Financing with Best Buy

[Hirsch]

Quote:

Originally posted by millerdog Audio, Just remember military Electronics Funds Transfers and direct payment take a while to set up. If I were you, I'd check out Navy FCU. When I sold cars, most the Navy/Marine guys used them. md

Navy FCU offers good loan terms (I just refinanced my mortgage with them), but they aren't interest free. The finance arrangements with Best Buy means that you'll apply for a Best Buy credit card, and buy your computer with it.

The key is the one-year deadline. Don't plan on making a baloon payment at the end of the deadline unless you have the money for it in place NOW. You will get nailed with interest if you make a late payment, or if the computer isn't paid in full. We're talking world of financial hurt here...those rates are high. If you do have the money in place, best strategy is to make minimum payments, collect interest on your money, and pay the balance when the interest free-period is ready to end. If you don't have the money in place, then set of a monthly payment that doesn't leave a balance at the end of the interest-free period. Take the $2600, and subtract what you have in the bank for this computer now. Divide that total by 12 to get your monthly payment, and don't ever pay less, pay late, or touch the money that's sitting in the bank to use for your final payment. Alternatively, if the payment you calculate is greater than the minimum, you can put part of it into the money you're keeping in the bank, provided you never miss, and never touch that money until its time to pay the loan. If you can do that, the Best Buy financing is a pretty good deal.

 

[MacDEF]

Quote:

Originally posted by Wodgy I think Audio&Me chose that specific model of laptop because it's said to have particularly good onboard sound. A solid idea.

Then how about this one -- guaranteed better sound, and proclaimed the best laptop on the market by InfoWorld and PCMag

(Oh, and it's only $2300.)

http://www.infoworld.com/articles/pl...lpowerbook.xml

 

[Wodgy]

I don't believe the Powerbook has 24/192 sound, nor a S/PDIF digital out for connecting to an ART DI/O.

 

[Audio-Me]

I plan on getting an Echo Indigo for it (I've dealt with echo soundcards, they are certainly of high quality), I have no faith in their "great sound" marketing scheme. Why did I choose this particular model? One word: widescreen. Oh and convenience that I can get one locally when I go home on leave.

The Sager model I originally wanted is HUGE and heavy! Not exactly portable, although I'm sure it performs hell of a lot faster.

I have no money in the bank at the moment, that would be nearly $300/mo (9 months), I suppose I could handle that, but I am a spendthrift, I waste money left and right, I'd have to get my act together on that one, which I plan on doing anyway.

Best Buy credit card!? I completely overlooked that, the sound of it gives me the creeps. I'll most certainly look into Navy FCU, thanks. Interest free would be nice, but I'm willing to pay the extra financing charges of Navy FCU if it is the most painless way to go about it.

I dislike Mac OS.

I should have chose Navy Federal as my banker in the first place, dunno why I chose AFB.

 

[Audio-Me]

The hell with it, I've never believed in credit, always figured if I don't have the money to spend, don't spend it. But I need to build credit, will a used vehicle loan build enough credit to purchase a home later on in life?

I don't like AFB, and there aren't any NFCU buildings near my next command, nor any ATMs. I like my home bank (People's Heritage, part of Bank North), I'll be switching to them.

 

[Audio-Me]

As much space as laptops save, I hate them, nothing beats a custom built workstation. Hope the new Matrox graphics card improves on the G400 Millenium Max instead of going head to head with ATI.

Credit with best buy, what the hell was I thinking?

 

[thomas]

I tested that notebook about 2 weeks ago, and its very impressive for watching movies...

It uses the same 15" widescreen LCD and slot loading combo drive as the Apple TI powerbooks, but its not an apple

The monitor is not only widescreen, but also is noticably brighter, sharper and has better contrast than any other notebook i've seen....

Sound is also supposed to be amazing, though i didn't test it out- it upsamples to 192/24, and i'm guessing should be at least as good as the echo add-in card...

