Electronic hobbiest's black hole

[Geek]

Hehehe, you're welcome!

Good thing for your card, I didn't post more from my "favorite sellers" list.

[impsick]

Originally posted by SY
Here I am, living near the high tech capitol of the world, and I have to spend this morning driving nearly two hours each way to buy some resistors and perf board. Radio Shack is useless- the ones around here have nearly zero parts in stock, they really only sell cell phones and batteries- and the independent electronics shops have all gone belly up.

Electronics construction is a rapidly dying avocation.

ha ha thats funny radio shack does seem to specialize in cell phones and batteries. Luckily out here if you ask for some perf board they wont have a clue what your talking about but manage to pull some out of the back. I've noticed some Shacks actually have a designated section for diy and others dont.

[astouffer]

Pittsburgh is just as bad. Theres one store for electronics parts and it just recently moved across town. Sure theres radio shack but I'm not paying 2 bucks for a 50 cent LM317. You think this crumbling city of old folks would have lots of surplus or salvage yards but keep thinking...

[davesaudio]

Dude- one word
DIGIKEY

order the parts in the early afternoon
get them the next morning

[davesaudio]

My great sadness is that Glitchbuster is closing his doors.
Randy would ship small orders to Canada for under $3.00

[thomas997]

Originally posted by davesaudio
Dude- one word
DIGIKEY

order the parts in the early afternoon
get them the next morning

They are great for a medium sized project, but if your looking for a handful of parts its not really worth it.

"A $6.50 handling charge is added to your order if the subtotal is less than $32.50." +$8 flat rate shipping.

edit: www.dipmicro.com (good site check it out), used to offer a digikey group buy service. But it would only run once a week. I suspect it was too much effort with too little profit to keep it going (only a 10% handling fee, and shipping was basically at cost).

[dangus]

Originally posted by roddyama
What you need is a trip to Japan.

Ahkihabara is the cure for what ails you.

I was kind of disappointed with Akiba. I visited a bunch of electronics parts places, but saw very little in the way of digital audio bits, and what there was cost more than from Digikey. It's still a mind-blowing place to wander around. And the Akiba Maid Deli was cool.

Digikey's shipping charge isn't nothing, but it isn't that much more than I can spend on gas driving around town for an afternoon. And you don't get stuck with brokerage charges from UP$ or the $5 handling fee from the post office.

[thomas997]

Originally posted by dangus
Digikey's shipping charge isn't nothing, but it isn't that much more than I can spend on gas driving around town for an afternoon. And you don't get stuck with brokerage charges from UP$ or the $5 handling fee from the post office.

Digikey ships purolator and any duties/taxes are included in the price on the website (just make sure you click the canadian flag).

UPS I agree is horrible, but I have never had any issues with digikey and paying any additional fees.

[Puffin]

I went into Maplin in Hammersmith last Sunday. There was a guy who wanted a replacement resistor. Two goons behind the "specialist Components" desk said "the chap who knows about resistors only works during the week".

I took hold of the resistor, opened the catalogue and read off the value from the page.

Beggars belief really.

Maplin are a waste of time now. I think they have even stopped stocking any toroidal transformers now. Rapid do them at a good price though.

[Sonusthree]

Originally posted by Puffin
Maplin are a waste of time now. I think they have even stopped stocking any toroidal transformers now. Rapid do them at a good price though.

I always really enjoy looking up products on their website only to find that they they don't stock them in any stores except Croydon!!
Maplin gets a bad press, not least because they are quite expensive but who else sells what we need on the high street? I fear that they may go the same way as Radio Shack (Tandy).

Martin.