OK, for the very first time, Amazon is hiking the Prime membership fees from $79 to $99. I have a write-up on what it is. At this juncture, you can start your free Prime Membership Trial to 'lock' in the old price of $79 for the first year. Do remember to cancel the auto-renewal if you don't have the intention to pay.
Is it still worthwhile to sign up at the new price? Well, it very much depends on what you're going to do. Personally, if the Prime video library agrees with you, it's probably ok to sign up. Even so if you like the free 2-day shipping.
Good luck.
Showing posts with label Tutorial. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Tutorial. Show all posts
Saturday, March 15, 2014
Wednesday, December 25, 2013
Tutorial : Processing Returns
There will be times when you need to return the items for various reasons. Some of the common ones include -
- Items are defective or damaged
- Items do not matched what you've ordered
- You regretted
There might be others, but the process is exactly the same. The easiest method is for you to chat up with an CSO. Describe to them politely the problem. I know it can be very frustrating when you get damaged/wrong items but venting your anger at the CSO won't speed things up.
The CSO might offer you a return label from UPS. There is a problem with this approach. You have to send the item to UPS Singapore. The address given is within the security zone in the Airport Cargo area. I wouldn't want to go there. So if they do, tell them it's very inconvenient to return the items at UPS. Note that not all offers this return method.
The next option will be likely for you to return it via the most economical method. With this method, the CSO will create the return label for you, which is essentially an 'RMA' number and the Amazon address where the returns will go. You'll receive an email from the CSO, giving you instructions on what to do next. Essentially, there'll be a link for you to click to print out the return labels. There are 2 parts to it. The first part is for you to include it INSIDE the package. It basically says what you are returning. The second part is the actual address for you to paste OUTSIDE the package, for the postman to deliver it.
Next, go to your nearest post office and get those bubble envelop or the shipping box. Ask for standard registered parcel. It cost about $10 to ship an SSD, about $12-$15 to ship back a boxed DVD/BD set. Get receipts for both items (the box and postage). Fill up the postal form which you're going to get back a copy of it, as well as an RA number. Scan both the receipt and RA number and email it back to the Amazon CSO. Just reply to the original return label email will also do. For me, Amazon took a total of 5 minutes to respond and start the reimbursement process.
What will happen next varies. In my case, the moment the return label is created by the CSO, he went ahead and ordered a replacement for me straight. According to Amazon's own SOP, they need to receive the returned items first before they ship out the replacement. So YMMV here. You can try to ask for priority shipping but I personally feel it's bad form to do this if you did not pay for priority shipping originally.
It take about 2 weeks for the parcel to go back home. When Amazon received it, you'll get an email telling you so. And that completes the returns procedure. The replacement order is treated like a new order.
A few thoughts -
- I don't really advocate harassing the CSO for a speedier replacement. Just let the process run its course.
- This applies only for items shipped directly to Singapore, and for items fulfilled by Amazon.
- If you're returning due to reason #3 (as in, You regretted), please man up and pay for the return shipping. I don't think it's fair for Amazon to foot the return postage because you bought the items on impulse.
- If the items are shipped to you via a forwarder, you'll likely need to pay the return postage as their return label is valid only in US for items shipped domestically. They have no other options.
I hope this is useful information to you and also hope that you don't really have to go through this. I also want to appeal to my readers to not kick up a rookus due to minor cosmetic defects or packaging defects which do not affect the product itself (which is very common). Amazon, as a company, takes your words for it most of the time, so don't abuse this trust.
Read my other articles and tutorials starting with Shopping at Amazon Starts Here!
Monday, December 23, 2013
On the Mac : Windows, VMs and Flash Drives
If you do not prefer the Bootcamp approach describe in my other article, obviously you can just run Fusion or Parallels and have a virtual Windows environment running alongside your Mac. But again, due to the precious disk space on some Airs, carving out this 20GB to run a VM might not be something you can afford. In reality, this article also applies to Windows laptop with a similarly sized SSD on board. If you have such a machine and just need another Windows VM for testing, continue reading.
Now, there are obvious workarounds to this problem. You can, for example, run it on an SD card or run it on a thumb drive or external portable disks. If you can use an external portable disk, it'll be the most economical way. Read my other article about them. There's one problem with running it off an external disk. It's not exactly very portable since you have to move around with the drive attached to your Air (or laptop). It works, but there's this caveat. If you're going to be sitting on your desk while running the VM, then I think this approach works well. It's not going to be very high performing, but it's reasonable. I do have a few test VMs running off 'Desktop' class external disks.
I've hunted for some time since getting the Air, for a thumb drive/SD card that is reasonably fast so that I can just stick it to the USB port (or SD slot) and carry it around with me. SD card never works, period. They are just too slow. I must admit that I haven't really tried many of them, but I don't really want to waste any more money. The seriously fast ones (as claimed by Sandisk) cost multiple dollars per GB. Unless Sandisk wants to send me one to play with, I'm not going to outright buy them and pray that it works. For the record, I tried a Sony Class 10 and an HP Class 10. Both are 32GB, and both never complete the Windows installation after 1 hour, as far as I can remember.
So I'm left with thumb drives. I had a SanDisk Ultra 64 GB USB Flash Drive SDCZ45-064G-U46
at that time and I decided to try it. It's ok, but still slow. I didn't wait for the Windows installation to complete. I ended up putting Diablo III client on that thumb drive. Yes, that works reasonably but you can get killed due to disk read latency. I know I did a few times. At this point, I realized what I need is something which performs well for small I/O read/write. And it just happens that SanDisk announced their latest thumb drive, the SanDisk Extreme 64 GB USB 3.0 Flash Drive up to 190 MB/s SDCZ80-064G-X46
. This is an interesting drive. It sports an USB3 connection and some insane claimed transfer speed. And the best part? It costs about SGD1.4/GB locally here.
