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Microsoft via Digital River has the Windows 7 home premium and Windows 7 professional for sale at $29.99. This is a download version, if you want to order a CD you have to pay $13 more. This promotion is aimed to students only. You must have to have a valid edu email address to purchase Windows 7 products. Obviously, this is a great deal if you are using Windows Vista and want to switch to the new Windows 7 operation system. Normal price for a Windows 7 home premium would be $119.99!

YOU have to enter your school address ended with edu to star the purchase. After submit your email address, a link to place the order will be provided and you have to click the link to make the purchase.

Here are some instructions after enter your email address:

To Purchase:

1. Check your email inbox.
2. Click on the link in the email to access to the store.
3. Purchase your license/product key.
4. IMPORTANT! Hold on to your confirmation email. You will need this if you need to restart the installation process.
5. Checkout and download Windows 7!

If you do not receive the email:

1. Check your junk or spam folder.
2. Add “studentwindows.us@digitalriver.com” to your email contacts list or whitelist.
3. Request your university IT department add “studentwindows.us@digitalriver.com” to their email whitelist.
4. Click here to resend your password.
5. If the above actions do not work, contact Customer Service.

This promotion ends on Jan 3rd, 2010.

Today I received the new check from ebates.com. The amount is only $24.39 including $10 sign up bonus. Usually ebates.com offer $5 sign up bonus for shopping at through ebates.com. But I got $10 bonus because they were running a special promotion at that time. Right now ebates.com is offering $5 bonus for signing up and make at least one purchase through ebates.com.

Whenever I place an order online, I will check ebates.com to see whether they offer additional cash back for purchasing stuffs through them. I know some of you might be not aware that you can save additional money for shopping through ebates.com. Ebates.com is the pioneer and leader in online cash back shopping. Nearly 1,000 of the largest online retailers have partnership with ebates.com. Ebates.com has about 6 million registered users now. Since 1999 ebate.com’s members have spent nearly 1 billion with participating retailers. The average cash back from ebates.com is about 5%. Ebates.com membership is always free and provides shoppers with actual cash back on purchases — there are no rebate forms to submit and no points to redeem. They will send a check to you very quarter.

Ebates.com also collect official coupons or promotion codes from their participating retailers which will save you a lot of time for shopping cheaper stuffs online.

Sing up and get $5!

If you sign up an account at ebates.com today, you can get $5 bonus which will show up in your account immediately. Of course, you have to make at least one purchase to cash out the $5 bonus. You can also refer your friends to sign up at ebates.com and then you can get $5 bonus too!

There are also other shopping sites out there. Overall, I like ebates.com best and use it all the time!

I also received another bonus check from surveysavvy.com which offers small money for doing a survey online. The payout usually is around $1 to $20. I got $20 bonus for doing a survey about HP printer. Details about surveysavvy is here.

I first reported the huge 35% cash back from eBay via Microsoft live search in June 2008. I personally saved a lot of money through this trick for purchasing at eBay. There are even many other more crazy deals from Microsoft live search, for example, 40% cash back from HP on Black Friday, 25% cash back from AT&T and T-mobile or other places. If you are looking for something on eBay, it is wise to use Live Search to save additional money for you.

The microsoft cash back for purchasing at eBay has been stopped for a while. Now it comes back!

Following is a brief guide on how to get the eligible links through live.com.

Open your IE and go to live.com. Search “Xbox”, if you can not see any links, just refresh the page several times. It will come out finally. If you are using firefox, I’m sorry it does not work. It is also reported that Sarafi can also provide the 25% link.

If you are using firefox, you can search “Xbox”, “t43″, “onkyo”, “PS3″ or “wii cheap”. It will give you 8% cash back links.

For people who are still looking for discount from T-Mobile and AT&T, this is a great news! Live Cash Back actually is still offering 25% cash back for T-Mobile and AT&T. If you want to buy a new phone, you should try to use the 25% cash back.

It is pretty easy to get the link work. Go to Live.com and type in “T-Mobile” or “ATT, ATT phone, ATT plan” and the link for the 25% will appear on the screen.

I know some may do not know how to do it. Here is the link for T-mobile, and this is the link for AT&T.

Combined with my previous posts on how to save money on monthly bills from mobile carriers. I believe you can save a lot of money on your cell phone bill.

I wrote two posts about how to get discount from T-Mobile. 1. How to Get A Discount from T-Mobile. 2. New T-mobile Discount for University Employees, Students and Alumni. These two posts attract a lot of T-Mobile users to MyCardBlog.com. I believe I have provided great information on how to save money at T-Mobile. There are actually many readers are not using T-Mobile services. It’s important to write up something on how to save money with other mobile carriers.

