Go to BestBuy.com and search for “Palm Pre” and here is what you get:

But that banner doesn’t LINK to anything let alone give us any indication of information like price and date. So why is it there? We know that Sprint and Palm are pretty good partners of BestBuy so it makes sense. But here is what REALLY gets us…

A few days ago the Palm Pre was rumored to be going on sale at BestBuy before anywhere else in the world which was considered a “trial” period of sorts where only 4,500 Pre phones would be sold in total. That rumor orginated at BGR and then was not only Shot Down by InsideSprintNow but vigourously contended as the masked blogger basically called the guy a complete idiot, but used more words to do so.

Check out a chunk of the “debunking”:

So let’s take the post as it was stated:

“according to our ninja, Best Buy will be getting its hands on a limited inventory of Pre handsets for a trial launch on June 7th. Sprint will be direct-shipping the lot to arrive on the 6th and in total, about 4,500 units will be spread throughout Best Buy Mobile locations across the country. That might not seem like a lot, well, because it isn’t, but each and every Best Buy Mobile will be getting at least one Pre to hawk.”

Wow. I’m not sure where to even begin on this one – let’s start by saying that any release this big certainly isn’t going to be done with anyone ‘partnered’ in, other than Sprint and Palm. Sprint has thousands of stores across the country that are perfectly capable of launching  a device – where we not only can tightly control the inventory pre-launch, but where we can also make money on the accessory sales in-store on launch day. To even think that we would miss out on that opportunity and turn it over to a ‘partner’ is simply crazy. Does this person know how huge accessory sales are for a Sprint retail store? Also – Each BB Mobile guaranteed to have at least 1 device? C’mon – I don’t care how bad I wanted the Pre, I would not get out of bed for that, because you KNOW that an employee of BB would have it purchased before the doors opened. Flunk.

“Speaking of hawking, our ninja has some numbers to report as well. Pricing is supposedly still being discussed but the probable points are as follows: New customers with a 2-year contract, $199.99. Existing customer upgrades, $299.99. Outright, $999.99. Yes, seriously.”

Seriously? I don’t think so. Flunk, again. $999 price point?  Put Simply, no. Not in any combination will you find the $999 price point to be valid, contract or not. As to the upgrades for existing customers? Have you -ever- seen a single price point for an upgrade price? The answer is no, because the system is simply not set up like this. The existing customer price will be the standard $75 off for 10+ months into agreement, $150 off for 22+ months, and the full $150 off + any rebates for those that qualify and have have the same device for 24+ months, which is essentially new customer pricing. Premier & White Glove customers also qualify for essentially new customer pricing at the 12 month mark, just as with any other device. To hint that there would be a single price point for any customer that wanted to upgrade is simply incorrect, and anyone as familiar with Sprint as BGR should be, knows that the system just isn’t set up to allow for that.

So where does this latest Pre banner fit into the BGR vs. ISN spat fit in? Hmmmmm…