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Archives for October 16, 2020

Datacolor Spyder-Lens-Cal Autofocus Calibration Aid for $39

Calibration maniacs of the world, unite and take over! Good until Saturday at 10am ET, the ADorama daily deal is the new condition Datacolor Spyder-Lens-Cal Autofocus Calibration Aid going for $39 with free US shipping…

Meanwhile among the Saturday Best Buy dailies they have the 1TB Samsung T7 Gen II USB 3.2 portable external SSD with Hardware Encryption going for $160. The SSD and the hardware encryption = higher price than good old portable spinning HDDs…

And at the Woot dailies they have the Contixo F16 and F30 drones under “Sellout”, Whistling tea kettles under Clearance [something to wake you up while you are burning the midnight Photoshop oil], and under Gourmet they have a 3pk of Mad Priest [Melisandre NOT included] coffee…

October 16, 2020 Filed Under: camera accessories Tagged With:

Pre-order the all new OnePlus 8T for $749 with FREEbie

It’s raining new smartphones left and right these days, and one such is the expected now-a-days “T version” of the current OnePlus model. So if all the options out there the OnePlus 8T is the one you want, it is now available for pre-ordering at B&H Photo for $749 with free US shipping and during this promotional pre-ordering period you will also receive for FREE (automatically by B&H) the OnePlus Truly Wireless Earbuds. The 8T is available in two color options…

As a quick refresher, this uses the SnapDragon 865, 12GB RAM, four back cameras, one front camera, 6.5″ IPS touchscreen (20:9 2400 x 1080, HDR10+, 1100 nits, 120Hz, Gorilla Glass 3), dual SIM, 256GB UFS 3.1 on-board storage, North America variant with 5G, unlocked, Wifi 6 (aka 802.11ax), Bluetooth 5.1. However, no microSD, no headphone jack!

October 16, 2020 Filed Under: technology deals Tagged With: , , ,

PSA: Chromebooks Getting Extended End Of Life deadline

Google is very “data creepy” (but it has plenty of competition from Facebook, Instagram, Ad Networks, Governments, etc). However, one of the good things it did the last few years is the launch of Chromebooks, easy to use and easy to maintain laptops and more recently moonlighting as Android kinda-tablets.

And while Google avoided the Android pitfall and Google was responsible for the OS updates, it placed OS update expiration dates on Chromebooks. Not on an individual Chromebook but on the platform. Let’s say your Chromebook is using the Celery 123U half-core processor. The Celery 123U launched in May 2015. You bought your Chromebook brand new in box from a retailer in May 2020. The OS updates expiration countdown does not start from May 2020 but May 2015. So even though you just bought a NIB laptop from an authorized retailer, the OS updates were already close to expiration.

After getting e-yelled at by many and mayhaps losing some big corporate and educational orders over this, Google increase the OS updates expiration date (“AUE” in Google speak) multiple times.

And now they have increased it once again per Android Central, so be sure to visit the official Google Support Auto Update Expiration Date page to check whether your current Chromebook(s) have been given a new lease on life. One of mine jumped from 2021 to 2023!

BUT that’s not all. Some of you frequent Chromebook users may have noticed something irritating the last few weeks. Instead of having one set of settings like it used to, the Chromebook now has separate ChromeOS and Chrome Browser settings. This was irritating and confusing. Why were they doing that?

Well the answer to that is related to AUE. Google’s Project LaCros will be splitting the Chrome browser from the ChromeOS, allowing older Chromebooks who no longer get the OS updates to be able to receive Chrome browser updates like a “normal” computer.

This also opens up an interesting question and food for thought for anti-monopoly hawks. Will Chromebooks also be opened up to other web browsers now that OS and the Browser will separate? Details at the OS News at 11 🙂

October 16, 2020 Filed Under: technology deals Tagged With:

First Timers: $5 Amazon promotional credit when you convert $30+ in Coins for an Amazon Gift Card at Coinstar

This is the closest thing to free money one can get these days! IF you put $30+ in coins at a participating Coinstar kiosk (found inside grocery stores and such, those green things) AND you get your converted money in an Amazon Gift Card (you get a gift card code on the printed receipt, it won’t print a plastic gift card) you will automatically receive a $5 Amazon promotional credit (for items sold and shipped by Amazon herself only) to be used until 12/31/2020.

IMPORTANT: this promotion is only available to first timers. The terms and conditions state:

“Offer limited to the first time a customer gets an Amazon.com Gift Card claim code from a physical location”

The promotion runs until 11/30/20. All the details at the Terms and Conditions page.

If you are not familiar, Coinstar charges a service fee IF you convert your coins into cash. However, if you convert your coins into gift cards, there’s no service fee (because presumably they get a commission/service-fee from the stores offering the gift cards).

I have done these type of Coinstar promotions a few times before without issue. The only thing that worries me this time is the “first time” language. But if you typically convert your coins to Amazon gift cards anyway, you have nothing to lose by doing this.

PS: if you like making noise, this is fun, because the Coinstar machine makes a lot of noise while counting the coins ^_^

October 16, 2020 Filed Under: gifts and gadgets Tagged With:

Fujifilm Instax Mini 11 instant film camera for $60

Not a daily deal but more of a longer-term sale at Amazon proper, it is, in five colorful pastel-y color-schemes, the new condition Fujifilm Instax Mini 11 instant film camera going for $60 with free US shipping. Limit 3 per color per customer. Not sure if the limit of 3 is on all colors, or only on a single color.

As of the time of writing this critter averages 4.7 out of 5 based on 1100+ global ratings and it has 45 answered questions…

PS: also part of these longer-running (longer than a daily deal that is) sales at Amazon is a Samsung SSD sale with seven options, four of them external, three of them internal…

PS2: I don’t want to create an additional post for this, but for traveling photographers who happen to be Costco members, you get a $20 Costco shop card when you rent an AVIS/Budget car (with additional driver included) by 10/19/20. The rental period (travel) does not have to start now, just the booking. The rental period can be as late as 3/31/21 [if anyone of us survives the several doomsday scenarios currently in play!!!] Check their website or email newsletter or stores for more details…

October 16, 2020 Filed Under: fixed lens cameras, fuji Tagged With: ,