I began trawling the web for benchmarks. I found exactly 1 (I can't remember the site, sorry, but it compares this drive with a ton of others). Remember this is more than a year back (probably towards the end of 2012) and USB3 drives with real performance isn't that common place. Most USB3 drives at that time are just their standard USB2 parts retrofitted with an USB3 port. I knew this drive is going to be the one when I saw the benchmarks. The CDM 4K readings are unheard of. They read close to 10MB/s write with the default 4K test. You just have to trust my word as I don't have the URL anymore. Just for comparison sake, almost all flash drive at that time managed barely 1MB/s read/write on the default 4K CDM test.
I took the leap of faith and buy the 64GB version. I popped it into the Air's USB2 ports, format it to HFS+ and straight away put a Fusion VM on it running Windows 7. The speed is incredible, even on an USB2 port. It feels faster than those VMs running off normal external disks. I've been running my primary Windows VM on this drive since. After a year of hard hammering, it's getting slower and slower. I've yet to research this. You can start to feel the momentarily freeze at times, Outlook is not as responsive opening a cached Inbox etc. I'm not exactly sure why this is happening at this point. However, that said, it's still plenty fast mind you.
Even though I'm extremely happy with the purchase, there's a few things I ought to mention.
Now, there are obvious workarounds to this problem. You can, for example, run it on an SD card or run it on a thumb drive or external portable disks. If you can use an external portable disk, it'll be the most economical way. Read my other article about them. There's one problem with running it off an external disk. It's not exactly very portable since you have to move around with the drive attached to your Air (or laptop). It works, but there's this caveat. If you're going to be sitting on your desk while running the VM, then I think this approach works well. It's not going to be very high performing, but it's reasonable. I do have a few test VMs running off 'Desktop' class external disks.
I've hunted for some time since getting the Air, for a thumb drive/SD card that is reasonably fast so that I can just stick it to the USB port (or SD slot) and carry it around with me. SD card never works, period. They are just too slow. I must admit that I haven't really tried many of them, but I don't really want to waste any more money. The seriously fast ones (as claimed by Sandisk) cost multiple dollars per GB. Unless Sandisk wants to send me one to play with, I'm not going to outright buy them and pray that it works. For the record, I tried a Sony Class 10 and an HP Class 10. Both are 32GB, and both never complete the Windows installation after 1 hour, as far as I can remember.
So I'm left with thumb drives. I had a SanDisk Ultra 64 GB USB Flash Drive SDCZ45-064G-U46
at that time and I decided to try it. It's ok, but still slow. I didn't wait for the Windows installation to complete. I ended up putting Diablo III client on that thumb drive. Yes, that works reasonably but you can get killed due to disk read latency. I know I did a few times. At this point, I realized what I need is something which performs well for small I/O read/write. And it just happens that SanDisk announced their latest thumb drive, the SanDisk Extreme 64 GB USB 3.0 Flash Drive up to 190 MB/s SDCZ80-064G-X46. This is an interesting drive. It sports an USB3 connection and some insane claimed transfer speed. And the best part? It costs about SGD1.4/GB locally here.I began trawling the web for benchmarks. I found exactly 1 (I can't remember the site, sorry, but it compares this drive with a ton of others). Remember this is more than a year back (probably towards the end of 2012) and USB3 drives with real performance isn't that common place. Most USB3 drives at that time are just their standard USB2 parts retrofitted with an USB3 port. I knew this drive is going to be the one when I saw the benchmarks. The CDM 4K readings are unheard of. They read close to 10MB/s write with the default 4K test. You just have to trust my word as I don't have the URL anymore. Just for comparison sake, almost all flash drive at that time managed barely 1MB/s read/write on the default 4K CDM test.
I took the leap of faith and buy the 64GB version. I popped it into the Air's USB2 ports, format it to HFS+ and straight away put a Fusion VM on it running Windows 7. The speed is incredible, even on an USB2 port. It feels faster than those VMs running off normal external disks. I've been running my primary Windows VM on this drive since. After a year of hard hammering, it's getting slower and slower. I've yet to research this. You can start to feel the momentarily freeze at times, Outlook is not as responsive opening a cached Inbox etc. I'm not exactly sure why this is happening at this point. However, that said, it's still plenty fast mind you.
Even though I'm extremely happy with the purchase, there's a few things I ought to mention.
- This drive is expensive! Price is relative when I said it cost SGD1.4/GB. The other 'normal' flash drives cost like SGD0.80/GB. Price is lower now compared to a year ago.
- If you need to just copy huge files back and forth, you might want to look elsewhere. This guy doesn't score number 1 in sequential transfer. Nor is it the most cost effective for bulk storage.
- This drive shines only if you have a workload which requires small random read/write IO. Running VMs off it is one example.
If you skip all the post and come straight here, I'll say just buy this guy to run VMs off it. You won't go wrong.
Friday, December 20, 2013
On the Mac : Bootcamp, Thunderbolt and SSDs
I'm going to side track and talk a little bit about my experience trying to bootcamp my MacBook Air (mid-2011). Now, I'm sure everybody with a MBA that sports either 64GB or 128GB of internal storage will be able to attest that we are always doing some house keeping to prevent our apps from overwhelming the puny storage. I am no different, especially when I also need a Windows environment to get some of my work done.
In short, I'm ill equipped to run a VM using the internal disk. Fusion wants 20GB (which I think is reasonable for a Windows 7 Setup) and that will leave me with even less storage to deal with. The options I have is either run the VM off a USB stick (which I eventually did and will be a story for another day), or run the VM off the Thunderbolt port, which I did as well, but it's a little clumsy and not exactly very portable.
But what if I want to 'boot camp' and play some Windows-only games? The storage consideration alone will be daunting as there's really no way both partitions can fit into the internal 128GB SSD. Not for me at least. And so I have a thought, to simply put the Windows partition on its own disk and run it off the Thunderbolt port!
First, let's talk a little about the hardware I actually use. I opted for an SSD instead of a traditional spinning disk for obvious reason. In my case, I picked Intel 530 Series 240GB 2.5-Inch Internal Solid State Drive (Reseller Kit) SSDSC2BW240A4K5
.
