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4 GB of RAM is $60? When the hell did that happen?

Fry's sells defective components back to customers in the hope they'll be too lazy to return it (they do have an extremely liberal return policy, though -- it'll just go back on the shelf for someone else to buy).

I've never had a problem with components from Fry's. Just gotta choose the right brands. Patriot and Kingston are decent brands that usually gets sold in good sales (I think I got a couple of nice Kingston 2 GB sticks of for $35 each recently). Sometimes you'll see a great deal on Crucial as well.

I should also add, that your theory doesn't even make sense - the kind of people who buy components from Fry's are exactly the kind of people who will return stuff. What they are doing is just typical retail loss-leading sales in hopes that you'll buy that new DVD-burner* with a higher markup while you're in there.

* or whatever

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