Just back from one of my CVS shopping trips (24 Hour CVS store). All the deals produced extrabucks as promised (except I did not buy either of the two cosmetic items so I don’t know abut those). It looks like the only item that has a limit of 2 are the GUM toothbrushes (2 packs).

The only weird thing that happened which I think has nothing to do with Black Friday but is an ongoing problem is that some of the coupons ring for strange (and wrong) amounts and it is never in your favor. For instance, I got 4 Three Musketeer bars one man Q rang for the correct $1.29, but the other rang for only 29 cents (shorting me $1). Also the $3 CRT coupon for Colgate rang at only $2.81 for me. So I returned those 3 items and the clerk was nice enough to ring them separately and the correct coupon price came off. It was actually a MM for me because when she refunded the 3 items I got back the full retail price without a deduction for the coupons I used albeit with the wrong amounts.

All in all it was a pleasant shopping experience.

Interesting. Even though I entered a New Hampshire address, in my order confirmation e-mail it still listed my correct address in California, but no worries as no sales tax was charged.

Wait a minute though…for the rebate I have to enter the order number and the ZIP code, right? Do I enter my real ZIP code in CA or the ZIP code of the address I used in New Hampshire? Does anyone have any experience with this? I do not want my prepaid rebate card to go to a McDonald’s in New Hampshire!

Thanks for the advice. I used a McDonald’s address in New Hampshire and no sales tax was charged. I guess California now charges sales tax on downloadable software. I hope I don’t get in trouble for tax evasion though. I guess that is highly doubtful that would happen.

Good thing it is not for AT&T Prepaid. A few months ago I just paid $199.99 for an iPhone 6 at Best Buy for AT&T Prepaid. I would have really felt burned.

I got the download version and I live in California where software downloads are not supposed to be taxed. When I go through the checkout process it says “estimated tax to be collected $3.10”. Can anyone else confirm that California does not have sales tax for software downloads? Or did some new tax law pass that I wasn’t aware of? If indeed they are taxed, I would be better off buying the boxed version in-store so at least I could recoup 5% of the 7.75% sales tax in rewards to cut my losses.

Select Conair hair appliances on sale for $10 get $5eb.
The turbo blow dryer w/ diffuser attachment pictured is regularly $20.99.

@dangeruss said in Amazon Black Friday starts now with Alexa:

@mrvietnam said in Amazon Black Friday starts now with Alexa:

Yes, I did buy the regular version and I know it did not come with a smarthub. I was just posting that for your benefit and others who might be interested in the Plus.

Well you said you were debating returning yours based on the fact that it doesn’t have a full featured hub, so I thought that maybe you thought yours came with a hub.

It’s a great device for what it is, although I’m not sure if a full size one is necessary, the dot is probably fine for most people.

Actually I was posting a question and answer that I saw on the Amazon site. I thought it might be helpful to you and others who were debating between the Echo or Echo Plus. No big deal though. Thanks for posting.

@dangeruss said in Amazon Black Friday starts now with Alexa:

@mrvietnam said in Amazon Black Friday starts now with Alexa:

@dangeruss said in Amazon Black Friday starts now with Alexa:

@mrvietnam said in Amazon Black Friday starts now with Alexa:

@dangeruss said in Amazon Black Friday starts now with Alexa:

@mrvietnam I want the echo plus because it has a smarthub built in. Then I can start adding devices to it.

I have a couple of devices that work with alexa, including my thermostat, but I barely use the integration.

Does the first generation Amazon Echo (regular price $180) have a smarthub built in? It does, doesn’t it? I wonder if the smarthub is improved on the second generation or just the same?

Nope, no smarthub. It only communicates with other devices over wifi.

For what it is worth, here is a question and answer on the Amazon site:

The Echo hub functionality appears to be extremely limited and I’m debating returning mine.

Question: The Echo can control devices, with the Echo Plus, what does it mean to work as a hub?

Answer: For most hubs, it means you can connect all sorts of devices and then program to to interesting things, like when I turn on this light, turn that light on too. Or when no motion is sensed in this room for X minutes, turn off the lights and change thermostat settings to save power (because nobody’s there). There’s all sorts of cool things you can do.

The Echo Plus’s hub supports “turn this light on” and “turn that light off”. That’s basically it. No programmability. No support for sensors, can’t do anything interesting with switches. It also doesn’t support as many types of devices as most hubs.

Super disappointing.

I thought you bought the regular version, not the plus? In that case it wouldn’t have a hub anyway.

The Echo itself is great, but it sad to hear that the hub is not fully featured.

Yes, I did buy the regular version and I know it did not come with a smarthub. I was just posting that for your benefit and others who might be interested in the Plus.

@dangeruss said in Amazon Black Friday starts now with Alexa:

@mrvietnam said in Amazon Black Friday starts now with Alexa:

@dangeruss said in Amazon Black Friday starts now with Alexa:

@mrvietnam I want the echo plus because it has a smarthub built in. Then I can start adding devices to it.

I have a couple of devices that work with alexa, including my thermostat, but I barely use the integration.

Does the first generation Amazon Echo (regular price $180) have a smarthub built in? It does, doesn’t it? I wonder if the smarthub is improved on the second generation or just the same?

Nope, no smarthub. It only communicates with other devices over wifi.

For what it is worth, here is a question and answer on the Amazon site:

Question: The Echo can control devices, with the Echo Plus, what does it mean to work as a hub?

Answer: The Echo hub functionality appears to be extremely limited and I’m debating returning mine.

For most hubs, it means you can connect all sorts of devices and then program to to interesting things, like when I turn on this light, turn that light on too. Or when no motion is sensed in this room for X minutes, turn off the lights and change thermostat settings to save power (because nobody’s there). There’s all sorts of cool things you can do.

The Echo Plus’s hub supports “turn this light on” and “turn that light off”. That’s basically it. No programmability. No support for sensors, can’t do anything interesting with switches. It also doesn’t support as many types of devices as most hubs.

Super disappointing.

FYI, to answer what a hub is. No, you won’t need a hub for your echo dot to operate devices which do not require a hub (such as nest thermostats which can contain their own hub for other devices too). Those are devices with built in wifi which can attach to your home wifi signal, so no hub is needed. A hub is required when devices use other signals besides wifi, like zigbee, or zwave. These are home automation signals which can extend the range of communication just by adding more devices too. They mesh or bridge the signal over one another automatically. Wifi devices can be limited by the distance from the router.

@dangeruss said in Amazon Black Friday starts now with Alexa:

@mrvietnam I want the echo plus because it has a smarthub built in. Then I can start adding devices to it.

I have a couple of devices that work with alexa, including my thermostat, but I barely use the integration.

Does the first generation Amazon Echo (regular price $180) have a smarthub built in? It does, doesn’t it? I wonder if the smarthub is improved on the second generation or just the same?