Now, I need some kind of a disk enclosure or an adaptor which can convert the Thunderbolt port to a SATA port. Seagate has exactly this contraption, Seagate Backup Plus Portable Thunderbolt Adapter (STAE128)
. This adaptor is actually designed for the Seagate Backup Plus Portable series
of external disk drives. This family of external drives (sans the newer 2TB versions) come with a detachable USB3 dongle, which you can remove and expose the naked SATA connector on the disk itself. You then plug this into the adaptor and it will then becomes a Thunderbolt portable external disk. Neat! And since the connector on the adaptor is a standard SATA connector, you can plug any standard SATA 2.5" disks to it and turn it into a Thunderbolt portable external disk.
There is one caveat. The adaptor itself does not provide 12V power and as a result, it is unable to power certain drives, notably the Seagate Constellation.2 1 TB 7200RPM SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache 2.5-Inch Internal Bare Drive ST91000640NS
. This guy requires both 5V and 12V rails to be available and will not work with the adaptor.
So now I have these, how do I put Windows on it? We're going to make use of a lesser known technique in the consumer world to install Windows : Windows Automated Installation Kit. Windows AIK tool is a free download from Microsoft, you can get it here. In reality, you only need 'imagex.exe' from the whole bundle so you probably can find just the binary alone by searching the web. In addition to Windows AIK, you'll also need Apple's Bootcamp drivers. It's easy to get the drivers, all you need to do is just run Bootcamp Assistant and it will download the correct drivers for your Mac. Put these drivers onto a thumb drive or something. Lastly, you'll obviously need the Windows installer itself. It can be a physical disc or an ISO image.
Next, you'll need a Windows environment to prepare the drive. It can be a physical desktop/laptop or a simple Windows VM. I'm going to assume you have access to all the components on the same desktop/laptop/VM -
Step #2. Create a second partition consisting of the rest of the drive. Format it with NTFS. Assign a drive letter to it, let's call it 'W' (for Windows).
Step #3. Determine the INDEX number of the desired Windows edition you want on the Installer disc/ISO. You need to do this because your disc/ISO may contain multiple versions of Windows, like 'Professional' or 'Enterprise' etc. To do this, you need 'imagex.exe'. Assuming your disc/ISO is mounted on drive I:, the command to do this is
Step #4. Deploy Windows. The command to do this is
This will take some time so you have to wait patiently for it to complete.
Step #5. Install the boot sector.
Boot your Mac and hold onto the 'Option' key. You know this will lead you to the Boot Drives selection screen. You should see a disk named 'Windows' along with your usual Mac boot disk and also the Recovery partition. Use your arrow keys to select 'Windows' and hit 'Return'. If you have done everything correctly as listed, your Windows partition will boot and installation starts. Just follow the on-screen instructions. It should be no different from a normal installation procedure.
At this point, Windows might reboot a few times during the course of installation. You have to remember to do the hold 'Option' key dance and select 'Windows' on the selection screen. After the installation completes, login and run 'setup.exe' from the Bootcamp Drivers thumb drive as Administrator. Follow instructions to complete the installation.
You should now have a fully bootable and working copy of Windows on the disk. Note that this procedure also works on a USB adaptor as well.
Something to take note -
works pretty well. It comes with both USB3 and Thunderbolt connector. However, it is a spinning disk inside. If you must have an SSD, then using the Seagate Backup Plus Portable Thunderbolt Adapter (STAE128)might still be the best bet.
In short, I'm ill equipped to run a VM using the internal disk. Fusion wants 20GB (which I think is reasonable for a Windows 7 Setup) and that will leave me with even less storage to deal with. The options I have is either run the VM off a USB stick (which I eventually did and will be a story for another day), or run the VM off the Thunderbolt port, which I did as well, but it's a little clumsy and not exactly very portable.
But what if I want to 'boot camp' and play some Windows-only games? The storage consideration alone will be daunting as there's really no way both partitions can fit into the internal 128GB SSD. Not for me at least. And so I have a thought, to simply put the Windows partition on its own disk and run it off the Thunderbolt port!
First, let's talk a little about the hardware I actually use. I opted for an SSD instead of a traditional spinning disk for obvious reason. In my case, I picked Intel 530 Series 240GB 2.5-Inch Internal Solid State Drive (Reseller Kit) SSDSC2BW240A4K5
.Now, I need some kind of a disk enclosure or an adaptor which can convert the Thunderbolt port to a SATA port. Seagate has exactly this contraption, Seagate Backup Plus Portable Thunderbolt Adapter (STAE128)
. This adaptor is actually designed for the Seagate Backup Plus Portable series of external disk drives. This family of external drives (sans the newer 2TB versions) come with a detachable USB3 dongle, which you can remove and expose the naked SATA connector on the disk itself. You then plug this into the adaptor and it will then becomes a Thunderbolt portable external disk. Neat! And since the connector on the adaptor is a standard SATA connector, you can plug any standard SATA 2.5" disks to it and turn it into a Thunderbolt portable external disk.There is one caveat. The adaptor itself does not provide 12V power and as a result, it is unable to power certain drives, notably the Seagate Constellation.2 1 TB 7200RPM SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache 2.5-Inch Internal Bare Drive ST91000640NS
. This guy requires both 5V and 12V rails to be available and will not work with the adaptor.So now I have these, how do I put Windows on it? We're going to make use of a lesser known technique in the consumer world to install Windows : Windows Automated Installation Kit. Windows AIK tool is a free download from Microsoft, you can get it here. In reality, you only need 'imagex.exe' from the whole bundle so you probably can find just the binary alone by searching the web. In addition to Windows AIK, you'll also need Apple's Bootcamp drivers. It's easy to get the drivers, all you need to do is just run Bootcamp Assistant and it will download the correct drivers for your Mac. Put these drivers onto a thumb drive or something. Lastly, you'll obviously need the Windows installer itself. It can be a physical disc or an ISO image.
