Lite-On 52/32/52 CD-RW And Avery After - $9.99 after rebates

[jeldrid]

I can't believe I missed out on this one. I've been waiting for a good CDR deal to pop up here for a month or two, now. I just need to check more often, I guess. :/

[Inertia]

The Best Buy website ordering is so sluggish it makes for a frustrating experience. It's probably the worst online ordering experience I can remember.

I ordered mine Sunday evening 8/10 and received it yesterday - Tuesday 8/18. The retail box was inside a larger box with nothing else inside to keep it from rattling in the large box. No paper, no peanuts, no bubble wrap, nothing. This is careless packing, and not up to standards of other vendors.

As far as I know, the drive was undamaged and the limited testing I have done so far has been OK.

[dodecahedron]

congrats on your new drive!
(or should i say on your new toy? )

[Inertia]

congrats on your new drive!
(or should i say on your new toy? )

Thanks. I guess I shouldn't bitch too much considering the total cost of the LTR-52327S, labeling kit and (free) shipping will be $10 after rebates.

[CDRecorder]

Edit: Only the labeling kit shipped today: the burner didn't ship yet.

I'm sorry to hear that your drive was packaged so carelessly, Inertia; I hope they begin packaging their drives better soon.

[cfitz]

Mine finally shipped today!

I'm sorry to hear that your drive was packaged so carelessly, Inertia; I hope they begin packaging their drives better soon.

Where "soon" might be as of 9:00 AM this morning, for example?

cfitz

[CDRecorder]

Where "soon" might be as of 9:00 AM this morning, for example?

cfitz

That would be nice!

[jjones]

With this drive, at what speed do you guys burn the Fuji (TY) 48X CDRs at?

Should I burn at 48X just to play it safe?

[CDRecorder]

The Fuji 48x discs should work just fine at 52x, from what I've heard. I haven't actually tried it myself, though. My drive is still in the mail.

[CowboySlim]

Basically the same deal here. Two e-mails from BB today. Avery label kit is shipped today. Burner to be shipped in 23 days. That's like the 13th of Sept. With three days to get here and the Rebate postmarked NLT Sept 16, I'm out of the game.

I wouldn't have ordered the labels except for the bundled deal. Look for them on E-bay.

[AnEnlightenedGuy]

Here's a brief synopsis of my experience of this deal:

8/11: Ordered the burner/labeler bundle as soon as I found out about the deal on CDRLabs. Final price came out to be $74.36 after tax...that's right, Best Buy charges tax. So for me, the $9.99 burner is really a $14.36 burner. Oh well... (BTW, isn't $74 a little steep, considering that the rebate isn't a guarantee?)

8/13: Received email from Best Buy, "The item listed below is not yet available to be shipped. We expect to ship it to you by 08/19/2003"
Both the burner and afterburner are listed as Backordered.

8/19: Another email from BB, "The item listed below is not yet available to be shipped. We expect to ship it to you in the next 24 days."
Both items are still listed as Backordered. At this point, I'm thinking of cancelling the order and shelling out the $40 bucks to NewEgg

8/20: "Your shipment is on its way" but oh wait. Only one item has shipped, and guess which one...?

At this point, what are my options? Can I cancel the unshipped burner and return the afterburner to my local BB? Or should I keep waiting for this ever-elusive Lite-On to arrive?

[airtommy]

The retail box was inside a larger box with nothing else inside to keep it from rattling in the large box. No paper, no peanuts, no bubble wrap, nothing. This is careless packing, and not up to standards of other vendors.

Remember the HP DVD300i mentioned in this forum? I ordered it from Office Depot, they said it would ship from the factory. HP packaged it the exact same way you describe above. Once, I received an item from Staples that was similarly packaged.

[Turkeyscore.com]

I ordered mine on the 16th. Had to pay 7.5% tax though...so it was like $15 and some change. It shipped today...from ohio?? I live in California! grr....

[CDRecorder]

Turkeyscore: Did your drive ship, or only the label kit?

I was wrong about what I said earlier; only my label kit shipped, not my drive. BTW, I had to pay 6% tax on mine, too.

[CowboySlim]

Best Buy charges tax

I'm not sure how all that works. It depends on where the store is and where you live.

This I do know (I live in CA.):
Amazon is not physically in CA, no tax.
Mwave and BUY.com are physically here and charge me CA tax rate.
Land's End (Wisconsin) did not used to charge me, but does now that Sears has bought them (because Sears is everywhere).