The only weekness is its graphics card, the GF4 420 with only 16 megs of normal SDram is not fast enough to play the latest games at the default resolution of the LCD.

Personally i have the Compaq Evo n800c, which is better for everyday use (lighter, larger screen, better battery life, probably much better build quality) and much faster for games, but the VPRmatrix blows it away for watching movies.

here's a review of the presario2800, which is the consumer version of the same computer:

http://www.hardwarecentral.com/hardw...eviews/4534/1/

 

[Audio-Me]

Hell yes, I watched an entire movie on it at Best buy, had my Beyer DT250-80 with me too.

The graphics card does suck, it'd look even better if it was the new radeon mobile. I hate nvidia cards. But I'm killing the idea of a laptop, they're evil, and cost too damn much. I'm going to build an amazing workstation. Seagate 15k ultra160 hard drive, new matrox graphics card, dual channel 333mhz ddr, yeah I'm getting excited just thinking about it.

 

[thomas]

wow, i would have thought the anal best buy salesman would have kicked you out 15 minutes in

Laptop prices have dropped quite a lot in the last 6 months, i've seen some very decent looking compaq's with athlon xp and ATI radeon integrated graphics for under $1500 CDN, which is equivilent to about 99 cents US

And performance of laptops have made huge improvements in the last year, and have basically caught up with desktops for everything other than extreme gaming and professional app's...

IF you're going with a workstation, i'd wait a few months for AMD's Hammer to come out, should blow away anything you can build today....

 

[Audio-Me]

Some dork was bugging me, I told him to **** off really loud so that everybody could hear, he didn't come near me anymore.

I plan on a $3k system, that won't be for like a year and a half, depending on how long it takes me to buy the Cary CDP. Isn't the hammer 64bit? I need 32bit performance, I don't want new crap. wonder if QDR will be out by then.

professional aps - adobe photoshop, high resolution negative film scans, see, laptop is no good for me anyway. Viewsonic P220f is screaming my name.

I like intel because of their photoshop optimizations, but they're a rip off, I'm a huge AMD fan (since the K6-III 400mhz).

Well, good talking with you again. Man I miss irc and aim. BTW, when are you going to convince aos to let me review a pdac?

 

[thomas]

haha... maybe i'll drop by irc one of these days if i can find the time...

I'm no longer involved in the DAC, soldering in a dorm room is kinda sketch, and i simply don't have the time... But i still have an early prototype (may sound quite different from final version)that you could probably borrow, though it needs some repairs/modifications before it will work again...

I can't even imagine what a 3K system would be like in a year and a half, probably be over 5ghz and DDRII, if not qdr... damn, by then my laptop would be obsolete, maybe should have put the money into audio instead

 

[radrd]

The battery life on that laptop is probably very crappy; you should look into that if you are serious about using it on batteries.

For $2600 I could build one hell of a nice desktop rig with a 20" lcd that would kick the crap out of that laptop, but you probably want portable, so I'll shut up.

 

[Audio-Me]

Sure, I'm a big fan of prototypes, my amp is one.

I like original stuff, that way, less chances of unnecessary things being done/added to it. Some of it could be essential, but it's fun taking chances.

 

[Eagle_Driver]

Quote:

Originally posted by ServinginEcuador Check out the interest rate that BestBuy is offereing. It is generally very high to outrageously so!!! Then check out how much less your bank will give you for the same amount!! Unless you can pay it off really quickly, avoid financing thru places like BestBuy, they're not a bank, so they try to add some additional percentage points onto the deal for securing te loan. IOW, they also make money on you for giving it to you!!!

One of my 'regular bank' CC accounts carry a 24.99% APR. (That's HIGHER than most store CC accounts!

) It was about 17.7% before it got bumped up to its current 24.99% level by payments arriving late twice. Sadly, there is NO way to bring the rate down on that particular account; it will stay at 24.99% forever.