Next, you'll need a Windows environment to prepare the drive. It can be a physical desktop/laptop or a simple Windows VM. I'm going to assume you have access to all the components on the same desktop/laptop/VM -
- Target disk drive you're putting Windows on
- imagex.exe
- Windows installer disc or ISO
Step #2. Create a second partition consisting of the rest of the drive. Format it with NTFS. Assign a drive letter to it, let's call it 'W' (for Windows).
Step #3. Determine the INDEX number of the desired Windows edition you want on the Installer disc/ISO. You need to do this because your disc/ISO may contain multiple versions of Windows, like 'Professional' or 'Enterprise' etc. To do this, you need 'imagex.exe'. Assuming your disc/ISO is mounted on drive I:, the command to do this is
It will list out all the available editions you have on your current disc/ISO. The output is quite lengthy but otherwise very self-explanatory. Let's assume the edition you want is located at INDEX 0.<PATH to IMAGEX.EXE>\imagex.exe /info I:\wim\install.wim
Step #4. Deploy Windows. The command to do this is
<PATH to IMAGEX.EXE>\imagex.exe /apply I:\wim\install.wim 0 W:
This will take some time so you have to wait patiently for it to complete.
Step #5. Install the boot sector.
W:\windows\system32\bcdboot W:\windows /f ALL /s B:Once you reached here, you're done with the disk. Shutdown your Mac. Stick the disk onto the Seagate adaptor and plug the adaptor into the Thunderbolt port of your Mac. Remove ALL USB devices from your Mac now. USB connected drives will prevent your Mac from booting up from the Thunderbolt disk correctly. Check that you have nothing on your USB ports and also no SD cards in the SD slot (if you have one).
Boot your Mac and hold onto the 'Option' key. You know this will lead you to the Boot Drives selection screen. You should see a disk named 'Windows' along with your usual Mac boot disk and also the Recovery partition. Use your arrow keys to select 'Windows' and hit 'Return'. If you have done everything correctly as listed, your Windows partition will boot and installation starts. Just follow the on-screen instructions. It should be no different from a normal installation procedure.
At this point, Windows might reboot a few times during the course of installation. You have to remember to do the hold 'Option' key dance and select 'Windows' on the selection screen. After the installation completes, login and run 'setup.exe' from the Bootcamp Drivers thumb drive as Administrator. Follow instructions to complete the installation.
You should now have a fully bootable and working copy of Windows on the disk. Note that this procedure also works on a USB adaptor as well.
Something to take note -
- If your installer is 64-bit, then you need 64-bit versions of everything, including BCDBOOT, Bootcamp drivers etc.
- Make sure you don't have any USB devices attached when booting. Otherwise, it will not boot correctly.
works pretty well. It comes with both USB3 and Thunderbolt connector. However, it is a spinning disk inside. If you must have an SSD, then using the Seagate Backup Plus Portable Thunderbolt Adapter (STAE128)might still be the best bet.
Monday, December 16, 2013
Tutorial : Getting the Deals
Prices on Amazon are generally decent. However, Amazon runs deals 24x7 and if the items you wanted appear in any of them, you can generally get even better pricing. What are the deals available? There are a few types and I'll try to describe them and also how to get them. The types of deals available are
Deal of the Day
Every day, Amazon will post a 'Deal of the Day'. As the name implies, the deal will only last for 1 day, starting at midnight Pacific Time. This translates to 4pm Singapore Time during winter (like now), or 3pm during summer. This deal can be a single item, or a group of related items. Depending on what you're looking for, deals under this category can be 'wow' or 'meh'. However, they are generally ok and offers slightly more discounts than usual.
The only caveat is that you have to check out the item by 3pm (or 4pm) in order to enjoy the pricing. This is because items in your shopping cart do not hold their pricing and once past the dateline, the price will revert back to the original one.
Lightning Deals
As the name implies, these types of deals happen quickly and is extremely time sensitive. It starts at a pre-defined time and usually lasts for a few hours only with a limited number of quantities available. Most of the time, the items offered has no options and you just add them directly to your cart when it becomes available. Other times, there will be options available, for example, you can select the size of a thumb drive or the platform of a game. When you're done, you add it to your cart.
Now the caveat. Once the item is in your cart, you have to check out within the next 15 minutes, and there's a timer to remind you. Otherwise, you'll be deemed to have forfeited the chance. You can then add it back again if you wish, provided it's still available. There is a countdown timer in red, just underneath the picture of the item of the deal, which indicates for how long more will this item be available with the special price.
Some popular items, or items which simply has such a huge discount (you then tend to exhibit 'Buy First Talk (Regret) Later' syndrome), will get sold out very fast. I have come across some items which, upon refresh of the browser, it's already sold out. How do you know if it's sold out? There is this line at the bottom of the picture of the item that reads 'XX% claimed'. Once it hit 100%, it means it has sold out. Normally, the yellow button will also say 'Add to Cart' if the item is still available. If the item is sold out, then the button will read 'Join waitlist'.
What is this waitlist? It is as the name implies, a queue on the waiting list to be offered the lightning deal. If it's already 100% claimed, why is there a need of a waitlist then? Now, the reason is simple. If you 'Regret' before you check out the item, or you simply remove it from your cart, then the item will be offered to the next in line, and so on. Once you join the waitlist, you'll be told your queue position and then a quick assessment on your chance of getting it. You can then continue your shopping while waiting. If you're lucky, you'll see a flashing notification on your right upper corner of the browser window, telling you that the item is now available! You have to act fast because you only have THREE (3) minutes to add the item in your shopping cart. Once it's in your shopping cart, the usual 15 minutes to check out timer starts.
Lastly, you're allowed to buy 1 each of the items offered on Lightning Deals. So if you're buying for yourself, you can't be buying it for a friend for the same price. You can still buy additional quantities at the prevailing price.
