Heh, well i'm a pretty frugal shopper... i'm teh kind of guy who buys components and games based on their price... (so rather than get a hard drive i desperately need or a game that i really want, i'll sit around till it goes on sale for 50% off the MSRP)

Hrrmmm so just wanted to share experiences... what're the best deals that you guys have ever snagged for a PC software/hardware component? And from where?

anyhow here's my list of purchases that i'm particularly proud of

No One Lives Forever: GoTY edition ($10 at CompUSA)
Age of Mythology Collector's Edition (with the music and concept art and posters and all that junk, for $20, at this store chain in northern california called Fry's)
Doom 3 ($20, just two weeks ago, from EB)
Geforce FX5500 128MB ($30, about three weeks ago, also at Fry's)
Logitech Z-3 2.1s ($40, from Amazon)
160 GB Seagate Barracuda w/ 8 mb cache ($50... also saw a 200 GB version the next week, but oh well... 4 gigs per the dollar! at this Fry's place)
Viewsonic P225f 22-incher.. ($135! This thing's a beaut... at a computer show)

i won't count used stuff

Doom 3 day it came out $0
CoD and CoD:UO $30 for both
Hitman 3 $7.50
Hidden and Dangerous 2 $5

that's all i can remember at the moment

Seagate 200GB for 50 bucks
The whole Tom Clancy: Rainbow 6 series for 3 bucks
My BFG GeForce 6800OC + HL2 + Far Cry for 210 after rebate.

You'll learn real quick that Fry's has killer sales. I work at a Fry's down in Texas, where they're getting just as popular as in California. Our hard drive deals are always the best. Pretty much any hard drive you see in our ad that's on sale is gonna be below cost, so it loses us money everytime we sell one. That's how good a deal they are.

Motherboard/CPU combos are almost always below cost as well. One thing you might find interesting is a new "program" we started called the Recommended Value, which is basically an upgrade from the ad item, of which the whole point is something that won't lose us as much money as the ad item. Thing is, more than half the time, the R.V. item is a killer deal as well, so it's like twice as much stuff on sale as before. Especially for motherboard/CPU combos as all we ever put on ad are the ****ty ECS Elitegroup boards. If you're looking at the shelfs, yellow signs are regular signs, and green signs are hanging where the ad item is located, with the green sign showing the price of the "recommended value."

Hope all this helps in someway or another.

Yeah, Fry's has some amazing stuff...

I saw a fully loaded Sempron 2400+ rig (case, mobo, hard drives) for $99...

Hrrmm they have good prices on CPU/mobo combos, but they're always packaged with real crappy motherboards...

wakka how'd you manage to get Doom 3 for free?

Sempron's are basically Durons for Socket A. Meh.

Haven't really had any good deals. Oh well *shrug*

I picked up a K6/2 475 notebook (damaged screen, but somewhat usable..also had VGA out) for 50 bucks a few years ago..sold it a year or two later for $50 + s/h.

Call of Duty - $10

2 160 Western Digital hard drives - $30 each

Semprons are actually repackaged AthlonXP thoroughbreds... They just repackaged the old thoroughbreds as the Sempron "economy line" (because everybody started buying the Bartons once they came out)...

Where in Texas? There's one in Frisco I visit occasionally, need to go back soon and get a new video card.

DooM 3 - $30 - Brand new, 2 days after it was released
UT2004: Editor's Choice Edition - $20 - Brand new
Far Cry DVD Edition - Free with purchase of Athlon 64 CPU
Black/Silver slim keyboard - $5
Nyko AirFlo Mouse - $10

hrrmm there's one in Frisco? I always haveta go down to the South Bay to get to one..

When the AMD 64 FX-51 was $800, I got it for $90.

well lets see...... I snagged a Geforce4 ti 4200 for 30 dollars about a year and a half ago. I got tie-fighter for 3 dollars. I picked up some dvd's at gamestop for like 4-5 dollars apiece, these dvd's included Matrix, Matrix Reloaded, Matrix Revolutions, and The Day After Tomorrow (highly under rated film.

....... You've got to be kidding me.....