What is wrong with a $772 D90 from Walmart?

<p>Nikon in the UK are offering £60 cashback on the D90 - when they do this it's often a sign that the model is about to be replaced. Maybe some of your suppliers are taking this into account in their pricing...</p>

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<p>And don't forget if you buy a camera from walmart you are further continuing to destroy smaller camera businesses and supporting all of their human rights violating practices. </p>

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<p>owen, make sure you pay your taxes, :-)<br>

sorry shun, i just can't help it.<br>

you may delete this post.</p>

<p>Actually, I worked for a company that was audited for sales tax. States do this, and it's a real mess.</p>

<p>From then on, we were much more careful about filing that sales tax paperwork and paying for stuff we bought from B&H and such places.</p>

<p>I don't think it is a good idea to discuss engaging in illegal activities, such as tax evasion, on this forum.</p>

<p>As usual, if you cannot be helpful to the OP or at least be helpful to a related question posted to this very thread, not posting is always an option and likely be the better option.</p>

<p>Sorry for the slight hi-jacking of this thread, but consider this:</p>

<p>I have lived most of my life in Greece, where I've bought most of my Nikon equipment. Say I travel for business to US and one of my cameras has an issue. Why wouldn't Nikon USA fix it? I am not saying fixing for free, but simply fix it? What kind of crap is that? Hasn't Nikon taken my hard-earned cash when I bought the camera? Aren't they obliged to fix my camera if I am willing to pay for it or for free if it is still under warranty?</p>

<p>And of course, the same is true for you Americans coming over to Europe. What happens if some of your equipment fails?</p>

<p>I believe those separations are totally stupid and the manufacturers should be urged to reconsider them.</p>

<p>From Nikon USA's point of view, a gray-market item is one that is imported into the US via an alternative importer and sold in the US. In other words, it is a competing product that denies Nikon USA's profit. That is why they are hostile to it and tries to discourage it.</p>

<p>If you buy a Nikon camera elsewhere and have a receipt for it from another country, that is not gray market and Nikon USA will fix it for a fee.</p>

<p>I have a strong feeling that OP's question has been answered and the thread is moving towards irrelevant discussion about tax fraud etc.<br>

<br />Shun - an we please close it now ?</p>

<p>Our preferred way is to let the posts onto a thread die down "naturally." A lot of the moderating happens in the background and not very noticeable.</p>

<p>Unfortunately, sometimes threads get off to a tangent and turn into heated debates, such as Canon vs. Nikon, film vs. digital, still image vs. video ... or some off topic issues about religion, social issues or international conflicts. Or sometimes people get mixed up and post to previous Wednesday image threads. In those situation we may decide to close certain threads, but we try to avoid that as much as we can (except for the Wednesday threads, which we close on the following Tuesday on a regular basis).</p>

<p>There is absolutely nothing "wrong" with a D90 from Walmart.<br>

I purchased my D90 and 35mm1.8 from them a few months ago when bing.com was running their 25% cashback.... that was a great deal...<br>

Camera and lens are new and function as advertised.</p>

<p>I am not saying that Nikon makes slightly different cameras for Walmart... Electronics companies do make products just for Walmart that appear to be identical but is slightly different in a way that most consumers will not notice. Take a close look at the televisions they sell. <br>

Perhaps the Walmart bound cameras were not QC as well to save money. Nikon has integrity but Walmart is a powerful retailer and calls the shots on pricing. </p>

 

<blockquote>

<p>I am not saying that Nikon makes slightly different cameras for Walmart... Electronics companies do make products just for Walmart that appear to be identical but is slightly different in a way that most consumers will not notice. Take a close look at the televisions they sell. <br />Perhaps the Walmart bound cameras were not QC as well to save money. Nikon has integrity but Walmart is a powerful retailer and calls the shots on pricing.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>CO, you are merely making some totally baseless remarks to generate doubts out of nothing. There is absolutely no reason to believe that Nikon makes an inferior version of the D90 or another camera and sells it at some discount store. If you dislike Walmart and/or Nikon, you are entitled to your opinions, but that does not entitle you the right to generate some baseless doubts.</p>

<p>If you indeed are "not saying that Nikon makes slightly different cameras for Walmart," you should not have made this post at all.</p>

<p>Agreed. Nikon doesn't let two classes of D90's ship from their factories. Nikon is Nikon, wherever you buy it it's a quality product.</p>

<p>(1) At Walmart some consumer items have a variant made for them which really might be non functional. Thus the with LAN cards; routers the Walmart box might have a "free" 7 foot LAN cable thrown in and there is a "free 7 foot lan cable" sticker under shrink wrap. Or if one goes across the street to Office Depot; the exact same lan card or router did not have the freebie cable; and it cost slightly more too.</p>

<p>(2) With some other routers and switches; the boxed item inside was the same; but the box has a "WM" in front of the boxes part number; and the instructions had another extra simple instruction sheet for Joe Six pack. Thus Walmarts Buyers add force the vendor to have better instructions; to reduce returns. The added WM also reduces folks buying product from Office depot on fire sale; and returning it to Walmart and pocketing the difference.</p>

<p><br /> ****RE CO's comment about TVs':</p>

<p><br /> This making a slightly different model number for *TV's* is at least 1/3 century old. One can have a Sears; Kmart, Joes TV; Frys; Pacific Stereo; or J C Penny version of RCA XL100 TV. Then if Joes TV says they will beat any price in town; it is impossibe; for only they sell that model RCA XL 100 color TV. That is why a Sams Photo Facts repair manual has 3 dozen model numbers for one RCA XL100 color TV; they are all the same except for the grill cloth; knob color; a few slight things for each vendor. Joes TV can run a legal advert and say they have the lowest price on a RCA XL 100 TV' and their custom model number is in the advert. If you fine one cheaper at Sears; Joes TV will not honor it; it is a different model. This goes back to at least the 1960's or before.</p>

<p>(3) In old dialup modems and CD burners and sound cards the Walmart version often had a CD driver disc that hand more drivers; going back to win 3.11 in sound cards; maybe win98 for the burner. Again the same hardware; better drivers and instructions to handle a wider range of old computers.</p>

<p>(4) In cameras my old Olympus D360L digital at Walmart came with charger; memory card, case and 4 NiMh batteries; and my mail order one had no charger or batteries.</p>

<p>(5) With my Walmart NIKON L6 digital; the Walmart one mailorder one I bought had the same stuff.</p>

<p>If anything the Walmart Item might have some extra goodies; or added instructions or it might be exactly the same. To add extra stuff only requires the buyer to request it. It can be as simple as an extra super starter instruction sheet that is shrink rapped around the box.</p>

<p>It is baseless to assume the Walmart Nikon item is 2nd tier.</p>

<p>In Kansas City in the mid 1970's Kmart sold a Nikkormat FTn with 50mm F2 and some rolls of focal film as a kit</p>

<p>It looks like <a href="http://www.photo.net/photodb/user?user_id=5907028">Kikas Vohli</a> is correct. This thread is about purchasing a D90, perhaps at Wal-Mart. Unfortunately the discussion has drifted into off-topic issues. It looks like meantioning Wal-Mart is going to casue problems.</p>

<p>At least the OP got his answers.</p>