My general rule is to buy two items down from the top of the line.

Unlike the man in the picture, though, you should never purchase that sweater.

Wait until you can buy a refurbished item. You don't necessarily have to by the refurbished unit, but if you at least wait that long, the jury will be out on the product.

Is that Osama on the TV in the background? That's not going to be good for business.

Im an early adopter for alot of tech, but i know when to wait at the same time. I waited on a HDTV for instance.

I do know the price you pay and thats less features and quality for more money. Which is why i find the Apple fanboys tirade over the iphone to be insane. They got a credit in the store but...they didnt deserve one.

My cell phone was $400 the day it came out, 2 months later it was $250. Its just the price you pay.

i would suggest on computers getting the best processor/motherboard combo you can find. often times bb, cc and other electronic stores sell great packages but with real shitty processors and motherboards which limit your upgrade options. try not to let the bells and whistles convince you to buy them. memory (RAM), video cards, power supplies, and hard drives can all be upgraded fairly easily. the strength of your processor is the best indicator of how long your comp will be good for.

Let's see, I think I hit the V3 RAZR two years ago. Still have it, and it sure beats the Moto C350 candybar I had before that. Especially after it went through the wash. iPhone? I still haven't bought any Apple device in my life yet.

Computers? :/ I build my own, and in fact this one I'm typing on is pretty new. I pushed it a little, owing to the fact that I just don't get a new one too damn often. $1300 for a quad-core system. I'm pleased, and it should last for awhile, unless I decide to go 64bit. Monitor, keyboard, trackball were all scrounged from the old system

I evidently got the deal of the century on my Panasonic TZ3 that I bought for my trip to Switzerland. Saw it there for double what I paid for it, and I haven't seen it as low that I paid since. It met my wife's demands of a 3" screen, and more than 3x lens zoom (10x).

HD TV? My 34" Sony that's 6 years old is still doing just fine for me. All of my friends have upgraded. Maybe after the last crop of twins get out of high school.

Heck I finally got myself an LCD screen for the computer this year. Of course, I already knew the 20" CRT was getting dark and ready for the power supply to blow. And it did.

I've got to say that I don't really calculate eventual price drops into my electronics purchases.
That's not to say that I'm an early adopter, I just don't buy any gadgets unless I need them or can justify the purchase to myself.
The only reason I have an HDTV is because the more than 15 year old one I had before finally gave up the ghost, and I decided to splurge an extra $150 or so from a recent raise on a cheap HDTV instead of getting a Standard that would have been a couple of inches bigger.
My cellphone is pretty nifty, but it was a gift from my sister back when she used to work for Verizon.
As for DVD's I don't watch a lot of movies, so I really don't care about HDDVD/Blu-Ray. Just being able to watch them with widescreen covering the entire screen on my TV is enough for me.
My DVD player is my Xbox 360 which I did buy relatively early because I just HAD to get me some of that sweet sweet Elder Scrolls.

Seriously, if I can't kill bandits, demons, and vampires and steal their stuff in the name of saving all of Tamriel I think I'd go out and do something... Ill-mannered.

@bytehead: if you have an intel quad core, guess what, you already should be 64 bit. just because you're running a 32 bit os doesn't mean you aren't running on 64 bit architecture.

I will say, for computers, that the 500$ system is cheap yes, but it'll end up hurting you if your intended use is anything more intensive than browsing/documents/youtube. You may bet that 2 gigs of memory, but it may very well be considerably slower than the 1 gig in that 900$ system. Read the specs and do some research. Low end graphics/cpu/ram/drives aren't too hot when you're churning out 5 gig .psd's or movies. You get what you pay for in computing... most of the time.

@Snapjak: bet = get.. wtg me...

A good rule of thumb is to buy one or two levels below newest/top of line.

We're at the point in the cycle where existing digital technology is "good enough" for most uses and so no one really needs to buy the latest new thing except the early adopters and fanbois.