It is not a secret that all mobile carriers have discount for some corporations or groups. But some are still not aware of the fact that he/she is eligible to get discount from specific mobile carrier. For students or university employees, you can always go to your local stores to check whether you are eligible to receive a discount for your cell phone plan.

AT&T: Premier Corporate Discount Program

AT&T is the larget mobile carrier in US and has business agreements with thousands of corporations, government agencies and educational institutions to offer wireless products to their employees and families at a significant discount.

Simply use your work email to see whether your are qualified for a discount. This can be done in seconds.

Verizon: Employee Discount Program

Verizon wireless also has agreement with many big corporates, governments, schools and even social groups. Enter your work email address to see if you qualify for discounts from Verizon.

T-Mobile: Corporate Discount Program

I have introduced on how to save money with T-Mobile. But the above link will take you to the corporate discount page where you can check whether you are eligible for a discount which ranges from 0% to 15% off your monthly bill.

Sprint: Employee Value Program

Sprint offers huge discount for employees of corporations, governments, schools or other groups that have business agreement with Sprint. You need to enter your work email to see whether you are qualified.

My post on “How to get a discount from T-Mobile” is very popular. I believe that this post has helped a lot of people to save money on their T-Mobile cellular service. I personally use the Freelancersunion.org
discount. The reason why I use this discount is you don’t have to call T-Mobile and give them the promo code. All you have to do is finish the form online and the discount will automatically shown on your bill. This is the easiest method to get a discount from T-Mobile.

Right now we have another great method to get huge discount (usually 15%) from T-Mobile by using University discount. This is a new discount provided by T-mobile by corporation with major US universities. This has been confirmed to work and it’s very simple to complete the discount request over the phone with T-Mobile customer service.

Let’s see a typical announcement from Penn State University.

Following information is listed on its website:

INCREASED T-MOBILE DISCOUNTS!

T-Mobile has increased discounts from 10% to 15% for Penn State students, faculty and staff, effective January 12, 2009. If already enrolled in the T-Mobile/Penn State discount program, accounts will automatically receive the new discount. Existing T-Mobile customers can call 1-877-453-8824 to have the Penn State discount added to their account.

Clemson University also has a similar notice listed on its website:

• As a current Clemson University Student, Faculty, Staff or Alumnus, you and your immediate family can take advantage of this outstanding discount from T-Mobile!
• To Open a T-Mobile Account and Receive the 12% Discount — plus waived
  activation fees and discounted phones — just call 866-464-8662, select option 3, and provide this promotional code: 11303TMOFAV
  OR
  Visit T-Mobile Premiere for more details.
• To Receive the 12% Discount If You’re Already a T-Mobile Customer just call
  877-453-8824 and provide this promotional code: 11303TMOFAV

It seems that Clemson University needs a promotional code to get the discount. It seems that even alumnus (Everyone can be an alumnus of Clemson University, T-Mobile can’t check this. Employee’s family members can also qualify for this discount.)can use the discount to save money.

University of Kentucky

Welcome University of Kentucky Employees! Great News!  You are eligible to receive corporate benefits when you activate new service through this T-Mobile Premier site or by calling 1-866-464-8662 referencing promotional code 866TMOFAV and identifying yourself as a University of Kentucky employee.  Keep in mind that you may now transfer your current number to T-Mobile when signing up for T-Mobile service.  Simply call 1-866-464-8662 and reference promotional code 866TMOFAV.

University of Louisville

U of L Students, Faculty, Staff, Alumni, and Family Members qualify for 15% off their monthly bills and huge equipment discounts with T-Mobile when they purchase new equipment or upgrade equipment through Tom Tollefson @ www.tomst-mobilesales.com/uofl, login: uoflcardinals, password: uofl09tmo.

Drexel University

University Procurement announces that Drexel students, faculty and staff are now eligable for a 15 percent discount on any T-Mobile rate plan, plus discounts on the latest handsets.

Information about T-Mobile service and the Drexel program can be accessed through the T-Mobile Drexel discount portal http://www.t-mobile.com/Drexeldiscounts or by calling 1-866-464-8662 and mentioning promo code 4946TMOFAV.

Existing T-Mobile customers can call 1-877-453-8824 to have the Drexel discount added to your account.

There are more universities that can get discount from T-Mobile. When you call in, the customer support may ask for my University ID, email address with .edu. If you are not a university student you can use the promotional code I listed above.

