Next big Amazon post Black Friday tech deal bonanza comes Dec. 12

Amazon began counting down to Black Friday 2016 with tons of tech deals in early November, and now that Black Friday (Nov. 25) and Cyber Monday (Nov. 28) have passed, the online retailer is still counting down. Now it's on to the Amazon 12 Days of Deals, playing off the 12 days of Christmas theme.

The 12 Days countdown began on Sunday, Dec. 4 with deals on toys and games, and Day 2, on Dec. 5, features deals on home entertainment and media offerings. As for future tech-related deals days, Day 4 on Dec. 7 features PC and video games, and Day 9, on Dec. 12, focuses on electronics and Amazon devices, such as Kindles, Fire tablets and Alexa voice-controlled products. Deals on pet supplies, cameras, crafts travel gear, sports equipment and more are featured on other days.

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Deals aren't revealed until the actual day they become available. For example, today, deals include AmazonBasics High-Speed HDMI cables (3-feet) for $4.89 and $80 off a Fire Tablet and Amazon Tap (portable Bluetooth speaker) Bundle (final price is $120 to $135). Some deals will only be up for short periods of time (a matter of hours) and only until supplies are exhausted.

Microsoft doing 12 Days of Deals, too

The Microsoft Store has kicked off its own 12 Days of Deals on Monday, Dec. 5, pledging savings of up to $1,000 on select Intel-powered PCs running Windows 10. Among the deals:

*$1,000 off an Alienware 15 Touch Signature Edition Gaming Laptop with 15.6-inch touchscreen, Intel i7 6th generation processor, 16GB of memory and 1TB of storage, with an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970M graphics card. Final price: $1,500.

*$350 off a Dell Inspiron 15 i5559 Signature Edition laptop (final price of $750) with 15.6-inch touchscreen, 8GB of memory and 1TB of storage.

*$250 of an HP Pavilion x360 Convertible 15-bk193ms Signature Edition 2 in 1 PC (final price $480). The machine has a 15.6-inch touchscreen, 8GB of memory and 1TB hard drive.

Cyber Monday 2?

This was a new one on me: A sequel to last week's Cyber Monday, now appearing on Dec. 5. Deal watchers BFAds.net and FatWallet have pointed out a handful of such tech deals, including:

* Samsung Galaxy Tab 4 7" 8GB White Tablet for $100 at Staples 

*Xbox One S 1TB Console Gears of War 4 Bundle $270 at eBay