My wife has been using an old Pentium II computer that used to belong to me. I works, but is relatively slow these days. It often comes up with the blue screen of death saying memory low, forcing her to reboot. If she turns the computer off, and on, she has to re-adjust the monitor as the horizontal and vertical borders of the screen will have moved. I have another Pentium II computer that is a little faster, and a little more solid. I had set that up, but never got around to moving all of her stuff over. It was installed with Windows 98 as I don’t think it was good enough to run Windows XP. My machine is an eMachines computer that I bought at Best Buy a couple years ago, and have been pretty happy with. The only hardware problem that I have had was a hard drive that died. I bought a new hard drive, and was surprised how easy it was to install. The stuff inside the case was easily accessible, and it took me on a couple minutes to replace the drive. And then with the Norton Ghost created CD’s that came with the eMachines computer, it was so easy to reinstall the software to that exact state the machine came new. So instead of setting up the other slow machine for my wife, I decided that it would be better to buy a new computer. I am trying to get her to set up a blog or two of her own that will make money. She has been unhappy with her job, and I think if she spent the same amount of time she does at work (about 70hours/week), working on websites, should be making far more money. I have been watching the sales. There was one about a month ago, where I could have bought her a machine for about $300 after rebates. I almost bought it, but I hadn’t fully decided yet. But I have been watching the ads. I thought about waiting till Black Friday. But I saw yesterday’s ad for a eMachines computer at Best Buy for $349 after instant savings. It seemed like a good deal. There was a similar Compaq computer at one of the office supply stores for $299, but I decided that I have been pretty happy with my eMachines computer. A Compaq may be more proprietary inside, or not come with the back up CDs, or whatever. So I stopped at Best Buy about 3pm. I was told they didn’t have any more. He said people lined up in the morning, and said it happened every weekend. How the heck do they know what will be on sale? Do they drive to the grocery store, and buy a paper in the hopes that Best Buy will have something good on sale, just so they can line up an hour before the store opens? I’d expect on Black Friday, but not just a regular Sunday. I asked for a rain check, and was told they didn’t do them for computers. He said that another nearby store had some in stock, but that didn’t help as I had to be somewhere else at 4pm, and the store was way out of my way. I got pissed off, and left. Last night I got the idea, to see if I could order the computer online on Best Buy’s website for in-store pickup. I found the ad, and clicked on the computer. I was able to order the computer for in-store pickup. So tonight after my class, I will head up and pickup the computer. Then will begin the process of moving stuff from my wife’s old computer to the new one.

Posted by Rob in Computers on October 9th, 2006 | 1 Comment