Attached is a list of confirmed schools:
Princeton University
Fordham University
New York City Publics Schools (teachers and employees only)
NYU (Teachers and Employees only)
The Ohio State University (15%)
UKY
Rutgers
UC Berkeley
UC Irvine
Auburn University (15%)
Johns Hopkins University (15%)
University of Southern California (15%)
University of Texas (15%)
Colorado State University (15%)
San Fransisco State University (15%)
Stevens Institute of Technology, NJ (8-15%)
St.Cloud State University, MN (15%)
University of Minnesota (10%)
University of Illinois (15%)
Arizona State University (15%)
Brigham Young University – Provo (15%)
Indiana University (15%)
University of South Florida (15%)
University of Georgia (15%)
George Mason University (15%)
Old Dominion University (15%)
UVA (15%)
San Jose State University (15%)
Sacramento State University (15%)
Loyola University of Chicago (10%)
Valencia Community College (8%)
Kennesaw State University (15%)
Californis State University, Los Angeles (15%)
University of Rochester, (15%)
San Diego State University (15%)
CUNY Baruch College, New York (15%)

I went to Chicago Premium Outlet this morning. There were a lot of people there. It’s even very difficult to find a parking lot. There are many reports and analytical reports indicated that during this holiday shopping season most merchants couldn’t get the expected sale income. Many experts said that there might be huge After-Christmas sales after December 25, 2008. So where to shop the After-Christmas deals?

The first place you want to visit is dealnews.com. Dealnews.com has a special section for After-Christmas sale deals. It seems that dealnews.com has already compiled all of the after-Christmas deals. I strongly suggest you visit the above mentioned website to see what you want to grab.

Another place you can get some ideas on what are on sale is walletpop.com. Geoff Williams at Walletpop summarized some great deals at many famous retailers like J.C.Penney, Target, Sears, Home Depot, and IKEA etc. Washington Post has a report which indicated that retail sales of items excluding gasoline from Nov. 1 through Dec. 24 were down 2 to 4 percent from the comparable period last year.

U.S. News & World Report also has a great article, explaining where to find the best After-Christmas sales. USA Today has a report titled “After-Christmas Sales Could Offer Really Big Bargains“. This report even said the After-Christmas day is the second Black Friday this year. MSNBC also reported “Retailers Offer Shopping for Insomniacs”.

Happy holiday to all MyCardBlog.com readers and enjoy shopping!

These days the news about the promotion from PayPal is widely spread over the internet. I have a post which indicated that PayPal is going to run Holiday Promotion in the coming shopping season published several days ago. And the current PayPal holiday promotions can be found at www.paypal-promo.com/holiday. Not all of the promotions listed there are hot deals. But some of them are really good.

Recently I received 2 PayPal promotions targeted to my personal PayPal account. I think it’s a good idea to briefly introduce the 2 promotions because some of you might not know the promotions are existing.

Get $20 cash back from PayPal when you spend $50 at Walmart.com

This promotion is pretty easy and really a great deal. Use PayPal when you checkout at Walmart.com and PayPal  will give you $20 cash back on your order of $50 or more!

This offer applies to transactions on Walmart.com when you use PayPal as a payment method. Offer begins December 5, 2008 and ends December 15, 2008. The maximum amount of cash back per PayPal account is $20USD. The cash back will be deposited into your PayPal account by January 15, 2009.

To get the $20 cash back, you must

(1) have a confirmed U.S. PayPal account in good standing

(2) receive an email directly from PayPal inviting you to participate in the Offer

(3) purchase using your PayPal account that has the same email address where you received the email invitation

(4) make an eligible purchase no later than December 15, 2008

This offer is similar to the American Express Credit Card promotion at Walmart and Walmart.com which will give you $20 statement credit for shopping at Walmart stores or Walmart.com twice with each minimum transaction of $40.

20% cash back from PayPal for shopping at eBay

Right now, Microsoft live search is only offer 8% cash back. So if you receive this email, it’s a great chance to pick up some cheap stuffs at eBay. This offer is very simple: Pay for your eBay purchase with PayPal, and get 20% cash back in your PayPal account.

This offer applies to transactions between December 10, 2008 and December 19, 2008 using PayPal as the payment method. Purchases made within the Offer period must be charged to your account no later than December 19, 2008. The maximum amount of cash back per PayPal account is $100 USD. The cash back will be deposited into your PayPal account by January 31, 2009.

To be eligible for the Offer, you must:

(1) have a confirmed U.S. PayPal account in good standing

(2) receive an email directly from PayPal inviting you to participate in the Offer

(3) make your purchases no later than December 19, 2008 using your PayPal account, which also has the same email address where you received the Offer invitation

Some might ask how to receive the promotional offers from PayPal. From my personal experience, I think the way to get the PayPal offers is don’t link your PayPal email to your eBay account. In this way, PayPal, which is an eBay company, will send more promotional offers to you.