Laptops Amazon selling laptop SKUs that are not available with other portals

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chetansha

chetansha

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has anyone noticed that Amazon sells laptops ( asus / dell ) that are not available with other portals, these laptops dont even come up on Manufacturer Indian websites ?
For example the asus vivobook i purchased www.amazon.in/gp/product/B0BSXD72X8 - i could not find it on asus.in . like wise one dell is also listed for sale - https://www.amazon.in/dp/B0C91QWF1X . comes with 1360P processor, whereas all other sellers have 1355u proccy. and this particular model is available overseas only.
what is happening ?

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chetansha said:
has anyone noticed that Amazon sells laptops ( asus / dell ) that are not available with other portals, these laptops dont even come up on Manufacturer Indian websites ?
For example the asus vivobook i purchased www.amazon.in/gp/product/B0BSXD72X8 - i could not find it on asus.in . like wise one dell is also listed for sale - https://www.amazon.in/dp/B0C91QWF1X . comes with 1360P processor, whereas all other sellers have 1355u proccy. and this particular model is available overseas only.
what is happening ?

​

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Maybe that these portals have done some type of EXCLUSIVE deals with these laptop companies, to sell their custom laptops on their websites only.
 
The vivobook is the same model as the one on asus.in, just the part after the hyphen is different. If you check the compliance statements of that model, it says the parts after K3502 depend on marketing, and the region I guess.

But at the same time, you can find the exact Indian SKU on amazon if you navigate to it from where to buy on the Asus site, so I guess it's still a mystery as to why the US SKU is listed separately.

Does the laptop you received have the US or Indian SKU?
chetansha said:
has anyone noticed that Amazon sells laptops ( asus / dell ) that are not available with other portals, these laptops dont even come up on Manufacturer Indian websites ?
For example the asus vivobook i purchased www.amazon.in/gp/product/B0BSXD72X8 - i could not find it on asus.in . like wise one dell is also listed for sale - https://www.amazon.in/dp/B0C91QWF1X . comes with 1360P processor, whereas all other sellers have 1355u proccy. and this particular model is available overseas only.
what is happening ?

​

Click to expand...
 
chetansha said:
has anyone noticed that Amazon sells laptops ( asus / dell ) that are not available with other portals, these laptops dont even come up on Manufacturer Indian websites ?
For example the asus vivobook i purchased www.amazon.in/gp/product/B0BSXD72X8 - i could not find it on asus.in . like wise one dell is also listed for sale - https://www.amazon.in/dp/B0C91QWF1X . comes with 1360P processor, whereas all other sellers have 1355u proccy. and this particular model is available overseas only.
what is happening ?

​

Click to expand...
Even some of the gaming laptops are like that, especially the Dell branded ones.
 
calvin1719 said:
The vivobook is the same model as the one on asus.in, just the part after the hyphen is different. If you check the compliance statements of that model, it says the parts after K3502 depend on marketing, and the region I guess.

But at the same time, you can find the exact Indian SKU on amazon if you navigate to it from where to buy on the Asus site, so I guess it's still a mystery as to why the US SKU is listed separately.

Does the laptop you received have the US or Indian SKU?
Click to expand...
i havent yet recd the asus vivobook, the K3502ZA is common, and what is listed in asus in site is oled model, what I bought is non oled
 
chetansha said:
has anyone noticed that Amazon sells laptops ( asus / dell ) that are not available with other portals, these laptops dont even come up on Manufacturer Indian websites ?
For example the asus vivobook i purchased www.amazon.in/gp/product/B0BSXD72X8 - i could not find it on asus.in . like wise one dell is also listed for sale - https://www.amazon.in/dp/B0C91QWF1X . comes with 1360P processor, whereas all other sellers have 1355u proccy. and this particular model is available overseas only.
what is happening ?