Case in point, I bought a Fuji S5000 big zoom camera over three years ago, for about $250, and it still works great. It shoots up to 3MP (6MP interpolated) but the quality of the images means they're indistinguishable from 7MP pocket cameras at any size below 8 x 10.

I plan to buy a dSLR but will wait for the inevitable Sony A100 price drop this Christmas (it's Minolta compatible and I have tons of those lenses).

I'm definitely not an early adopter. Have 2 TVs at home, 26" and 32" standard tube. Both work fine and will not be replaced until they die. With the new flat models I'd have to replace/get rid of the current entertainment centers I have.

Blu ray/HD DVD: I don't really care. My movies are standard DVD Widescreen so when I do upgrade the TV they'll fill the screen.

Computers: I build my own. My 2 newest are about 3+ years old. I would replace one of them but don't NEED a newer/faster machine. They run XP Pro, play all the games I need, do the office type stuff I want, and connect to the internet. My monitors are 21" CRT that I've had since around 2001 and until they die I won't be replacing them.

Cell phones: I use whatever's the "free" phone. I talk on it, don't need it to do anything else.

Digital Camera: Need a new one. Our Fuji that's about 4 yrs old is...crap. Eats batteries, low zoom, mediocre picture quality. Can't take good close up shots either. Plus we're going on a cruise and I want a camera that will take nice pictures.

I'm the kind of consumer that retailers hate. I don't spend money unless I have to.

i am so on the cutting edge that my feet hurt from balancing on it!

-my phone is now a 2 1/2 year old RAZR. i will say that i'm glad i bought it when i did b/c it only cost me $50 & it is one of the last production runs before they replaced almost all the "aircrft-grade" metal with plastic on the RAZR models.

-my computer is an 8-yr old hp vectra that i salvaged from an office for free. blazing fast 768MHz processing speed! i scavenged a hard drive & RAM, & bought an authentic windows copy & a refurb 19" flat screen on ebay & ended up w/ the whole package for <$150.

-my SLR camera is a nikon circa 1955 & for quick shots, the pocket digital i carry around is a casio exilim i bought 2 years ago.

-my high-def dvd's come out of the $5 bin at various electronics stores. wait, those aren't hd? coulda fooled me.

have a little fun:
[www.macobserver.com]
[wheel.blogs.com]

The best thing to do is always wait six months. The item you're looking at will always be cheaper and if you're lucky, there will also be a newer and better version of it available as well. Then repeat. This is a great way to save money because you'll never buy anything at all.

Different products have different product cycles, as well.

HDTVs hit a sweet spot about 8mos ago. Before that, they were (really) expensive and each had an ever-shifting list of technical features. Now, however, most have HD tuners built in, cable card slots (for the suckers buying cable), 1081p rez, etc. So now, the extra benefit of waiting it out isn't as large as it was before.

Apple products, on the other hand, are quite solid and feature-rich right out of the gate. They're known for waiting, polishing, getting it right before pushing it out the door. For instance, buy an iPod now and you'll be happy. Sure, one will come out (every six months or so) that's better, but hey, it's tech. The one you buy now will have all the features that attracted you to begin with.

Different mfrs, segments, have different product debuts as well. Newbies buying Apple products a week before Jobs is scheduled to give one of his presentations are unhappy consumers. But with a bit of homework, they'd learn this.

(Umm, the iPhone is the exception that proves the rule, so stop yer b*tchin')

Also, the length of time you anticipate owning your goodies make a difference. I had my old TV for over a decade, so the pro-rated price isn't as bad as, say, a cell phone.

Some product lines are so wonky (Zune!!), you should run, not walk. No matter when they come up with a new model.

In general, buy the original, not the knock-off. It's a bit more but the pleasure you'll get is worth it. Buy less often, but buy well. You'll be happier AND save more money.

@trai_dep: Why do Apple Fan Boys always make the stupidest posts?

