Spiky - Prices have been going up on these lately. Probably a lot going under the Christmas tree this year. I just checked surfremote.com and they are $95 shipped. With some people every penny counts and its also a good point that these have a very low failure rate.
And if I want to be really skepitcal, I see that surf remote says that they get new shipments from URC every week. So are they like Dunkin Donuts and they throw out any that they do not sell? You could still buy one from 3 months ago.
And being in the computer business I can tell you that having an updated product is not always the best thing either. The latest version of ITUNES on windowsXp is a nightmare from what I have been hearing.
All in all, I understand the point. If I did it over again, I'm not sure which way I would go. But for larger purchases, I will definitely check with the manufacturer to check the terms of the warranty.