​

Click to expand...
This isn't new. There are many such models and configurations which aren't officially listed on brand websites. As far as service and warranty is offered there's no need to worry.
 
nRiTeCh said:
There are many such models and configurations which aren't officially listed on brand websites.
Click to expand...
This is not as per my experience or expectation. Brand websites are supposed to be comprehensive and the source of truth. Before I buy anything at all I would check the brand website for the specifications and match them with those shown on Amazon or whatever store I'm buying from.
 
calvin1719 said:
This is not as per my experience or expectation. Brand websites are supposed to be comprehensive and the source of truth. Before I buy anything at all I would check the brand website for the specifications and match them with those shown on Amazon or whatever store I'm buying from.
Click to expand...
But we do not have an option nor emails or calls to the brand is going to improve the situation (have done that earlier)
They say as far as you have a proper purchase invoice warranty will be honored and that models keep getting updated o the website and not all models are listed
 
The laptop I bought had a longer delivery period. Pur on 16th july, original deliver dt wad aug 4 to 11th. Today I got update that it has been shipped and deliver expected on Thursday (26th july)
I guess they are imported after orders are booked or like that.
 
chetansha said:
The laptop I bought had a longer delivery period. Pur on 16th july, original deliver dt wad aug 4 to 11th. Today I got update that it has been shipped and deliver expected on Thursday (26th july)
I guess they are imported after orders are booked or like that.
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A bit offtopic,
I ordered a laptop from fk on 13th ,was supposed to ship on 20th and delivered up until 2aug.
But they changed shipping date to 26th,still waiting for it to ship.
The weird part is when i checked the product page on 22nd,it showed me delivery date of 26th.
Are they deliberately taking more time for my order,since it was bought on offers during sale?
 
This is generally expected. Large retailers expect custom sku's so that they don't have to worry about price matching. Even manufacturers are happy to do so because when their existing dealers complain they can say it's a different product.
 
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awestorr said:
The weird part is when i checked the product page on 22nd,it showed me delivery date of 26th.
Are they deliberately taking more time for my order,since it was bought on offers during sale?
Click to expand...
Unless it was some loot deal with at least 20-25% extra discount apart from usual sale discount then likely it is just typical glitch in inventory mgmt system.
 
I once had to pick a prolonged fight with Asus over my X200CA, because their inventory tracking simply didn't account for the various suffixes added for all the regional variants. Mine had a Celeron chip, but the support guys at Asus thought it was supposed to have a Pentium. Took me two months to get the right support.

For the companies that sell dozens of SKUs (often budget) that are being manufactured and assembled by a complicated collection of vendors, their inventory management and documentation is sometimes just... bad. I've bought cheap Acer machines for a research project where the manuals were both for a different model, and clearly just Google translated Mandarin, because they said things like "loosen the top flap with complete relaxation". Sometimes the SKUs sold in India were not initially intended for the region, and are overstock from a different region. Sometimes they don't even remember to swap the plug points before selling here.

Additionally, the reason these are often visible on Amazon and not the manufacturer's site is because the retailers with access to them can sometimes be bypassing the manufacturer when they acquire stock. Since Amazon is the largest aggregator of retailers, it makes sense they appear there and not elsewhere.

If you've ever shopped in a grey market clothing bazar, it can be somewhat similar. How did this seemingly authentic and unused University of Washington Huskies sweatshirt land up in Palika Bazar? Inventory got diverted either because of being an export reject or some more nefarious stuff, and things that were never meant to be sold in this country are being sold there.

Having talked to people in the tech distribution for mass market companies, there's a lot more chaos and lack of documentation than you would expect.
 
santhoshr said:
Oftopic but I noticed Samsung TVs also don't match both online and offline SKUs
Click to expand...
TVs are much more simpler in this sense. Almost all good TVs in India are imported so updating their info in a timely manner is not possible because nobody knows exactly how much time it will take for a shipment to reach company's warehouses in India after reaching the Indian shores & passing customs clearance. TV companies in India typically are also more lazy in this regard so they don't update their model SKU's as often.
 
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