I get e-mail from Dell, sometimes several a week, with the special du jour and/or 1-, 2-, or 3-day sales. The Home division just had a 1-day Cyber Monday sale on Inspirons, but I bet they'll have several more sales before Christmas. Sorry I don't know whether they drop more a few days before Christmas, but Monday's e-mail had Inspiron 15's from $449 and 17's from $549.
Dell has separate sales divisions -- business, home, refurbished -- that have their own sites and hold frequent sales on different system configurations and software. I suggest you look at both the business and home sites to decide which system options better suit your needs, then sign up for the e-mails.
I wanted XP instead of Vista when I bought my Latitude (almost 2 years ago now), and the only way I could still get it was to go through their business or refurbished division. If you sign up for the e-mails, you'll probably face more options than you'd like.
I've had good results with their refurbished division, which has its own website and some good deals. Sometimes the "refurbished" models are new and unused, but the order was cancelled or the machine sent back before it was plugged in. In any event, they've gone through them, reinstalled the software if it was plugged in, and still have the full factory warranty. Like buying an auto dealer's demo, but reconditioned to new. Their available stock (machines, not securities) moves fast, so you have to decide what you want, then keep an eye on the list of available machines, and be ready to pull the trigger. It changes throughout the day. I saved enough buying a refurbished Latitude to pay for the 3-year gold service plan, which is worth it. You can get a live person on the phone immediately and they speak English. Whether they can fix the problem or not might be more of a challenge. I've used it several times and usually did very well.
Hope that helps. Good luck. |
