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Adafruit buys most of their jellybean parts off of Alibaba and resells it. You are paying extra for them to stock this stuff in the US (NYC in particular). Real
by blackguardx 10y ago
Adafruit buys most of their jellybean parts off of Alibaba and resells it. You are paying extra for them to stock this stuff in the US (NYC in particular). Real distributors like Digikey and Mouser have better deals because you can get name-brand stuff for the same price as the Alibaba stuff from Adafruit. By jellybean parts, I am mainly talking about pin headers and such. Most of the dev boards Adafruit offers are unique to them.
- HeyLaughingBoy 10y agoI agree about the Adafruit, etc. buying jellybean parts from Alibaba, but Digikey's prices being close? No. At least not in smaller volume. I can buy Arduinos on AliExpress (qty 10 or so) for less than I could purchase even just the AVR chips alone. If a part is critical, I'll buy a known, characterized, device made by a reputable manufacturer from a reputable supplier. (I don't expect that an Omron 50A relay on Alibaba for $5 is real) But for generic LEDs, non-critical switches & connectors, it's Alibaba/Aliexpress all the way.
- seanp2k2 10y agoI see it as I'm also paying for their time and expertise in selling me a thing that won't malfunction in ways which might take me hours to troubleshoot. I also like what they do and their contributions to the community, and me buying a esp8366 through them with good-quality docs, tutorials, and working examples is worth the extra few dollars for my personal enjoyment of my hobby. I also can't feel good supporting fakes / copies and China's mistreatment of the environment for profit.