Regarding not buying books, I have a technical major and know some of the books would be useful in the future as reference. I continue to use a few of my 30+ year old books from the first time around on rare occasion.

They just redid their website and added support to either include or exclude international editions, which is a big deal.

Also, they allow you to choose your own ship time, then they calculate the lowest possible total price using the shipping method from all stores which gets the book there on time.

Pretty neat! [www.bigwords.com]

eons ago i attended a community college.....i found that it was not a good idea to buy last semesters books...it seems like each new semester the instructors were using a new text....the price of these books was outta site back then....there was no on line anything to go to, cause there was no on line period....at least now students have a chanch to save a couple of bucks.....

PS-I also worked at my school's bookstore as a loss prevention associate for 3 years, and this practice is completely legal.

I have used Amazon Marketplace for the last 3 years, and have only been ripped off by one seller once - it really was a deal too good to be true. Amazon refunded the price of the product and s&h within a week of my complaint. That kind of peace of mind is worth it.

Another resource is froogle.com, google's product search. Abebooks.com's products up on there, so does half.com's and textbookx.com's.

I had a horrible time with half.com. My book has still yet to arrive after a year of waiting and the payment sent. They never offered to fix the prblem after a complaint was sent to them. They lost a customer for life.

Ahh, brings up memories of going to a college where you couldn't buy them from outside sources because they had been out of print for 15 years.

You might not actually need to buy the books at all. I've had a number of classes (the majority, actually) where the "required textbooks" were never used, nor were useful for the course itself. I usually waited until after the first week to see if the books were indeed needed for the class.

Regarding the cable TV comment -- who doesn't have free time in college? If you're running out of time and aren't working full-time + college, look for a more efficient way to study. Sure, there's tons of busy-work in colleges today, but learning a few shortcuts and better study methods will save you far more time.

So generally, if you're planning on spending more than about $150 in Amtrak or Greyhound, the card is worth it. I know it saved me a lot of money during the course of my studies.

I've tried those sites and actually spent Saturday looking through several of those sites, but I wasn't getting anything really good. The best deals for the two books I need this semester, as with last Spring, were at eBay and Amazon.

I have utterly given up on buying books. Unless I need the books for homework questions (and sometimes not even then), no books for me! Even then I'll split it with someone else AND buy used.

The last two books I bought (in the last two semesters) were ones that had a SINGLE USE keycode for online homework; that is, you have to buy it new. That's the real scam, especially when you have to buy a set of three books to get the one keycode. 15 digits: $110. Instant, unavoidable monopoly: priceless.

At least some of my b-school teachers have now realized that by printing their own material they can save their class of 300 students $45,000.

For GERs, I typically was able to find the book for cheap from another student who wasn't happy with what the bookstore offered, and didn't want to deal with the hassle of selling online.

My favorite way around textbook prices is to take classes with friends: in addition to being able to coordinate absences (I mean, long-standing obligations...), we'd split the cost of the text if it was VERY necessary. I had one marketing class (ugh) where the USED copies were $80+! Three of us went in together, and about half the class shared one access code for the online supplements, from which the professor pulled many test questions verbatim.

It's a contest to see who can spend the least on textbooks. Engineering students always lose.

It's usually pretty easy to get a good deal at least that way I know someone deserving is getting my hard-earned dollars...

A word of warning for Amazon, ebay, craigslist, or any other site that involves an individual seller who may be selling just a few books for the first time. That individual may be an idiot who can't tell which edition a book is (my classmate was sent a 3rd rather than a 5th ed.) or it may be an outright scam. Anyone can show a photo clip of a later edition with their ad and then mail you something else.

The textbook industry is such a scam.

That's how it's really done!

Keep in mind that discount books are often the international version and may not be exactly like the one used by the rest of the class. This is usually not a problem unless the instructor assigns a lot of homework problems.

For all the returning students that have bookstores that don't release ISBNs (have to go to the store to find them), just email your TA or professor. I can usually get all my books by the end of August without ever waiting in the bookstore lines.

Make sure to ask your friends to borrow their old books too. By far the cheapest route.

Always make sure to check out what options your school has locally. I go to the Uuniversity of Illinois, and our student senate sponsors www.illinibookexchange.com, which is kind of like a Craig's List for textbooks only. What's more, they tie it into the actual bookstore book listings, so any book that is the same ISBN as an instructors' ordered text is listed as "IBX Certified". It works well because its' all person-to-person exchanging, so buyer and seller always meet in person.

I'm really looking forward to paying off that part of my student loans.

Or you can be REALLY frugal and rent the books from local libraries. I'm a poli-sci/history major and I can find 95% of my books at local libraries. If you are a member of one, typically you can have reciprical borrowing privilages at many other local libraries.

While most of the half.com comments on them were positive, there was a pattern with the negative comments, many, many of them (at that time) referring to the company not responding to problems.

I've had many other opportunities to buy from Abe Books but refuse to and will not deal with them in the future.