I've been trying to buy a new laptop recently, a project which I have not yet succeeded in. However, I've learnt a few things about buying a laptop that I thought might be worth sharing.
Buy it from America
Laptops are seriously half-price if you can get them anywhere that's not Australia. But the US is an especially good place to buy because of the Aussie dollar's relative strength. I don't know why, but laptops cost approximately half as much. Don't believe me? Compare US Lenovo's Thinkpad price and Australian Lenovo's Thinkpad X61 price. At the time of writing, the base-model X61 is $AU2199 or $US1025 (about $AU1,175.73. There'll be some tax too, but it's not going to be $1000). Insanity!
Get an American Express card
After having decided on a TP x61, I went through Lenovo's ordering page and got all the way to the end and discovered that it wouldn't let me use my Australian credit card -- the billing address doesn't let you specify a country, and all the states it lists are American states. However, if you read their unlinkable FAQ (you get to it by going through the ordering process, getting to entering your billing address and clicking the "credit card profile" link), it says:
If the billing information provided does not match what is on file with the credit card provider then your order will be held until we can verify that you are the authorized card user....
International credit cards
An international credit card is a credit card issued outside of the United States with a primary billing address in another country. To place an order using an international American Express card please call 1-866- 96-THINK. American Express is the only international credit card currently accepted by Lenovo.
I don't actually know if American Express have a special "international" card or not, but it seems like Amex is the card to have if you want to buy stuff from the US.
The closest thing to a redbook.com.au equivalent
redbook is a site listing all the cars, ever, along with detailed specifications and expected pricing and so on. It's immensely useful for buying a used car, or even a new one. Unfortunately I haven't found an equivalent for laptops, but at some point I did stumble upon CompUSA's laptop page which has a fairly representative set of current computers and a highly usable interface for narrowing down available options based on your requirements. I'd recommend buying direct from the laptop's manufacturer over buying from CompUSA, but they do have a very useful webpage.
Use discount coupons
It turns out, that like every other strange, perverted practice imaginable, there is an internet community committed to collecting and publicising the details of discount coupons for various laptop manufacturers. The one I stumbled onto was Fat Wallet. As an example, they have this page detailing discount codes for Lenovo laptops, including a coupon for a further 20% off!
Buy it at Thanksgiving
I haven't quite broken the code of when thanksgiving is, or what it is, but it seems to be a period of the year where no-one in America makes any money. It seems to be around November (ie: now). Whatever it is, it's a time of year when there's all kinds of discount offers to be had. Take advantage of it. See also bfads.
Get a "business" model
The "business" models from most vendors are typically much better machines, but that's not the reason I give this piece of advice. The reason is that since you're buying the machine from outside your home country, you'll want an international warranty; an extravagant extra normally only afforded to the "business" models (though exceptions exist).
Get it on Salary Sacrifice
I don't have a reference for it handy, but if utter the words "Salary Sacrifice" to whoever does payroll at your employer, you'll get the machine on pre-income-tax money. Which is great.
Can you Depreciate a Salary Sacrificed Laptop?
I don't know. I struggled with this on my last tax return. The argument for is that no matter what it cost you to acquire, you start out with an asset worth X, and it will lose a percentage of that value each year. So you should depreciate it. The argument against is that you didn't pay income tax when you bought it, so there's no income tax to claim. I don't know what the answer is, but I will point out that the tax pack lists a laptop computer as one of their examples in this section, and they're generally pretty careful about noting exceptions such as this. Make your own decision, but it's worth noting that there's a fairly defensible case either way.
Don't have time to get an Amex?
This is the unfortunate situation I'm in, and it renders most of my previous advice moot. However, you're not completely lost; it turns out that there are some vendors who sell laptops on ebay, and will accept paypal payment. They'll deliver it to anywhere in the US, and some of them will deliver internationally as well. If you can pick it up in the US, that's preferable, as you won't have to pay customs on it.
That's it for now. I'll be sure to let you know if I learn anything else before the conclusion of my laptop odyssey.