bruceb news

Sonoma County has a serious shortage of places to buy technology. It was a little upsetting when CompUSA announced it was closing, since it had a better inventory of network equipment than anywhere else nearby for those days when things have to be bought on short notice. It’s gone now. No more dealing with the obnoxious clerk that tried too hard to sell extended warranties.

When I needed a USB hub on Friday, I went into Best Buy for the first time in more than a year.

Something strange had happened.

The store was neat and well organized.

It had a reasonably wide selection of computer and technology products, and inventory was well-stocked. […] continued

Printers are never as cheap as they seem, but it’s hard to argue with the HP Deskjet F2110, an all-in-one printer/scanner/copier, for $34 at Wal-Mart. Now keep in mind:

1. It doesn’t appear on HP’s web site so it might be a stripped-down Wal-Mart exclusive.
2. It doesn’t include a black ink cartridge or a USB cable so the price is a bit misleading.
3. It’s probably a piece of crap.

But even when you take those things into account – well, $34 is really cheap. I fear for our landfills.

And here’s a couple of deals on widescreen Dell Ultrasharp monitors – 19″ for $210, 22″ for $275. […] continued

Sears has been caught installing spyware that silently tracks all Internet usage – including banking logins, e-mail, and all web sites visited – in the name of a nonexistent online “community,” with virtually no disclosure of the invasive nature of the software. In fact, most people would not be aware that any software had been installed. Be careful out there!

Sears.com and KMart.com have been offering a chance to sign up for “My SHC Community,” ostensibly for a chance to give feedback to the retailers in a “dynamic and highly interactive on-line community.” After harvesting your personal information – name, e-mail, address, city, state, and age – software is silently installed with no indication onscreen that it has been installed or is continuously running. […] continued

Monday, December 10 is expected to be the busiest online shopping day of the year.

Can I ask you for a favor?

There are a few links on the bruceb favorites page and the bruceb shopping page that lead to places you might do some shopping – any link to Amazon or Dell, plus Apple, HP, Buy.com, Adobe, Walmart, and TigerDirect.

Those are affiliate links. If you click on them and buy something, the merchants will send me a little money, or possibly a t-shirt. A tuna sandwich. Something, anyway.

As far as I know, your experience is identical whether you start from my page, from another page, or by typing in www.dell.com in your browser. […] continued

Thinking about a new computer – home, home office, small business? Let me give you some generalizations that will help you get started. (As always, gamers will be looking for faster processors and hard drives, more memory, and – particularly important – choosing from an array of high-end video cards. Notebook computers also require consideration of size and weight, which will trump some of the considerations below.)

• PROCESSOR  Intel’s Core 2 Duo processors are significantly better than the other Intel and AMD processors. Within the Core 2 Duo line, at some point there’s a step up to a 4Mb L2 cache, another bit of technical wizardry that’s worth a hundred dollars or so.

[…] continued

The retail industry built the day after Thanksgiving into a cultural icon as “Black Friday” – the must-shop day when consumers are meant to feel a nearly physical need to get to the stores. The media’s obsessive coverage of Black Friday is bolstered by incessant advertising, heavy newspaper inserts, and small quantity special deals to build a feeling of urgency.

Today’s papers are full of stories about “Cyber Monday,” reportedly the online equivalent for millions of people sitting down at their office computers for more holiday shopping.

Here’s a blog that finds the whole thing a little creepy. The trigger for all this media attention appears to be a study commissioned by shop.org, the online retailers’ arm of the National Retail Foundation, a lobbying and marketing association for the retail industry which issued a press release touting the “Cyber Monday” trend a week ago. […] continued