Apple’s eBay store offers significantly better deals on Apple.com refurbs

9to5Mac first broke the news that Apple sold refurbished merchandise through its own eBay store last year, equipped with the same price tags, full warranties, and approved inspections, and now the company has dropped prices on many of those items below what it offers at store.apple.com.

9to5Toys and eventually Dealnews recently noticed a $100 price cut for Apple’s 13-inch MacBook Air with 1.8GHz i5 and 128GB of storage (now over). It costs $100 more at store.apple.com for the same refurbished unit.

An even better eBay deal has emerged today: Apple’s 11.6-inch MacBook Air with 1.8GHz, 4GB SDRAM and 256GB SSD is only $949. It’s certified refurbished unite, while the same refurb model goes for $1,059 on Apple.com, and the 256GB MacBook Airs start at $1,299 new. All items come with free standard shipping, and eBay adds sales tax for only a few states at purchase and allows folks to pay with PayPal and BillMeLater.

[Source: 9to5Mac - Click here to read the full story]

eBay seller claims to be auctioning a Microsoft Xbox Durango development kit

A seller on eBay posted a listing for what they claim is a Microsoft Xbox Durango development kit today, with the current bid for the Alpha Tower at $15,000.

The tower, which is supposedly for the next-gen Xbox, was posted by eBay user SuperDae earlier this morning and listed additional items like a wireless controller and power supply. The auction includes only a single image of a non-descript tower, with no further details on its contents. The starting price for the tower was set to $1, and when contacted by The Tech Game, SuperDae said: "All proceeds go to charity. And by charity, I mean my new car." A Twitter user with the same handle tweeted images of what he claimed to be Kinect for the Durango over the weekend, although Microsoft did not officially confirm that they were legitimate.

According to Kotaku, SuperDae is policing the bids for the supposed Durango Alpha Tower, saying, "I only expect people who know what it is to buy it. Otherwise you have no reason to bid." We have contacted Microsoft for comment and will update this story when more information is available.

UPDATE: The Durango development kit was sold for $20,100. Earlier today the auction has six days to go, but the status of the auction switched to "sold" at 17:32 PDT after 43 bids had been placed

[Source: The Verge]

eBay Windows 8 Metro style app now available in the Windows Store

Microsoft's app store for Windows 8 has been on a slow and steady push towards 400 apps recently, despite the fact app publishing is still reserved for a small number of developers right now. After being previewed at a Microsoft event back in December,McAkins online notes that eBay has published its own Metro style app in the Windows Store, bringing the online shopping site to Windows 8 tablets and PCs.

The app includes notifications for buying and selling activities and the ability to pin a daily deals section to the Windows 8 Start Screen. eBay has also made use of the Windows 8 Share Charm by allowing users to share details of an auction across other apps or in an email message. Although the app includes sections for feedback and messages, you'll have to load these in a browser as they're not fully baked in. eBay joins high profile apps like Kindle, WordPress, MetroTwit, and even Microsoft Office as part of the Windows Store.

[Source: The Verge]