The XBox 360 Experiment

The release date for the XBox was November 22. A few stores (none near us) were doing a midnight sale, while others were doing first-come, first-serve that morning. We found out the Wal-Mart in Fremont was doing a 5 am lottery. Not the best odds, but we figured we'd try anyways.

We got there at 4:30 am, and there were already like 30 people there. We waited a while before the Wal-Mart guy finally came out and started handing out tickets. Even though the order you got the tickets didn't matter, some big pushy lady (who showed up way after we did) crammed her way to the front to get one.

Marc and I each got a ticket, and I gave him mine, then left to go to Best Buy while Marc waited for the drawing.

Wal-Mart only had 14 units, and only 4 of those were the Premium systems (which were turning out to be more desirable). The rest were the Core systems. Marc ended up winning the very last Core system! With my ticket, no less. So had the big pushy lady not pushed her way in front of us, we wouldn't have ended up with that ticket. Oh, and she didn't get one.

Meanwhile, I got to Best Buy at 6 am. I knew Best Buy had more units, and there were only about 30 or so people there, so I got in line. The store wasn't set to open until 8 am. They finally came out and announced that they had 40 Premium systems, and 15 Core systems. I was really hoping to get a Premium, but it was going to be close. I kept counting all the people in line ahead of me, and I was around number 40 or 41.

When the store opened, they let people in, but only a few at a time, to avoid a stampede. It took a while before I got to go in, and it was a little agonizing trying to find out which system I was going to get. Finally, at 10 am, I found out I was number 39. Woohoo! Yup, I waited there for four hours (and yeah, just a wee bit late for work).

Best Buy was only selling bundles, so the whole thing cost us $859. We had the system, plus three games, and some other accessories, including a $200 surge protector/power thingy.

The Core system cost us $299, and the Premium cost us $399.

I put them both up on eBay - the Core system alone, and the Premium with the three games, which totalled up to a value of $550. We set a 1-day auction, and the Premium bundle sold for $1025! The buyer was local, which was nice, because we were able to just meet the guy.

The Core bidding went crazy and went up to $950. Which turned out to be some jerk who just bid to be a jerk. He didn't pay, so I relisted it. It sold the next day for $750!

So after all the eBay and PayPal fees, I think we ended up making around $800 (we returned the power thingy). And at some point we should be getting our free Premium XBox (it's looking like January, but we're not in any rush). Not bad!