DailyTech - Amazon.com $100 Xbox 360 Core Promotion: A Done Deal

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Blog: Internet Amazon.com $100 Xbox 360 Core Promotion: A Done Deal
Michael Hoffman (Blog) - November 23, 2006 1:12 PM

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9 comment(s) - last by ninjit.. on Nov 24 at 7:15 PM

It has been a long time since this writer has seen the Amazon web site so bogged down

Amazon.com just a few minutes ago ran a promotion in which 1,000 Microsoft Xbox360 Core systems were sold to lucky consumers with a mere $100 price tag. The deal went live at 11AM PST but definitely did not last very very long -- all 1,000 units were probably gone in 60 seconds!

Leading up to the Amazon promotion, customers had to vote for four deals which they wanted Amazon to provide. The four possible deal choices were:

    * 1,000 Xbox 360 Core Systems for $100 each
    * 2,500 Mongoose dual-suspension bikes for $30 each
    * 2,000 Barbie in The 12 Dancing Princesses Interactive Genevieve Dolls for $10 each
    * One-year of Amazon Prime plus a $100 promotional certificate to Amazon's Toy Department for $40

Even though the Xbox 360 Core System won in a landslide, Amazon went ahead and offered all of the deals anyway. If you are going to scramble off to Amazon to check out the deals, don't bother -- they are all sold out!

Although I wasn't lucky enough to get one for $100, a friend of mine quickly sent me an IM informing me that he had indeed gotten one of the consoles.

Did anyone luck out and get an Xbox 360 Core for $100?

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Yes!!! I got one!!!

By Edgarsoft on 11/23/2006 3:06:14 PM , Rating: 2

Hehe, just at 10:59:59 I hit refresh and enter to the page and voila!!! After a question I got the deal. My others 2 friends in my house that have their laptops also try, but only I got lucky!!! I think all the xboxes were sold 15 seconds after 11:00 a.m. :)

RE: Yes!!! I got one!!!

By danz32 on 11/23/2006 3:11:59 PM , Rating: 2

Yeah...I couldnt even get the page to load for about 4 minutes, it was crazy

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RE: Yes!!! I got one!!!

By soydios on 11/24/2006 1:11:32 AM , Rating: 2

Same here. The page refreshed a solid 8 minutes after I hit F5 at 11:00:01am.

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RE: Yes!!! I got one!!!

By bdewong on 11/24/2006 3:44:36 PM , Rating: 2

Ditto to that. I refreshed at 10:59 and didn't get it to refresh till 11:07

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Wow

By GDstew4 on 11/24/2006 5:46:13 AM , Rating: 2

The Amazon boards are aflame with people who think they got the shaft.

RE: Wow

By VooDooAddict on 11/24/2006 11:25:57 AM , Rating: 3

I'll bet.

At a flat $200 instead of $100 it would have still sold out incredibly fast.

Or $250 bundled with a game like Gears of War. They could have sold a good 10,000 units like that this weekend. Advertise that even if you can't find a Wii or PS3 this holiday you can still have a next gen console this season. If they would price the bundle so that microsoft would only take a $10 - $15 loss ... over 10,000 machines that's $100,000 - $150,000 spent on major press taht steals much thunder away from the competition.

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RE: Wow

By TomZ on 11/24/2006 5:30:32 PM , Rating: 2

Ditto that. I also tried to get that deal. I think it leaves a sour taste in the mouth of many of the 99.9% of people who tried to get the deal and lost out. I remember thinking that last year when I went to Wal-Mart at 4am only to find about 500 people in line in front of me. I got nothing of course, and it leaves me feeling less enthused about shopping there in the future. I felt the same way about this Amazon XBOX deal.

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not a big truck

By irsyz on 11/23/2006 4:47:24 PM , Rating: 5

i guess you can say the series of tubes got clogged temporarily.

Web Server request queing

By ninjit on 11/24/2006 7:15:18 PM , Rating: 2

It's interesting how some people got in, and others didn't considering I think everyone was wacking F5 at precisely the right time.

I was doing the same, mostly to see how the servers would crawl with this promotion, and I noticed that the slowdown started a good 5 mins before 11am - even people who did get into the 1st 1000 requests should have been bogged down while trying to complete the forms.
So how does the web server client queing work work around all that?

Anyways, I was hoping there would be another significant deal for next week, because I was playing with the website a bit afterwards and may have found a way around the crowd - but I doubt the new deals will garner enough attention to cause another mass rush.
Shame, because if what I think is true it would be deceptively simple and totally legit - it may even explain how some people were able to get in on the deal and go through the whole process while others were still waiting for the page to refresh 10 mins later.