There are so many ways to get cheap electronics these days. But, in cases where you are talking about small and fragile high end items with moving parts, you usually get what you pay for. I am trying very hard to not only compete, but to not "piss off" m customers when I give them an estimate for products and services. I usually discount equipment when additional services are purchased as an incentive to the customer. But the everyday customer nowadays is willing to take a chance on warranties, service requests, and other types of things you need to go through an authorized dealer for. You would be surprised at how many people purchase items just to save a couple of bucks through an un-athorized route. In the end it winds up costing them much more.

As a consumer as well, I enjoy the peace of mind when I buy a product and I know that someone other than me will be accountable if it breaks during it's warranty or if I need a repair down the line for any reason. Its almost the differnce between owning an item and renting an item.

To me, Ebay cannot be trusted. There is nothing that protects you outside of a couple of short term clauses. But once you leave good feedback, you better hope that item don't crap out on you. I'm not syaing that everyone on Ebay is crooked, but since they are all human, trying to make money, and basically unknown I won't take my chances.