Savings and Sales Across Amazon
These aren't as exciting as the previous 2 types of sales described. This is also a time limited sale, although quite a long one, lasting several days. Just like the 'Deal of the Day', it can be a single item or a group of related items. If you're eyeing these, just take note of the expiry of the deal itself. There is a countdown timer, similar to the 'Lightning Deals'.
One problem with this section is that there usually are a lot of items on sale at any one time. A quick tip is to just to filter off everything else except the category you are interested in. You can do this via the selection drop-down on the top right corner, with a label that says 'Sort by Category'. The 'Lightning Deals' section features the same filter as well. If you don't see the category you are interested in being listed, then there are no items within that category is available.
Coupons
The working mechanism of coupons are not as straight forward as the three types of deals just described. However, they are simple enough and you just need to understand a few rules.
If you add go ahead and add it to your shopping cart, it will be indicated, like this -
And if you actually check it out, your Order Summary will look like this -
When you purchase items with coupons, please do make sure it's clipped and discounts duly applied on the Order Summary page.
Alright folks, it's another pretty long post and I hope it is helpful. Another nice feature will be Amazon Prime. Learn more.
- Deal of the Day (fka Gold Box Deal)
- Lightning Deals - Time sensitive discounts
- Savings and Sales Across Amazon
- Digital Deals
- Amazon Local Deals
- Coupons
Deal of the Day
Every day, Amazon will post a 'Deal of the Day'. As the name implies, the deal will only last for 1 day, starting at midnight Pacific Time. This translates to 4pm Singapore Time during winter (like now), or 3pm during summer. This deal can be a single item, or a group of related items. Depending on what you're looking for, deals under this category can be 'wow' or 'meh'. However, they are generally ok and offers slightly more discounts than usual.
The only caveat is that you have to check out the item by 3pm (or 4pm) in order to enjoy the pricing. This is because items in your shopping cart do not hold their pricing and once past the dateline, the price will revert back to the original one.
Lightning Deals
As the name implies, these types of deals happen quickly and is extremely time sensitive. It starts at a pre-defined time and usually lasts for a few hours only with a limited number of quantities available. Most of the time, the items offered has no options and you just add them directly to your cart when it becomes available. Other times, there will be options available, for example, you can select the size of a thumb drive or the platform of a game. When you're done, you add it to your cart.
Now the caveat. Once the item is in your cart, you have to check out within the next 15 minutes, and there's a timer to remind you. Otherwise, you'll be deemed to have forfeited the chance. You can then add it back again if you wish, provided it's still available. There is a countdown timer in red, just underneath the picture of the item of the deal, which indicates for how long more will this item be available with the special price.
Some popular items, or items which simply has such a huge discount (you then tend to exhibit 'Buy First Talk (Regret) Later' syndrome), will get sold out very fast. I have come across some items which, upon refresh of the browser, it's already sold out. How do you know if it's sold out? There is this line at the bottom of the picture of the item that reads 'XX% claimed'. Once it hit 100%, it means it has sold out. Normally, the yellow button will also say 'Add to Cart' if the item is still available. If the item is sold out, then the button will read 'Join waitlist'.
What is this waitlist? It is as the name implies, a queue on the waiting list to be offered the lightning deal. If it's already 100% claimed, why is there a need of a waitlist then? Now, the reason is simple. If you 'Regret' before you check out the item, or you simply remove it from your cart, then the item will be offered to the next in line, and so on. Once you join the waitlist, you'll be told your queue position and then a quick assessment on your chance of getting it. You can then continue your shopping while waiting. If you're lucky, you'll see a flashing notification on your right upper corner of the browser window, telling you that the item is now available! You have to act fast because you only have THREE (3) minutes to add the item in your shopping cart. Once it's in your shopping cart, the usual 15 minutes to check out timer starts.
Lastly, you're allowed to buy 1 each of the items offered on Lightning Deals. So if you're buying for yourself, you can't be buying it for a friend for the same price. You can still buy additional quantities at the prevailing price.
Savings and Sales Across Amazon
These aren't as exciting as the previous 2 types of sales described. This is also a time limited sale, although quite a long one, lasting several days. Just like the 'Deal of the Day', it can be a single item or a group of related items. If you're eyeing these, just take note of the expiry of the deal itself. There is a countdown timer, similar to the 'Lightning Deals'.
One problem with this section is that there usually are a lot of items on sale at any one time. A quick tip is to just to filter off everything else except the category you are interested in. You can do this via the selection drop-down on the top right corner, with a label that says 'Sort by Category'. The 'Lightning Deals' section features the same filter as well. If you don't see the category you are interested in being listed, then there are no items within that category is available.
Coupons
The working mechanism of coupons are not as straight forward as the three types of deals just described. However, they are simple enough and you just need to understand a few rules.
- Coupons are applicable usually to a group of items and sometimes a single specific item.
- Coupons discounts are applied upon checkout.
- The same coupon can only be used once per order.
- Coupon may be one time or multiple time use.
If you add go ahead and add it to your shopping cart, it will be indicated, like this -
And if you actually check it out, your Order Summary will look like this -
When you purchase items with coupons, please do make sure it's clipped and discounts duly applied on the Order Summary page.
Alright folks, it's another pretty long post and I hope it is helpful. Another nice feature will be Amazon Prime. Learn more.
Saturday, December 14, 2013
Tutorial - Tracking Prices on Amazon
You might have placed some items in your cart and have not checked out because you didn't reach the USD125 threshold. The next time you login, and went to your shopping cart again, you saw a yellow box at the top of the page.
This is really to inform you that the price of the item has changed the last time you reviewed your shopping cart. This is very common as prices fluctuate, sometimes quite drastically, on Amazon. Note that by putting items in your shopping cart does not means you have 'locked' in the price. Items in your 'Saved for later' section of the cart get the same treatment as well.
How do I then know I'm getting a good deal? Or is there a way to track the price changes over time for the items I'm interested in? In other words, in ultra geek speak, is there an 'MRTG' of the price? Yes, there is. Let me introduce to you one of the most popular price tracker : Camel3.
