Heres To You, Guitar Center.

[Mattia]

I dunno; a laptop without a warrantee just seems like madness, at least if you lug it around, and if you're using your PC to earn money, an extended 3 year next day at-home repair or replace type warrantee (Dell's is relatively cheap, really, for desktops at least) suddenly seems like a pretty darn good idea.

Also, unless you're gaming or doing massively memory-hogging stuff, the computer you bought three years ago is still a Pentium 4, and will easily take the upgrade to 2 gigs of ram (if it doesn't have it already), and is more than enough power to last you another few years, at least.

[avengers63]

For the extended warranty portion of this thread, I agree that it's best used on cars & electronics. There is probably something else I can think of, but these tow were mentioned, so I'll add my +1 to them. Of the three computers I've bought, all three had the extended warranties on them, and all three have ended in major upgrades when they imploded. FWIW: Dell has the best customer service I've seen in a while. After working with their VERY polite East Indian techies, the end result was that it blew up and I needed a replacement. Both times it was totally replaced & upgraded, no hassles, no problems. All I had to do was go through the motions with customer service.

For CG, I didn't have any bad experiences. Not yet, at least. You can tell right away if the dude knows what he's talking about and if you want to talk to him or not. Now granted, all I've ever bought from them is a couple of pedals and come strings, but I've fiddled with the gear and talked to folks there plenty.

I think the lesson for us all to learn is pretty clear. Be careful who you're talking to and don't be snowed into buying something you don't need. Since we basically know more than most of the goobers working there, the most help we'd need would be in finding something. It we'd actually need help or questions answered, we should know better than to ask the college age kids working their way through school. If I've been playing longer than they've been alive, I don't want to talk to them.

[carlosnelson]

I go to one 2day 2 get my 14 yr. old sister an electric-acoustic Ibanez guitar combo & it happens again. I see what I thought was the same guitar on the wall for $179.99. When I get 2 the counter it's suddenly $199.99 so I say 2 the salesman it's priced differently over there & he says it's a different guitar & this is a package. So I say no problem, he then asks me if I want the 2yr. extended warranty for $19.99 which is not bad at all. I say yes cause it's for a minor & who knows what will happen. Then all of a sudden the SHAFT comes: "Oh U qualify for the warranty 2 day at no extra cost 2 u at all, i'll just incorporate it into the price".

Ibanez IJAE5 $179.99-$5.00 spiff from Ibanez to sell thier product + 2% commision from TGC

Warranty $19.99-20% of warranty at the end of the month

$4 Commission from TGC

$5 Ibanez

$4 For selling extended service contract

$13-15 USD for a 5 min. sale

I don't mind paying if I want coverage, but don't F#@k me on it, thinking I don't know what's up. I could be a real BB & go back & cancel the warranty for thinking i'm blind, i've seen it done at my old employer a million times.

[weaponepsilon]

Forget those punks behind the counter. The last time I went to GC I ended up taking those guys for a ride (i think). I walked in and was eying an Ibanez 506 bass used, mind you. I took it up to the counter and told the guy the knobs were loose, the finish was banged up and I didn't think that it was worth paying their price for. The guys started to sweat a little and his supervisor came up and said he could take care of it. But he pushed me into getting a new one. I told him I wanted a used one. He knocked the price down about $100 and handed it back to the first guy I talked to. I then proudly presented the first guy with my rebate comp that they had just mailed to me. He stared at it and was like, "you can only used that on green tag items." I then politely pointed out that there was no mention of that in the coupon and there were certainly no green tag items at all in the guitars section. He relented and knocked the price down further. I told him as he was ringing it up that I wasn't going to leave without a case...used of course. He disappeared and came back with a neat Fender one. For whatever reason he couldn't find it in their inventory so I got a used hardshell for $20 and a new $700 bass for $475. Hahaha! Take that corporate schills!