Me too. I go 3-4 times a year. They have a couple things worth buying in a pinch. I'm using their "silver bearing" solder. I have a few of their resistor assortments, which are handy. (I usually use Vishay-Dale CMF series resistors in my builds, but I use RS resistors in prototypes if I can get away with it.)
The store by my house (Evanston, Il) is practically on the campus of Northwestern University. It never closed, and is almost always filled with smart and interesting people. Most of the employees I've encountered were very smart and enthusiastic, with one notable exception.
I remember in my youth it was a real store for hobbyists. It's a mess now, but at least they still sell some electronic components. But most of the store is junk, at ridiculous markups.
Edit - their proto boards are great! I try to keep 3-4 of each type handy at all times.
I "moonlighted" at a Tandy in Brussels Belgium from sometime in late 1973 to sometime in 1975 doing repairs and helping English speaking customers. The manager and his boss liked me and made sure I was well taken care of. (I got paid by the customers for repairs and got lots of goodies for helping out.)
Anyway the reason Radio Shack was known as Tandy in some overseas markets was because the UK firm Radio Spares owned a very similar RS trademark in those markets and would not permit Radio Shack to operate under that name in those markets.
I just put new batteries in our doorbell, which I fitted when we moved in 1988. The ones I took out were Tandy brand! 29 year battery's? I'm not surprised they're going down🙂
Their alkaline batteries were actually pretty good, and growing up overseas in general their batteries seemed rather better than the indigenous brands except perhaps unsurprisingly for Varta which also made some rather good batteries. (and some to be fair that weren't)
It was a big enough difference that I used to bring batteries back with me when I visited the U.S.
It was a big enough difference that I used to bring batteries back with me when I visited the U.S.
It is a bit ironic, I guess, that their response to slowing diy sales was to turn into cell phone stores right about the time that all the high priced "maker kits" were starting to become popular with kids. Back when we were kids those were cheap project kits but you call it a Maker Kit and you can charge more.
I just saw the big 50% clearance sale on their website. I need to go shopping tomorrow - no RCA to F connectors, but I do need some momentary push button switches.
Despite all the nostalgia, was their stuff ever really any good? The stereo components were always junky, the DIY electronic parts were generally the cheapest they could find and never cheap. Maybe the antennas were OK. Sure, I shopped there a lot, but it was never a first choice.
Despite all the nostalgia, was their stuff ever really any good? The stereo components were always junky, the DIY electronic parts were generally the cheapest they could find and never cheap. Maybe the antennas were OK. Sure, I shopped there a lot, but it was never a first choice.
Was called Tandy here, and was generally junk, people shopped there through lack of alternatives
Yes, basically. 🙂
I shopped Tandy when I lived in London and Paris. It was convenient, that was the big deciding factor.
I shopped Tandy when I lived in London and Paris. It was convenient, that was the big deciding factor.
Seems like Radio Shack was pretty hit-or-miss (mostly miss?) with their products. They had a few notable successes, like the TRS-80. I enjoyed their little Minimus-7 speakers; at one point I owned 8 of them, 4 in each vehicle. And then there was the occasional left-field stuff: Anyone remember this bit of silliness?
Didn't the TRS-80 have a cassette tape memory storage system?
I also had the Minimus 7 speakers...probably in speaker-heaven right now.
More recently, RS had Parallax MCU's, Arduinos etc.
I also had the Minimus 7 speakers...probably in speaker-heaven right now.
More recently, RS had Parallax MCU's, Arduinos etc.
Mine did. Some people I knew had a floppy disk drive, but I don't remember if it was a real Radio Shack product. Several of us built our own systems, or started with the most basic model and built on to it.
Mine......lets just say that I haven't killed them yet.
And a sales kid that didn't have a clue what they even were.
The Radio Shack across the street from the Motorola plant where I worked had a 30 something working there during the weekdays. He knew what he was doing and could find just about any part we needed. You need a 74HCT244 in SOIC, if he didn't have it in stock, he would have it the next afternoon. Unfortunately, his job and the whole store died with the Motorola plant, as did several of the good fast food places....and the liquor store!
The store here in West Virginia had few parts and nobody that could sell anything other than a cell phone or a car stereo. They did have Arduinos and some other tech toys, but nobody in the store knew what any of it was.
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There's a MicroCenter Store in Mayfield Hts., OH and they have a lot of microprocessor goodies, 3D printing mono-filament etc. The staff is incredible. Prices are very competitive too.
You walk in the store and you think you're in a sit-com. It's like "ham-landia" all over again.
They would do well to sell deodorant and pass out lit on personal grooming and hygiene, however.
Those catalogs are great!
So much time spent building the dream system at age 9 or so 10.
If I'd only known then how much nicer my dads old tube amps and Jensen open baffle speakers were than any of it...
The 8 ohm car systems were my favorite, even back then I knew better.
So much time spent building the dream system at age 9 or so 10.
If I'd only known then how much nicer my dads old tube amps and Jensen open baffle speakers were than any of it...
The 8 ohm car systems were my favorite, even back then I knew better.
My TRS80 model 3 had 5" floppy drives. It came with up to two of them in its main case with the CRT, but I really needed three, so I had an outboard floppy as well. With only 48k of RAM, it needed a data disk, a work disk, and a program disk unless you wanted to answer disc swap prompts all teh time.
The model 2 was the "business" computer and had 8" floppies.
They also had the CoCO - COlor COmputer - which we used in our pizza/arcade operations to put colorful blinking numbers up on displays so folks knew when their orders were up.
The model 2 was the "business" computer and had 8" floppies.
They also had the CoCO - COlor COmputer - which we used in our pizza/arcade operations to put colorful blinking numbers up on displays so folks knew when their orders were up.
I remember that Tandy shop downtown Brussels in the mid '70s. I used to go there as a kid to look at components
though their plastic blister packages just to get the feel of components I would only read about in DIY magazines.
But they were much too expensive for me at the time. Then I would actually buy them much cheaper at 'Cotubex' a
different shop at the other end of town. Cotubex personnel would serve mostly professionals over the counter and
would humiliate kids buying BC107's and 2N3055's by the unit. I hated them. Unfortunately, unlike Tandy RS, they
still exist somewhere in Brussels...
Never been to a Micro Center. The Cleveland area is a long ride for us. The closest I have come is Akron to pick out flooring for the house. I'll add it to my list of places to see if we ever get there. There is a flea market in Hartville that Sherri liked, and a good one in Rogers. Maybe summertime.
In Florida we have had computer stores come and go, some small and some national chains....Anyone remember the Byte Shop. I bought my SWTPC 6800 computer at the Miami Byte Shop in 1975. They also had an Apple 1, but couldn't get it to work when I was there. They are uber collectible today.
Ever been to a hamfest or computer show?
The computer show thing seemed to have died out but it was big in the 80's and 90's since it was much cheaper to build your own "PC clone" than to buy one. The computer shows and ham radio shows seem to attract a similar crowd....with a 20 to 30 year age difference.
Back in the early 90's Radio Shack tried to get into the "build your own PC" market with retail stores called Computer City. They lasted a few years and died......I collected lots of goodies, cheap when the local store folded.
They also tried a Best Buy type of operation called the Incredible Universe. Lots of flash, same clueless sales staff, died young. No good deals to be found at the going out of business sale.
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