Dan Warne29 June 2006, 5:36 AM
Scoring a 400GB hard drive for $109 is a pure kind of happiness for a geek. After all, tech is expensive, and there are only so many dollars to go round to store all your, um, Linux ISOs.
A new Australian website has been set up in the mold of the popular American site woot.com, which provides one hot deal per day -- valid only for one day -- to geeks.
Zazz.com.au [they're having some technical issues today so you may need to reload a few times] has hosted some incredibly good deals recently, like:
Today's Zazz is an ex-demo coffee maker for $335.
Here's Woot.com which is clearly what they're modelled off:
The people behind Zazz are surprisingly frank about some of their products. About a recent $36 wireless keyboard:
"Well, they're kinda cheap. They work perfectly and are quite attractive but I'll take a nice corded keyboard like the g15 and radio mouse like the g7 any day over a silver and black wireless set. Of course, I'll also be paying about five times the price, but who's to say who's right?"
And $12 tripod speakers that "looked crappy and yet they sold out!?!":
"This is the second item this week I haven't liked and the second time one's sold out. It was a good product, I guess, but I don't really like the look of them. "
The social news and bookmark aggregator Digg.com also recently started a "tech deals" category where people can submit and vote on hot deals around the web.
Today, it has 2GB SD cards for US$43, a 400GB Seagate hard drive for US$109, and a Linux-based handheld game console for US$169. Of course, you have to pay for shipping to Australia, which can sometimes negate the saving.
And of course, the perennial Australian favourite Staticice.com.au is always a great way to find the cheapest prices on any PC hardware.
Don't forget Google's price comparison service, froogle.google.com can often turn up good prices from retailers around the world. Also, eBay's shopping aggregator, shopping.com recently opened an Australian site, au.shopping.com which indexes Australian retailers (though, frankly, for tech purchasing, staticice is better.)
(OK, that's six sites, and I said this was a top 5, so I'll stop there.)
What are your favourite haunts for getting good deals (including cheap DVDs, etc?)