Best Buy Mobile to skip rebate, sell Palm Pre for $199.99 outright
By Darren Murph 
posted May 20th 2009 11:21AM
posted May 20th 2009 11:21AM
[Via Brighthand]
Please note: If you're a current Engadget commenter, you do not need to re-register. Simply login and you will be prompted to select a username.
Yep, was already planning on doing this (as long as the best buy near me gets them in).
I prefer the iPhone 3G scenario. It's awesome !
I hate narcissistic idiots who think their opinion is so important that they reply to the first post, although their post have nothing to do with it.
You're not important. You don't matter... Live with it.
You do not reply to my comment with that blasphemy.
(although tbh, we all kind of knew best buy was going to do this)
You only get the instant rebate if you buy Monster Cables to get HD out of the Pre. And then pay to have Geek Squad calibrate your Pre.
Best Buy Mobile is the only tolerable thing about Best Buy. I don't shop there as a general rule but their Mobile folks tend to know what they are doing and they are big enough to eat the cost of the MIR until they can claim it.
Sprint has done the MIR on every phone I've had. It's cheap and a huge hassle but considering how little I pay for minutes and unlimited data/text I save that $100 in two months against a comparable ATT plan so I deal with it.
This time I will probably hit BB just to avoid the MIR. If they run out, the Sprint store is across the street and I can just suck it up and wait 4-6 weeks like the other chumps.
Palm must keep pushing very hard so as not to let this Pre be a failure. There are rumors that the Pre will be scarce upon launch. I guess Palm will be holding an awful lot of Pres in a warehouse somewhere just to keep up the hype. I can hear the news media now. Palm Pres sell out first day. Riots break out everywhere. Which will indicate Palm released ten Pres per store. They better sell 100,000 of these Pres the first day or otherwise....yawn.
The last one sounds the best :D (doh!)
Sounds great. Radio Shack should do the same.
RadioShack did away with mail in rebates on phones last year.
I doesnt really matter at this point, any Radioshack that has a Best Buy within 20 miles will be forced to pricematch with their local competitor... so $199 it is whether or not Radioshack uses the MIR...
I know I am going to the RS down the street... i bet $100 their wont even be a line....
Radioshack does this as well.
Since when is Best Buy consumer friendly?
When you know people that work there!
I always thought when you had money to spend.
When you use it as a showroom for NewEgg.
@THJ, laughing to hard right now. So true.
omfg you are so right, :) thats the ONLY reason i go to BB
@THJ, ROFLMAO!
Yeah doing away with the rebate right off is nice, I like my points too. "Free" stuff is always good.
sweet! we JUST got a best buy in town so i'm there! well not yet...
Its funny how an unreleased device can cause so much excitement and bring back a company from the brink of extinction.
Honestly i was hoping for more from them, dont get me wrong its a nice device, but they could of done a bit more. Used some premium build materials and made the OS modern as opposed to the "bubbly" design theyve got going there.
As long as its a precursor to other great smartphones from Palm im happy.
Sorry you don't like the look of the OS but I am more impressed in what it can do, not that it has shinny graphics or rounded edges. I'm also just grateful that it's not uninspired looking and plan like Garnet or Android.
I'm impressed that they can get the time, battery and connection icons to display above the screen.
Palm seems to be doing this by simply having a black bar on the screen, unlike phones like the Sonic Ericsson z750a which find a way to make the screen blend perfectly with the device. Palm just photoshops the press pictures to hell to lie.
http://www.techgadgets.in/images/sony-ericsson-z750a-flip-phone.jpg
Where the text seems to appear on the device (what Palm tricks us into thinking they're doing)
http://www.palminfocenter.com/images/palm-pre-hw-imp-4.jpg
What they're actually doing (black bar on the screen, can clearly see where screen ends/device begins)
Tentos - Palm seems to be doing this by simply having a black bar on the screen, unlike phones like the Sonic Ericsson z750a which find a way to make the screen blend perfectly with the device. Palm just photoshops the press pictures to hell to lie.
http://www.techgadgets.in/images/sony-ericsson-z750a-flip-phone.jpg
Where the text seems to appear on the device (what Palm tricks us into thinking they're doing)
http://www.palminfocenter.com/images/palm-pre-hw-imp-4.jpg
What they're actually doing (black bar on the screen, can clearly see where screen ends/device begins)
Thanks for the pics - I was just poking fun at the photoshop job
it's pretty damn close. The difference is, those Sony Erricson ones are monochrome exterior displays. I'd like to see them do that on a full-colour main display.
unlocked phones cost so much because the carriers are running a mafia style stunt or what ?
