While I often live on the bleeding edge of technology, there are occasions when I’m content to wait. As a casual gamer, I didn’t pick up the Xbox 360 last year and I waited to try all three next gen systems before making a purchase. Now that I’ve some experience with the various consoles, I decided on the 360. Many factors led to this choice including price, online offerings, controller comfort, and visual quality (Wii doesn’t make the cut). Sony’s integration of a Blu-ray drive into the PS3 is compelling, but the downloadable high definition movies makes it nearly a wash and Microsoft beats them in the other areas… Not to mention I could actually find an Xbox and for significantly less cash.
So now let me tell you how I’m (theoretically) getting the 360 for half price… Micro Center is running an in-store deal to promote their Gaming Department. Buy an Xbox (Core or Premium) by December 5 and get a $100 rebate by mail. That brings the Premium unit down from $399 to $299. But wait… there’s more! If you get their credit card (and potentially lower your credit score in the process) and make a $399 purchase you’ll receive 13,000 points redeemable for $100 check. For a twenty dollar rebate I wouldn’t bother jumping through these hoops, but $200 makes it worthwhile… assuming it works.
I’m still between projectors, so the 360 will live with the TiVo Series3 and Slingbox Pro attached to a 30″ Panasonic HDTV. My classic Xbox and Moviebeam are headed to ebay (to join my former Gamecube and PS2). I’ve enjoyed playing the online demos of Rainbox Six and Modern Warfare the last two nights, and I’ve loaded up on Points to make my first purchase once Superman Returns HD arrives. If you’re interested in kicking my butt online, my gamertag is Zatz and I look suspiciously like the creepy Burger King.
UPDATE: Turns out Micro Center has extended the $100 rebate dealio through 12/31! That should give you enough time to get to one of their 19 locations.
Dave,
Congrats on the Xbox 360 purchase. I’m still waiting for the Wii to become plentiful on store shelves before I buy, but I have a good backlog of games I haven’t played on the past-gen platforms to tide me over.
People who are thinking about the 360 and can’t take advantage of the Microcenter deal should be aware that Microsoft is making noises about a price cut on the 360 to compete with Sony and Nintendo.
I will add you to my friends list Zatz.
I also forgot that the last dashboard update and a program that’s free called transport 360 now let me stream avi files through my MCE PC files that are on my XP machine and the picture quality is great
I now save hrs of time converting files or burning to a DVD to watch them
click and select and watch and it does the conversion on the fly
Tversity does a similar thing but I had issues with it,
Speaking of which, I forgot to mention I set up the 360 as a media extender for my MCE computer. I don’t know that I’ll use it much (or ever), but it’s ready when I am.
Dave if you have any avi files on your PC then go and get the program from here
http://runtime360.com/2006/10/30/the-fall-update/
I missed it at first but when browsing to a folder on any PC in the network click it once and then hit the X button and select MORE and click transcode
It then starts streaming the avi right on the TV and the quality is clearer than playing it on media player on my LCD
Seems almost endless what these updates can do. 1080p now, HD DVD, Video cameras and what else can they modify via the live update in years to come
If you sign up for 1 year of $25/mo vonage, you get a $200 voucher to use immediately. So in the end you’d get a free xbox360, a vonage adapter (free with rebate), and 12 months of vonage service for ~$325. Not exactly breaking even, but figure for $125 more you can replace your POTS phone service for $10 a month for a year — since you were going to spend $200 anyhow on that Xbox360
If someone didn’t have and wanted Vonage, that’s a pretty good deal. Though I already have, and don’t particularly care for Vonage… We’re on the $15/mo plan and are considering dumping it now that we’ve met our year commitment.
How do you redeem the 13,000 points and get $100 check?
I believe I made an account on the credit card site, and “redeemed” the points for the $100 check. I was able to do that pretty quickly and easily… got the check about a month after purchase.