I am sure stores and electronics companies really hate me:

My phone is a umm.. Nokia 6010, it makes calls, I don't need it for anything else, thank you. Its over 2 years old, works just fine, no need to replace.

20 inch CRT TV, works fine, plays all my video game consoles, my only requirement for a TV is that it has AV ports in the front, and this does so it suits me just fine. This was bought in 2004 so I have a long time to wait before it dies and then I am forced to upgrade to something else because they don't sell CRT's in the stores anymore. No one in my family even knows what an HDTV is yet.

Most of my game consoles were bought for >$20 at yard sales, they all work fine and play games, plus I get full games and I don't have to pay extra to download content that the game should have been shipped with anyways! Newest game consoles are a Gamecube and a DS Lite, the DS was totally worth it for me because I play it so much. I have such a plethora of games from yard sales that I am completely desensitized to the wanting for more consoles!

For things like video games its definitely best to wait because they only drop in price and its still the same game. Its a bit different for online games though if your playing online you might want to consider buying the game brand new then selling it off as quickly as possible for the next big thing since eventually for every online game the community that plays it goes somewhere else. It wouldn't be a good idea to keep an online game until it becomes obsolete because the servers will eventually be taken down and then you will be left with nothing but a coaster. However if your playing non-online games, games can be purchased VERY cheaply if you are willing to wait. Most games drop to 19.99 at some point, or even lower in some cases. You should never have to spend 50$ for that brand-new, non-online game, its just too much money and no game out there is worth that much money to me at least.

@SaraAB87: NO! NO! NO! YOU MUST PREORDER EVERYTHING!!!1!1!!

/sarcasm (& sorry about the caps)

@eslaydog: troll much?

@trai_dep: Apparently, anyone who understands Apple's business model and pricing structure is a "fanboy". Seriously, it bugs me that if I want to point out the company's strength, I have to qualify it with a "but..." and follow with some canard to be taken seriously, like "but it's overpriced..." or "but it's only for designers and musicians" or "but it doesn't run enough software.

S -

Yeah, there are some goofy people out there. I'm a demanding consumer and don't take kindly to companies that overpromise, con or mistreat. Yet there ARE some good companies out there. They should be rewarded with loyalty and positive word of mouth. Otherwise, why would any company even try to ethically serve their customers with great products that deliver solid value?

I think that mediocre people are made uncomfortable by excellence. So they mindlessly slag things (and people :P) that they know in their heart of hearts are too good for them.

Hey, it's all good. Someone has to buy those diarhhea-colored Zunes, right?

@trai_dep: i don't know that i'd agree on the apple products. sometimes they're fully refined when they reach the market. sometimes not so much. the ipod gen iv (i think) wasn't as good as the models before or after - the glossy finish was extremely prone to scratching, battery life was shorter than predecessors due to size reduction & there were some issues with defects. macbooks have had issues from year to year with some versions being better than others. then we can talk about cheetah or the power pc switch to pentium, etc. etc.

i'm not bashing apple - they do a very good job at releasing high-quality & desirable products, i just don't think they're immune to the concept of "wait & see".

@eslaydog:

I didn't really see anything "stupid" about trai_dep's comment(s). Play nice.

The more they ask me to preorder the more I shop online for better deals (or just wait the few months it takes for most price drops to occur)!

@mac-phisto: Good point. Come to think of it, I wait a couple weeks after a new Apple product hits the shelves (procrastinating early adopter?), to avoid the problematic models. As you say, no one's perfect, but it's hard to be filled w/ too much rancor if I feel the company is at least trying its best.

And some categories, regardless of mfr - laptops come to mind - seem more prone to wonkiness, so extra caution is advised.

Err, except for the iPod Touch. I've made three phone calls already to see if it's in stock. Planning on sleeping in car if it means getting one soon. :D

I guess the broader point I was trying to make is, measure twice, cut once. Shop value over price. Over the life of the product, you'll probably be happier spending a bit more getting what you really wanted in the first place.