The UI of the website is very user friendly. All you need to do is key in the URL in the search box above, or the ASIN (which can be found in the Product Details section), or just the keyword.
Let me use the ever popular Intel 530 Series 240GB 2.5-Inch Internal Solid State Drive (Reseller Kit) SSDSC2BW240A4K5 as an example. If you follow this link and look under the Product Details, you'll find that the ASIN is B00DTPYT78. Key this into the search box on the Camel3 website. Immediately, you'll be greeted with a wealth of information. Let's take a look at the big price chart first.
The bottom axis is the date while the vertical axis is the price. There is also a red dotted line above, which represents the highest price and a green dotted line below, which represents the lowest price. On the right hand side, there's are 'Price Type' check boxes. Since we're only interested in items sold by Amazon, we'll only need to enable the first checkbox.
From the graph, we can now tell that the highest price is $300 (on Sep 17, 2013), the lowest price is $149.99 (on Nov 19, 2013) and the current price is $164.29. I'm sure you know the lowest is not $149.99 but $149.00, and that Amazon offered this item at $149 on not one, not two, but THREE occasions. Yes, that's right. Amazon offered this item on 3 different 'Lightning Deals' over the Black Friday 2013 week. It's a buying frenzy. So why am I not seeing $149 reflected? I read that Camel3 does not capture 'Lightning Deals' price information.
If you think the graph is too long a time frame (because you may not be interested in price changes a year ago), you can always zoom into the graph by sliding the bar under the 'Date Range' label. This particular item is relatively new so there's only a few months of data at the time of this writing. You can get a really huge graph for items that are available for a long time.
OK, $164.29 is a decent price but I'm betting it will go lower. But I don't want to check back every minute I'm awake to make sure. Sure, just set up a price alert on the website! Let's go back to the page again (I hope you didn't close it). Right above the chart, there is a kind of table, like this
Again, we're interested only in the first row, which is for items sold by Amazon. Just key in the desired price, your email address and hit 'Start Tracking'! If the price went below that of your desired price, you'll be alerted via email. Neat huh?
Some other tips. I also suggest you create an account with them. Include all the items you are interested in the price alerts. You can then view all your items under the 'Your Price Watches' page. I hope this enhances your ability to grab good deals off Amazon.
This is really to inform you that the price of the item has changed the last time you reviewed your shopping cart. This is very common as prices fluctuate, sometimes quite drastically, on Amazon. Note that by putting items in your shopping cart does not means you have 'locked' in the price. Items in your 'Saved for later' section of the cart get the same treatment as well.
How do I then know I'm getting a good deal? Or is there a way to track the price changes over time for the items I'm interested in? In other words, in ultra geek speak, is there an 'MRTG' of the price? Yes, there is. Let me introduce to you one of the most popular price tracker : Camel3.
The UI of the website is very user friendly. All you need to do is key in the URL in the search box above, or the ASIN (which can be found in the Product Details section), or just the keyword.
Let me use the ever popular Intel 530 Series 240GB 2.5-Inch Internal Solid State Drive (Reseller Kit) SSDSC2BW240A4K5
as an example. If you follow this link and look under the Product Details, you'll find that the ASIN is B00DTPYT78. Key this into the search box on the Camel3 website. Immediately, you'll be greeted with a wealth of information. Let's take a look at the big price chart first.
The bottom axis is the date while the vertical axis is the price. There is also a red dotted line above, which represents the highest price and a green dotted line below, which represents the lowest price. On the right hand side, there's are 'Price Type' check boxes. Since we're only interested in items sold by Amazon, we'll only need to enable the first checkbox.
From the graph, we can now tell that the highest price is $300 (on Sep 17, 2013), the lowest price is $149.99 (on Nov 19, 2013) and the current price is $164.29. I'm sure you know the lowest is not $149.99 but $149.00, and that Amazon offered this item at $149 on not one, not two, but THREE occasions. Yes, that's right. Amazon offered this item on 3 different 'Lightning Deals' over the Black Friday 2013 week. It's a buying frenzy. So why am I not seeing $149 reflected? I read that Camel3 does not capture 'Lightning Deals' price information.
If you think the graph is too long a time frame (because you may not be interested in price changes a year ago), you can always zoom into the graph by sliding the bar under the 'Date Range' label. This particular item is relatively new so there's only a few months of data at the time of this writing. You can get a really huge graph for items that are available for a long time.
OK, $164.29 is a decent price but I'm betting it will go lower. But I don't want to check back every minute I'm awake to make sure. Sure, just set up a price alert on the website! Let's go back to the page again (I hope you didn't close it). Right above the chart, there is a kind of table, like this
Again, we're interested only in the first row, which is for items sold by Amazon. Just key in the desired price, your email address and hit 'Start Tracking'! If the price went below that of your desired price, you'll be alerted via email. Neat huh?
Some other tips. I also suggest you create an account with them. Include all the items you are interested in the price alerts. You can then view all your items under the 'Your Price Watches' page. I hope this enhances your ability to grab good deals off Amazon.
Tuesday, December 10, 2013
Tutorial - Why don't I get free shipping?
This is one of the most common questions asked. There are many reasons why your cart doesn't qualify. First, let's get the most obvious reasons out of the way. According to Amazon, in order to qualify, you need to satisfy at least the following criteria -
The first one is easy to spot. Does your cart adds up to > $125? Sometimes amidst all the excitement, you can forget about this one.
The second one can be tedious. You'll need to go into every single one of the items and look at the product description. First, make sure the item is sold by Amazon, and not other third party merchants. There should be a line (just underneath the price) that says 'Ships from and sold by Amazon.com'. If it says anything else, then it's not sold by Amazon.com and will not qualify.
Next, you can also look under the Product Details. There will be a line which says 'Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.'
99% of the time, this will mean the item can be shipped to Singapore.
Third, make sure you don't split up the shipment, or otherwise choose 'I want my items faster. Ship items as they become available'. These will surely incur additional charges.
