newegg

Crave giveaway of the day: $500 Newegg.com gift card

In my humble opinion, this is one of the best giveaways we've ever done. Why? Well, because thanks to some intrepid work by our reps at Shopper.com, Newegg.com is generously offering up a $500 gift card, which means you get to pick your prize.

In case you don't know what Newegg.com is, it made its name selling computer gear and accessories at really low prices. But now it sells not only computer stuff but tons of electronics, so you're looking at a whole lotta selection.

As for Shopper.com, it powers CNET's price-comparison … Read more

Newegg announces IPO, plans for expansion

This was originally posted at ZDNet's Between the Lines.

Online electronics retailer Newegg is launching an initial public offering estimated at $175 million, according to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Monday.

The retailer has largely been focused on IT products such as hardware, software, and peripherals since its launch in 2001, but it recently has expanded into the consumer electronics business and products that are targeted at small to midsize businesses. It has also expanded beyond the United States, moving into Canada and China.

Last year, it reported net sales of $2.1 … Read more

7 things electronics salespeople won't tell you

Going to a retail store for consumer electronics purchases can be both exciting and frustrating. After working at Best Buy for two years, I have a few opinions to share that you might want to consider before your next shopping trip.

1. We have no formal training in the field of consumer electronics. Upon transferring to the computer department from home theater, I expressed concern to the manager: "Will there be time for someone to train me on laptops/desktops? What do these specifications mean?" His reply was simple: "Just do your best. A good salesperson can just read the labels and compare specs." Ouch.

Salespeople are not necessarily experts in the products sold in their departments, even if they are expert salespeople. Though many express a strong interest in the products they sell, your time spent at a retail store fishing for information about a future TV purchase could be better spent online researching the products yourself (I heard CNET has pretty great reviews).

2. We make little off the big-ticket items, so we smother you with accessories. Remember the story "If You Give a Mouse a Cookie"? Well, if you tell a salesman you're going to buy a TV, he's going to want to sell you a DVD player to go with it. Once he sells you the DVD player, he's going to want to get you to buy an HDMI cable, too.

Managers at Best Buy (and possibly all retailers) tell employees that the store profits surprisingly little from video game consoles and computers. Cables, accessories, mice, and other components, however, have a huge profit margin-- stores can make about $120 from a $150 Monster HDMI cable. Angry yet? The point is, we're going to work really hard to convince you to purchase that big item, but once you've said "OK" you've opened Pandora's Box.

Here's my advice: Grab the big item, and run. Purchase all accessories online, including memory cards, cables, traveling cases, and so on. Amazon, Monoprice, and Newegg are all reputable discount Web sites. You'll find what you need at a much lower price.… Read more

Relaunched Circuit City site is a triplet

It wasn't long ago that I used these pages to write Circuit City's eulogy. At the time, many of us thought the company would be gone forever. Oh, how wrong we were.

Last week, Circuit City came back to the Web. On May 19, Systemax, the company behind TigerDirect and CompUSA, purchased the Circuit City brand and Web site for $14 million. It took only a few days for Systemax to populate the site with products. And now it's live.

Systemax's decision to acquire Circuit City shouldn't be a surprise. In 2008, the company acquired CompUSA's brand and domain for a discounted price. Systemax then relaunched CompUSA.com. Today, it even operates a series of CompUSA brick-and-mortar stores.

There's currently no indication that Systemax will be opening Circuit City-branded brick-and-mortar stores. Right now, it seems that the company is focusing mainly on CircuitCity.com.

I've spent considerable time on the site, evaluating its design and comparing offers to see if it's a place worth spending cash. And after just a few seconds, it quickly became clear that it's basically just CompUSA.com (or TigerDirect.com) with a different name and logo.… Read more

Newegg reverses practice of charging New York sales tax

Online electronics retailer Newegg has stopped charging sales tax to its New York customers, according to a posting on the Consumerist.com.

The move by Newegg reverses action the online retailer took in June, in which it began to charge applicable sales tax for all shipments to New York, following passage of a new state law that required certain companies to charge sales tax on shipments to New York state.

Effective August 21, however, Newegg discontinued the practice and is leaving it up to New York residents to pay that sales tax themselves. That policy basically returns the responsibility of … Read more

The Gizmo Report: an Eee PC in the house

I recently mentioned my plan to get the new Eee PC laptop from Asus in spite of a price hike just before the product was introduced. The Eee PC is basically a low-cost subnotebook intended for developing markets, like the One Laptop Per Child project's XO, which I've also written about here--but unlike the OLPC, the Eee PC will be regularly available in commercial channels.

Well, earlier this week, I found the gizmo for sale over on Newegg.com and placed my order. A mere $458.45 later, including California sales tax and two-day shipping, it was … Read more

CrispyShop: A pretty comparison shopping tool

CrispyShop is a new tool for comparison shopping. Launched last week, CrispyShop lets you search and compare prices and specs for pretty much anything sold online, using visualization that's both useful and easy on the eyes. CrispyShop is built on ShoppingPath, a technology that visually sorts and separates search results. All results come from Yahoo Shopping, and provide users with direct links to purchase products from popular Web shopping sites like Newegg and Buy.com.

Search results show up in a scatter plot, with product thumbnails that magnify when you mouse over them, similar to the dock on Mac OS X. … Read more