Imagine you're at some high-profile collector-car auction. You fall for some rare hottie on the block, but don't have enough data stored in the ol' meat computer to make an educated bid. Now imagine you had access to reams of information on other cars like it that sold at auction — the auction company that offered it, the location and date of the sale, odometer reading, condition rating, and whether or not it sold, plus a condition description, market opinion and current market value. (Sweet mother. That's like being Rain Man in Vegas. Yeah, counting cards, yeah.) Actually, it's a new service from Sports Car Market, a search tool for e-mail-equipped Treo and Blackberry handheld devices that allows car-auction bidders to research vehicles on the spot. Bidders can send an e-mail to "search@scmgold.com," including the car's YEAR, MAKE, and MODEL in the subject line. (The search term "help" will reply with detailed instructions.) SCM is offering its SCMSearch service free throughout January — just in time for the big Barrett-Jackson event next week. After that, it'll be a premium service. Go to Sports Car Market for more info.

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Barrett-Jackson to Auction 001 Cars [internal]

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