
I would be very wary of retail outlets selling as cheap as educational prices!
I went for a retailer, actually mail order (CDA computers), because its price
was better thant the campus computer store. I found out why later on when I
tried to get a repair done at an Apple registered repair center - the CPU was a
resale. The serial number had been removed and replaced with a non-standard
number (probably from CDA computers). Consequently, the Apple repair man could
not do ANY warrenty repairs. So I ended up with just a 90day warrenty from CDA
over the Apple 12month warrenty. Boy, was I pi**ed! Moral of the story, CAVEAT
EMPTOR.

However, if you go with a reliable, trustworthy mail order firm (if they exist
- maybe someone could enlighten us with their experiences), you will probably
get a better price than your local educational outlet simply because mail order
out of state does not REQUIRE sales tax yet. Though for how much longer remains
to be seen. The addition in sales tax on a CPU purchase will probably wipe out
an educational discount. Again CAVEAT EMPTOR, some mail order companies DO
include sales tax on purchases even if they are out of state, so check!