Does anybody live in a no sales tax state like Nevada and get charged CA sales tax when they buy from somebody here like buy.com?

[cfitz]

Basically the same deal here. Two e-mails from BB today. Avery label kit is shipped today. Burner to be shipped in 23 days. That's like the 13th of Sept. With three days to get here and the Rebate postmarked NLT Sept 16, I'm out of the game.

I wouldn't have ordered the labels except for the bundled deal. Look for them on E-bay.

8/20: "Your shipment is on its way" but oh wait. Only one item has shipped, and guess which one...?

I was wrong about what I said earlier; only my label kit shipped, not my drive.

Best Buy's master plan to get rid of a huge overstock of Avery CD labeling systems: Offer a nice burner at an irresitable price, but require purchase of the useless labeler kit to get that price. Then ship the labeler kit while backordering the drive until the rebates are no longer valid. At this point Best Buy has unloaded all the worthless labelers and will either not have to ship the drives, because people cancel their orders, or receive full price for the drives, because they don't have to honor the rebate. Sheer evil genius!

Fortunately, you can return BestBuy.com orders at your local Best Buy retail outlet, and not incur any shipping charges. You do have a Best Buy retail outlet located close by, don't you?

cfitz

[CDRecorder]

Thankfully, I do have a Best Buy fairly close, so I will be able to return the label kit if the burner doesn't ship in time to get the rebates. I sure hope that the burner ships soon for everyone!

[Inertia]

When I placed my order the burner was in stock and the labeling system was backordered. As mentioned, the burner was received 8/18. The labeler has been shipped and will be received 8/25.

Both Fuji/TY and TDK/Ritek 48x discs burn nicely at 52x. I just picked up a 100 pack of the 48x TDK/Ritek discs at Staples for $4.99 after rebate. Can't beat those high quality 5¢ burns on a state-of-the-art $10.00 burner.

[airtommy]

Best Buy's master plan to get rid of a huge overstock of Avery CD labeling systems: Offer a nice burner at an irresitable price, but require purchase of the useless labeler kit to get that price. Then ship the labeler kit while backordering the drive until the rebates are no longer valid. At this point Best Buy has unloaded all the worthless labelers and will either not have to ship the drives, because people cancel their orders, or receive full price for the drives, because they don't have to honor the rebate. Sheer evil genius! cfitz

From what I can see, the rebates are not bundled. So, you can submit the Avery rebate even if you cancel the Lite-On part of your order. Am I wrong?

My experience with BB is that they have great customer service, and their rebate dept. is the best rebate dept. around, IMO. I am not worried that they are trying to screw us.

P.S. I noticed that this deal is no longer available.

[hoargard]

well, i called customer service and they have no idea (naturally) when they're getting a new shipment in; but i WAS promised that whenever a back-shiipment comes in, they fulfill the backorders FIRST.

we shall see, kimosabe, we shall see.

i'm tempted to cancel the order but that $9.99 price tag is VERY alluring; i'll probably just wait another week or two, then cancel--just in case Best Buy DOES come through!

[AnEnlightenedGuy]

Just browsing thru the BB site this evening, and came upon this:

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp ... d=cat01040

The MediaStor CW-524 52x24x52 CD-RW for $9.99 after 2 rebates, and as of right now, it's listed to be in stock. The deal expires tomorrow (8/23), and apparently it's a rebadged Optorite.

I'm gonna hold out for my Lite-On (which btw, is shown to be in stock 8/25-9/2)

[Turkeyscore.com]

Turkeyscore: Did your drive ship, or only the label kit?

I was wrong about what I said earlier; only my label kit shipped, not my drive. BTW, I had to pay 6% tax on mine, too.

Both shipped for me, but from ohio, not California
Edit: Just realized that only lable maker shipped

[CowboySlim]

Californication sales tax is 7.5% to7.75%, depending on locality. Retailers without a physical presence in the state, such as Amazon, don't extract it from residents as the federal government has declined to mandate such. However, residents, by law, are supposed to notify the California State Board of Equalization (a euphamism for the confiscators), obtain a form and remit such amount of sales tax as if they purchased at a local retailer.

[CDRecorder]

Both shipped for me, but from ohio, not California

My label kit shipped from Ohio. My drive hasn't shipped yet. BTW, what date did you order yours? I ordered mine on the 16th.

[Turkeyscore.com]

same here
Edit:
ARRGH!! I just realized that they only shipped my lablemaker.