hard drive purchase
 

where is the best, but cheapest place to find a new 120GB + hard drive?

Here's the scoop, man. This is what I did. every Sunday, check your newspaper ads (Best Buy, CompUSA, Fry's, etc.) and look for rebates. Be patient. You won't find these rebates at Internet-only places (trust me--I've looked :p). I picked up a 120GB Maxtor with 8MB cache over at CompUSA for $60 after a $40 instant rebate and $40 mail-in rebate.

Also check this site out:
http://forums.anandtech.com/categories.cfm?catid=40

Those are good folks. When you hit one of their posts, make sure to check the date on the first post, because some discussions continue after the sale is over.

Admittedly, you'll be hard-pressed to find a 50 cent per gigabyte sale, but I've seen a lot of 120GB drives for $80 lately.

Also keep in mind that Western Digital has a 3-year warranty on all their 8MB cache drives, while everyone else is one year.

Good luck and keep your eyes peeled!

Yeah, I'm with Johnny. I got a 200GB for $130 at Best Buy a few weeks ago. Took a few weeks to get the rest of my money back, but definately worth it.

MPEDrummer

Screw all the stupid rebates. Check out this linky for a 120 gig Western Digital Special Edition w/8MB Buffer for $112.

Always check out these three places when buying new parts:
GoogleGear
NewEgg
PriceWatch

I'm gonna have to agree with JohnnyRotten here.

I've seen unbeatable deals come in the national chain's for pc products and I've been lucky to snatch some of them.

If you have a fry's electronics near you, they have 6 page ads on friday's newspaper with amazing deals.