My brother and I arranged to meet early yesterday morning to discuss some important details regarding my father's ongoing care, and to take the necessary steps to ensure that sufficient finances were in place to pay for it for the foreseeable future. This took quite some time as it involved some lengthy discussions and a visit to the local branch of the bank that holds my father's bank accounts and investments.
We then had some lunch in a local café and afterwards we were able to spend an hour with my father. He was quite chatty and much better than he had been for some time, but he tires easily and needs to rest much more than he used to which is why our joint visit was relatively short.
After my brother and I had parted company, my wife – who had been shopping in the local High Street whilst my brother and I had been to the bank and visited my father – joined me and we set off to a large retail park that was not very far away. Over the past few days we had been discussing the possible replacement of our existing laptop computer with a newer model, and whilst we driving into the retail park my wife noticed that there was a large branch of Comet (an electrical retail group that has recently gone into administration) located near to the entrance and joking remarked that they might have something suitable on sale … and she was right!
We are now the proud owners of an Acer Aspire One D270 10.1-inch Netbook …
… and it says much for the continued development of personal computers that – thanks to Comet administrator's stock liquidation sale – it was less than half the price of our current desktop computers (which are not yet three years old) with twice the clock speed and over five times the RAM!
We finally got back home during the early part of the evening feeling tired, but also feeling that we had done a lot of things that needed to be done and happy that we had bought a new small computer for a very reasonable price.
We then had some lunch in a local café and afterwards we were able to spend an hour with my father. He was quite chatty and much better than he had been for some time, but he tires easily and needs to rest much more than he used to which is why our joint visit was relatively short.
After my brother and I had parted company, my wife – who had been shopping in the local High Street whilst my brother and I had been to the bank and visited my father – joined me and we set off to a large retail park that was not very far away. Over the past few days we had been discussing the possible replacement of our existing laptop computer with a newer model, and whilst we driving into the retail park my wife noticed that there was a large branch of Comet (an electrical retail group that has recently gone into administration) located near to the entrance and joking remarked that they might have something suitable on sale … and she was right!
We are now the proud owners of an Acer Aspire One D270 10.1-inch Netbook …
… and it says much for the continued development of personal computers that – thanks to Comet administrator's stock liquidation sale – it was less than half the price of our current desktop computers (which are not yet three years old) with twice the clock speed and over five times the RAM!
We finally got back home during the early part of the evening feeling tired, but also feeling that we had done a lot of things that needed to be done and happy that we had bought a new small computer for a very reasonable price.
For comparison's sake I checked out what your D-70 would cost from Staples Canada . . . and it was on sale for $260 Canadian (plus all the taxes, of course).
ReplyDeleteBut I'll bet you got a better deal.
-- Jeff
Bluebear Jeff,
ReplyDeleteUsing an exchange rate of $1.50 Canadian = £1.00 the comparable UK pre-tax price should have been £173.00 ... which is a bit more than the pre-tax price that I paid, which was £152.00.
That said, the Staples UK price for the Notebook is £208.33 (before tax) which equates to $312.50 Canadian ... and £260.00/$390.00 after VAT (Value Added Tax) has been added!
I think that you are getting a better pre-tax deal in Canada than we are in the UK.
All the best,
Bob
Good to hear the family news Bob. Hopefully it'll keep going in the right direction. Super laptop as well!
ReplyDeleteSidney Roundwood,
ReplyDeleteThanks for your best wishes. My father will never get better, but it is good news that he is currently not getting worse.
I was very pleased with our new Netbook, and I look forward to using it as soon as I can.
All the best,
Bob
My little Netbook is now a staple part of my computing experience - it's easily taken over all the duties that I used to use the big desk top machine for, I can sit with it on my lap if I fancy browsing the web while still in company with the family.. marvellous bit of kit... congratulations on the bargain!
ReplyDeleteSteve-the-Wargamer,
ReplyDeleteNow that I own one, I can see why so m any people extol the virtues of Netbook computers. They are almost as small (and as light) as an iPad but have a 'proper' keyboard, which for someone like me who does a lot of word processing is an absolute 'must'.
I can see myself using it quite a lot in the near future.
All the best,
Bob