Lastly, there is a weight limit. Shipping heavy or bulky items cost serious money and Amazon is not stupid to do it for free. Items that weigh over 20lb will not qualify. Otherwise, folks will be shipping dumbbells over. Over-sized items, like baby prams or Samsonite Luggage don't qualify! How do you know if the item is over-sized? Again, look under the Product Details. If you see this :
"Shipping Advisory: This item must be shipped separately from other items in your order. Additional shipping charges will not apply."
Then the item is over-sized and you will not get free shipping to Singapore (or India). The 'Additional shipping charges will not apply' is only applicable for shipping within the US so you can ignore that.
If, after going through this check-list, you are still hit with a charge, there's 2 things you can do. First, you can start a friendly chat with the Customer Service Officers (CSO) and ask them if they know why it doesn't qualify and try your luck to see if they can waive it. Or, you can just send the item to a freight forwarder, like vPost, Borderlinx or ComGateway.
Sometimes, there'll be glitches in the system that prevents you from getting the free shipping option, maybe because the items are not setup correctly for it. Only Amazon will know and there's really nothing you can do about it.
- Have > $125 (USD) worth of qualifying products in your shopping cart
- AmazonGlobal Eligible
- Ships to a single address in Singapore or India
- Items must not weigh > 20 lbs or be over-sized
The first one is easy to spot. Does your cart adds up to > $125? Sometimes amidst all the excitement, you can forget about this one.
The second one can be tedious. You'll need to go into every single one of the items and look at the product description. First, make sure the item is sold by Amazon, and not other third party merchants. There should be a line (just underneath the price) that says 'Ships from and sold by Amazon.com'. If it says anything else, then it's not sold by Amazon.com and will not qualify.
Next, you can also look under the Product Details. There will be a line which says 'Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.'
Third, make sure you don't split up the shipment, or otherwise choose 'I want my items faster. Ship items as they become available'. These will surely incur additional charges.
Lastly, there is a weight limit. Shipping heavy or bulky items cost serious money and Amazon is not stupid to do it for free. Items that weigh over 20lb will not qualify. Otherwise, folks will be shipping dumbbells over. Over-sized items, like baby prams or Samsonite Luggage don't qualify! How do you know if the item is over-sized? Again, look under the Product Details. If you see this :
"Shipping Advisory: This item must be shipped separately from other items in your order. Additional shipping charges will not apply."
Then the item is over-sized and you will not get free shipping to Singapore (or India). The 'Additional shipping charges will not apply' is only applicable for shipping within the US so you can ignore that.
If, after going through this check-list, you are still hit with a charge, there's 2 things you can do. First, you can start a friendly chat with the Customer Service Officers (CSO) and ask them if they know why it doesn't qualify and try your luck to see if they can waive it. Or, you can just send the item to a freight forwarder, like vPost, Borderlinx or ComGateway.
Sometimes, there'll be glitches in the system that prevents you from getting the free shipping option, maybe because the items are not setup correctly for it. Only Amazon will know and there's really nothing you can do about it.
Tutorial - Placing Your First Order With Free Shipping
This post will be slightly long but I'll try to hand hold you to place your first order with free shipping to Singapore. I'm going to assume you have already setup your payment method and a shipping address in Singapore.
Step #1 : Find the items you want. Search for the items you are looking for and then check the box that says 'AmazonGlobal Eligible'.
Since I'm a fan of Terry Prachett and I particularly like Making Money, I'll use this as an example. Let's now go to Amazon. Follow me and type in 'Terry Prachett Making Money' in the search box near the top of the web page. You should see it as the first item in the search result.
Step #2 : Click the link to the item to get more details of the product. Since this is a book, there are a few versions of it.
We'll just stick with the 'Mass Market Paperback' version and add it to the cart. Leave the checkbox that says 'Yes, I want FREE Two-Day Shipping with Amazon Prime' alone. I'll come to that in another post, I promise!
Step #3 : Just to make sure that this item can be shipped out of US, go to your cart and pay attention to the blue-background box on the right side. Click on the link 'Estimate your shipping and tax'.
Aha! It says 'Estimated shipping & handling : $9.98'. This pretty much confirms that we can indeed ship this book out of US.
Wait, but I want free shipping! Sure, this book is so good, I'm going to buy 20 copies and give it to my friends! Edit the Quantity of the item and key in '20'. Remember to hit 'Update' to get an updated cart. Now, take a look at the blue-background box again.
The cost to ship 20 copies of it is listed as $104.97. However, there is now an entry that says 'AmazonGlobal Saver' that says -$104.97, effectively negating the shipping cost. This is the confirmation that the books will be shipped for free to your doorsteps.
Step #4 : Checking out your shopping cart. Once you are ready, hit the 'Proceed to Checkout' button on the right. It's a striking yellow button so you can't really miss it. In the next page, you will be asked to pick your shipping address. If you have set it up previously, the address will appear here. If not, you will now have to key in this information.
Once you have picked the shipping address, you will now have to choose your shipping options. If you have followed the tutorial, there will be an option for 'FREE AmazonGlobal Saver (averages 9-14 days)' under 'Choose a shipping speed' -
You have to select this option. I repeat, you have to select this option. Amazon will default to paid shipping, regardless if you qualify. I cannot stress this enough. A lot of times, newbies just click through this screen and then realize they have no free shipping! Hit continue to select your payment method.
If you have not already set up a credit card, you can do so now. Note that if you are adding a new credit card, Amazon will ask you what is the currency of your card. You can just pick Singapore Dollars. Choose a billing address next. If this sounds very tedious, it is. This is the reason why I suggest you set up your payment and shipping address before hand. You can just pick when you're checking out.
Finally, you'll be presented a final page where Amazon shows you the details of
You'll immediately notice that Amazon wants to charge your card in SGD. This is probably because you have indicated that your credit card is in SGD. Let's change the currency to USD instead. Click 'Switch currency' and pick USD. Your Order Summary will now show the amount in USD.