Unlocked phones are usually sold at retail, since the locked phones are carrier-subsidized.
Go check out the prices unlocked phones on eBay - they are much more expensive when they are not a loss-leader for signing up new customers.
Yeah, this is definitely the plan. My upgrade isn't until July 1, so I'm hoping maybe they could give it to me a month early. If not, I'll pay whatever I need to pay. I've been waiting 5 months, I'm very excited only 16 days are left.
Only 3 weeks to wait and you would rather spend $150+ more? I could wait a few weeks.
I can't upgrade till Sept 1 and I'm calling Sprint all the time to badger them into letting me do it. I doubt it will work, but worth a try.
@gator - talk to the retention dept. Tell them that you are thinking of cancelling(you wont really) . They will listen to you then.
It does sound petty, like it's only a few weeks...but with even Sprint saying they won't be able to keep up with demand and that they'll be shortages, I don't want to have to wait even longer than those weeks. It's not worth it to me.
I asked this over at Engadget Mobile before checking here to see if there was a thread...
Okay...I just joined Sprint back in early December. So I'll be at 6-7 months when this phone gets released. I currently have a Samsung Ace and love it, but it's kinda sluggish, I'm starting to really miss having a touch screen and I didn't know about the problems with the ear piece allowing dust to get inside the phone between the LCD and glass.
Plus I kinda banged it into a railing and now there's this nasty discolored spot on the bottom left corner of the screen :(
But...I'm SOL, aren't I? I can't walk in and get this for $200 as I sign a new 2 year contract...correct?
@ super - Just call them and threaten to cancel the service. They will help you out then. Talk to retention. Not just regular customer service.
I don't know about you guys, but I'm not buying a phone from a company that claims there are 46 days to june 6th.
I would think that this is a good thing, because the 2 week return policy more than doubles in length? ;)
They gotta sell it cheap to lock ppl in..only way they can really compete
iPhone 3G was $199 under contract when it was released. I guess great companies think alike.
I am really excited about the HTC Rohdium more than the pre... But I'm getting the HTC Rohdium at best buy too. The last time I had a sprint rebate it took over 16 weeks longer than what was clearly stated on the form.
I'm just going to try to get my Sprint store to match that...
I dont think you are in the position to argue the price. If u dont take it, the person behind you who is more willing to pay and less willing to go to Radio Shack or BBMobile WILL.
If only this stupid thing wasn't limited to 8GB.
They make it wayyy too easy for people to pick the iPhone over it, simply because of this one spec.
It's not like you can't add a more space you know...memory are dirt cheap these days. You are worrying about nothing there.
Why do some people continue to fuss over the memory?... It has been known since CES in January. A device having 50, 75 or 100GB does not matter, if the device has poor memory management. The Samsung Instinct microSD is 4GB max, you can put just as many songs on it as an 8GB iphone. It was reported that webOS has excellent memory management.
who said anything about the Samsung Instinct?
I'm talking about the Pre's ability (or lack thereof) to make current iPhone users sign on for 2 years w/ a Pre on Sprint.
That simply won't happen for anyone who wants to use their phone as their primary PMP. You can't be an iPhone killer without at least somewhat stealing their marketshare. Game, set, match.
no way will this make me chose the iphone over the pre. so the iphone has more capacity, but this "stupid thing" is way smarter than the current iphone could ever dream of being. at this point, iphone users have no choice but to put all their eggs in the software update basket...hope it delivers.
@p3t3b2
Memory management refers to RAM not storage space. A 4MB MP3 is still 4MB whether it's on an iPod, Instinct or Pre.
p3t3b2, what in the world are you talking about??? The only way you are going to put 2x as many songs on a drive that is 1/2 as big is to cut the song quality down by half. As far as your "memory management" scenario, I'm pretty sure the Instinct keeps the miniSDHC cards formatted as Fat32 just like just about every device in existance.