daily deals that even beat Amazon’s pricing. And their shipping is fast and cheap, perfect for the cheapskate like myself.
4. eBay- I never considered eBay as a place to buy new items, but there are vendors selling items throughout the site. I was comparing prices on RAM and if I were to buy it on eBay I would save $25 bucks. Nice. I wouldn’t trust eBay with any of your gifts, better deals elsewhere.
5. Dell.com- Who knew a crappy PC company had such great deals. Xbox 360 accessories X% off, mp3 players for cheap, and shipping isn’t to bad either.
6. PayPal- Using PayPal on certain websites could get you 20% cash back on your purchase. Amazon’s not on the list, but Overstock is. *Looks like the deal is ending soon, many stores have already been taken off the list.*
7. Retailmenot.com- Every site offers a “Coupon” code or “Promotion” code box during checkout, but do you ever have a code? With Retailmenot, you can search for codes for all of the popular stores. I used a code on Finishline.com and saved $25 bucks on $110 Nike Shox, not bad. Checkout Black Friday Coupons.
8. Woot!- No selection, limited stock, but you might find the occasional deal. Be careful though, not everything is new, some items are refurbished. Be sure to check out Shirt.woot.com, Wine.woot.com, and Sellout.woot.com for even more deals.
9. Geeks.com- Great deals all year for the geek in your family. Items don’t always come in their boxes and manuals are sometimes missing, but that’s why it’s for the geek in your family.
10. Overstock.com- The Kmart of online stores. There is a lot of crap you’ll need to dig through to get to the good stuff. Strangely, Mothers seem to love this site the most. Overstock is offering 20% cash back when you pay with your PayPal account.
11. Beatmyprice.com- Think you’ve found a really great deal? Enter the deal you found into the site and find even cheaper prices.
12. JungleCrazy- At least 70% OFF or more on specific items at Amazon.

Tags: blogs, christmas, coupons, deals, electronics, holidays, money, prices, sites, store, web

Better than iTunes, Better than Amazon, it’s Rhapsody

The experience of moving all of my info from my now old Macbook to my new Macbook Pro was a long and tedious one. Transferring files took more than a day(?) so I decided to do it manually. Moving files manually was pretty easy until I had migrate my iTunes library. After nearly two days of messing around I have come to the conclusion that I will never buy another non-mp3 song from the iTunes store.

The Amazon MP3 music store is a great marketplace for MP3 music, but after looking for specific, obscure, songs I’ve found Amazon doesn’t have many of them. I enjoy Amazon, but compared to the iTunes library it’s pretty lackluster. Looking for Blink-182’s Adam’s song on Amazon left me with the karaoke version, but on Rhapsody, I found in it the matter of seconds.

The Rhapsody MP3 Store is similar to Amazon’s, it offers all of the songs through a website instead of an application like iTunes. As in the name, all of the music in the store is MP3 format, which will work on 99.9% of music devices and applications including the iPod.

Okay, so Rhapsody’s better than iTunes, but why is it better than Amazon? Like I said before, Amazon’s library doesn’t include obsure music like Rhapsody does. Amazon also has the trouble of being more than a music store, unlike Rhapsody which is focused exclusively on music and is much easier to navigate. I find when I use Amazon that my searches can find more than just a song, they’ll find a computer part or a movie with a similar name.

I will still use iTunes and Amazon, but Rhapsody is the first place I will check for music. iTunes DRM-Free is still a work in progress, Amazon doesn’t have everthing I need, all of which Rhapsody has solved. It will be interesting to see in six month’s if I’ve changed my mind or found a better service.

Rhapsody MP3 Music Store

What do you use for music? All of them? None of them? Still a pirate? Leave it in the comments.

Tags: amazon, drm, itunes, library, mp3, music, rhapsody, store

New Shirt in the Store: RAWR

There’s a new shirt in the store. Check out the little monster who has something to say. Enjoy.

Visit the Store

Tags: , bountee, clothing, new, picture, rawr, shirt, store