Step #5 : Placing the order. I'll suggest you go through the final page one more time to make sure
Now, obviously this is just an example to take you through the process. Once you're at the final page, you can always back off by clicking a very small link right at the bottom of the page to go back to Amazon's home page.
Realistically, you will be buying several items to make up the $125 cart. All you need to do is to repeat the search, filter, add to cart until you have enough. Need shopping ideas? Check back here! I'll also be sharing a few items which I have purchased in the past with some savings.
In the next few updates, I'll try to go through some of the issues you might encounter that prevents you from getting the free shipping options. Do check back!
Step #1 : Find the items you want. Search for the items you are looking for and then check the box that says 'AmazonGlobal Eligible'.
Step #2 : Click the link to the item to get more details of the product. Since this is a book, there are a few versions of it.
We'll just stick with the 'Mass Market Paperback' version and add it to the cart. Leave the checkbox that says 'Yes, I want FREE Two-Day Shipping with Amazon Prime' alone. I'll come to that in another post, I promise!
Step #3 : Just to make sure that this item can be shipped out of US, go to your cart and pay attention to the blue-background box on the right side. Click on the link 'Estimate your shipping and tax'.
Aha! It says 'Estimated shipping & handling : $9.98'. This pretty much confirms that we can indeed ship this book out of US.
Wait, but I want free shipping! Sure, this book is so good, I'm going to buy 20 copies and give it to my friends! Edit the Quantity of the item and key in '20'. Remember to hit 'Update' to get an updated cart. Now, take a look at the blue-background box again.
The cost to ship 20 copies of it is listed as $104.97. However, there is now an entry that says 'AmazonGlobal Saver' that says -$104.97, effectively negating the shipping cost. This is the confirmation that the books will be shipped for free to your doorsteps.
Step #4 : Checking out your shopping cart. Once you are ready, hit the 'Proceed to Checkout' button on the right. It's a striking yellow button so you can't really miss it. In the next page, you will be asked to pick your shipping address. If you have set it up previously, the address will appear here. If not, you will now have to key in this information.
Once you have picked the shipping address, you will now have to choose your shipping options. If you have followed the tutorial, there will be an option for 'FREE AmazonGlobal Saver (averages 9-14 days)' under 'Choose a shipping speed' -
You have to select this option. I repeat, you have to select this option. Amazon will default to paid shipping, regardless if you qualify. I cannot stress this enough. A lot of times, newbies just click through this screen and then realize they have no free shipping! Hit continue to select your payment method.
If you have not already set up a credit card, you can do so now. Note that if you are adding a new credit card, Amazon will ask you what is the currency of your card. You can just pick Singapore Dollars. Choose a billing address next. If this sounds very tedious, it is. This is the reason why I suggest you set up your payment and shipping address before hand. You can just pick when you're checking out.
Finally, you'll be presented a final page where Amazon shows you the details of
- Item and Quantity
- Shipping Address
- Payment Method and Billing Address
- Order Summary
You'll immediately notice that Amazon wants to charge your card in SGD. This is probably because you have indicated that your credit card is in SGD. Let's change the currency to USD instead. Click 'Switch currency' and pick USD. Your Order Summary will now show the amount in USD.
Step #5 : Placing the order. I'll suggest you go through the final page one more time to make sure
- Items are correct
- Payment information is correct
- Shipping address is correct
- Checking out in USD
- There is no shipping charges levied
Now, obviously this is just an example to take you through the process. Once you're at the final page, you can always back off by clicking a very small link right at the bottom of the page to go back to Amazon's home page.
Realistically, you will be buying several items to make up the $125 cart. All you need to do is to repeat the search, filter, add to cart until you have enough. Need shopping ideas? Check back here! I'll also be sharing a few items which I have purchased in the past with some savings.
In the next few updates, I'll try to go through some of the issues you might encounter that prevents you from getting the free shipping options. Do check back!
Tutorial - Setting Up Your Amazon Account
Before you start to shop at Amazon, you may want to setup your account first. This will make things a lot simpler during the checkout stage as all information will have been provided before hand. This is not mandatory, since you can also provide all the required information when you're checking out.
But let us go through this simple one-time setup to add
And then go to Add a Credit or Debit Card -
From then on, just follow instructions on screen to add your credit card to it.
About credit card fees and what not. If you're based in Singapore (like me), posting a charge in a foreign currency attracts certain fees. As far as I know, CIMB charges 2.5% (including MasterCard fees) while Maybank charges 2.2% (including MasterCard fees). This will surely change in the future but I believe this is correct as it stands right now. In my experience, Standard Chartered Bank charges the most exorbitant fees so I'll avoid that.
There are also various credit card schemes where they offer rebates. I know of a FRANK card by OCBC which offers 6% rebates for online purchases, if your total spending exceeds SGD500. This post is not about which is the best credit card to hold on to so please do your own research.
Now that you have sorted out your payment, the next step is to setup your shipping address. It's known as 'Address Book' on 'Your Account' page -
Now, if you recall, you may have already provided an address earlier when you create your account. If you do, it will appear in your Address Book. You may want to consider adding your office address to it because you may want to consider shipping stuff directly to the office instead.
You're now ready to shop!
But let us go through this simple one-time setup to add
- Payment information
- Shipping information
And then go to Add a Credit or Debit Card -
From then on, just follow instructions on screen to add your credit card to it.
About credit card fees and what not. If you're based in Singapore (like me), posting a charge in a foreign currency attracts certain fees. As far as I know, CIMB charges 2.5% (including MasterCard fees) while Maybank charges 2.2% (including MasterCard fees). This will surely change in the future but I believe this is correct as it stands right now. In my experience, Standard Chartered Bank charges the most exorbitant fees so I'll avoid that.
There are also various credit card schemes where they offer rebates. I know of a FRANK card by OCBC which offers 6% rebates for online purchases, if your total spending exceeds SGD500. This post is not about which is the best credit card to hold on to so please do your own research.
Now that you have sorted out your payment, the next step is to setup your shipping address. It's known as 'Address Book' on 'Your Account' page -
You're now ready to shop!
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