Advice for Buying Something Hard to Find

[Ikoma]

So... no action on any of the alerts I had placed. Not that I expected any. I figured it would take a while for more to get back in stock. Until today...

About five minutes ago, a little browser alert popped up. Walmart.com had Xbox Series X back in stock. I clicked on the pop up and was taken to the right page. It showed them in stock. I clicked add to cart. And.... they are out of stock again.

So... either they were never really in stock and an update temporarily made it look like they were. Or... Walmart did get more in stock and 'bots got them all in the few minutes it took for me to get the alert and then click on all the links using my ol' Mark I brain and hands. Looks like I may need to just put a watch on the console at eBay as a proxy for how well scalpers are doing on the resell market. Until it's not profitable for a scalper to, well... scalp, I won't get getting a new game box.

EDIT: Recent auctions are ending at about $700. So a $200 markup...

[Gyro LC]

Yeah it's a good moment to be a patient gamer.

I curse the unavailability of top hardware but thank the dark gods that I can run everything on high with 5 year old hardware (so long as I keep it off 4K or VR). Not a luxury we would have enjoyed with 5 year old Voodoo3 rigs.

My gaming PC lasted from 2008 to 2020. The only things I changed were switching to SSD and GTX 970. Seems like tech is on a plateau right now and it's good for the wallet.

[BottledViolence]

Lots of stuff is still hard to find, I got back into RC cars and Mini-Z stuff is tough to find too. Luckily, it's pretty niche, so not a lot of scalpers for it.

[Ikoma]

Got another big batch of pop up this morning informing me that a lot of online retailers got restocks of Series Xs (ugh, weird way to pluralize). Of course, it looks like they put them up in the wee morning hours when <sarcasm>normal people are up and about and shopping online.</sarcasm> So they are all gone. The good news is that eBay is showing a slow drop in the ending price of Series X auctions. And new auctions are starting in the low $600s. At this pace, I expect supply will have caught up with demand around the end of March... perhaps mid-April. At that point, I should be able to get a Series X at MSRP.

EDIT: Out of curiosity, I checked the trends on PS5s. They are still selling on eBay in the low $800 range. So it will take longer for them to drop out of the scalpers markets.