slamboard

I just got finished unpacking and setting up a ‘new’ computer. This is an addition rather than a replacement and we decided to go as cheap as possible. We grabbed a ’starter’ computer just before this September’s issuing of student financial assistance results in the local retailers being cleaned out of cheap computers.

I don’t have any complaints so far, except we are already regretting our decision not to upgrade from CD-ROM to a more up to date disc drive. One other thing that I was surprised by was the date of manufacture of the monitor. It was made in 2004. It’s interesting to think about how a three or four year old computer component was considered garbage a few years ago and now they can sell them retail.

Just to let readers know how old I am, I can remember when they still sold vinyl records in franchised music stores.

When I was a kid, I had an eclectic collection of vinyl that an aunt had left at our house. I used to listen to the records, but then the old player quit working. That was right about the time that vinyl was completely out of fashion for the average consumer. At the same time, Hip Hop was being born and along with it turntable scratching and associated techniques. I had the misfortune of being in the market for a turntable when they had ceased to become a consumer commodity and transistioned into a specialty item for professionals.

Long story short, I couldn’t afford to get a good turntable in the 80’s.

Imagine my surprise to see that Electra Warehouse has a turntable on their front page that is going for less than a hundred bucks. This eStore carries items that are designed for professional DJ’s but the discounts are designed to move the gear out to all the wannabe’s as well.

The store also has impressive deals on car audio components.

I was just looking at an article about recent stats released concerning customer satisfaction in the computer industry. There has been a slight drop across the entire industry, thanks in large part to decreases at Apple and Dell. There have been a few actual problems, but it seems that the decrease in satisfaction is largely due to an increased demand for products and customer service.

Expect to see Dells numbers drop even further as its sales in Walmart take off. Actually, I’m not sure about who will be the front line with customer service in that particular case. Walmart may take care of some returns and exchanges independently of Dell.

My little experiment of changing my header everyday for a week is almost over. The colors today are kinda like what Walmart uses.

I was researching something almost unrelated to Walmart yesterday and I ended up on one of the many websites that exist solely for the purpose of exposing ethical problems with that particular company. I have talked to a lot of different people about the issues surrounding this monolithic retailing success. I met a very libertarian entrepreneur once whose face shone as he talked about documentary footage that he had seen of a giant warehouse that Walmart has that has almost no workers. It operates using robotics. The system reads universal product code information supplied by the truck drivers and retrieves the load faster and more accurately than humans could ever hope to. They probably wish they could run retail without humans, but they have to compromise by just not treating their employees like humans.

I am fascinated by ePERKS.com. From what I can see, it is set to become an ideal place to compare the perks being offered by businesses like automotive dealers, construction contractors and real estate agents. For example, I clicked on a dealer and saw that they are giving away plasma screen TVs with the sale of a car. Many of these deals are available exclusively through ePerks.

There is also a lot of communication going on on the site. People are asking pointed questions about housing markets. Car dealers are asking each other about stuff.

I did some more browsing and discovered that iPods are a popular perk. I have pretty much given up on getting an iPhone. Maybe I can get a top of the line iPod thrown in with some purchase at some point.