7 ms·

I’m not surprised, but this makes me feel incredibly sad. I built my first PC using parts from there. I’m going to miss it. But once Fry’s pivoted to be a cons

I’m not surprised, but this makes me feel incredibly sad. I built my first PC using parts from there. I’m going to miss it. But once Fry’s pivoted to be a consignment store that was mostly empty and selling pallets of bottled water and perfume, it was obvious the business was about to die. Curiously, Microcenter has managed to live on and seems fairly robust. I can’t help but think Fry’s tried to sell too many different products and had a massive amount of floorspace to keep up. Whereas my local Microcenter just sticks to electronics and the store is much smaller and feels cramped in comparison.

geocrasher 6y ago
The only time I've ever been into a Fry's (due to not living near one) was around 2010 in the Sacramento CA area. It was so huge that I genuinely got dizzy and had to work hard to focus to see individual items (It's a thing that happens to me when there is a lot of "input" for lack of a better term). I suspect that the cavernous real estate (and its cost) only hastened their demise.
- BuyMyBitcoins 6y ago
  Cavernous is such an apt description. Fry’s uses giant warehouse sized buildings and even the distance in between racks and aisles is wide. I also remember the checkout lines having dozens of empty checkout stations that I never saw used. I always assumed they were there for Black Friday or something.
  - mc32 6y ago
    >Cavernous Apropos, didn't the one in Sunnyvale become an REI?
    - bigmattystyles 6y ago
      Sports Basement - they kept the enter key on the door though. To be fair when Fry's left that building, it's because they built a bigger one down the street, the one with the sinc function as a logo. It was a glorious experience in the 90s.
      - mc32 6y ago
        > they kept the enter key on the door though That's a nice touch/nod! Thanks for the correction, yeah SportsBasement. I went mostly to the one off Portage.
        unsatchmo 6y ago
        I distinctly recall that location is where we bought the legend of Zelda back in the 80’s when it first came out. Gonna miss fry’s.
  - bnjms 6y ago
    They were from back in the day when Fry’s would hire extra people for the holidays and staff nearly every register. Also back then stores would fill space with extra registers. I was nostalgic and sad when I saw they had removed half their local registers. They had (bought) one of the earliest web retail stores. They ought to have become New Egg with a mini Best Buy and RadioShack for locals. But that’s hindsight and I couldn’t have done it.
- abc_lisper 6y ago
  Hey, I have the same issue. I get dizzy inside malls too
  - geocrasher 6y ago
    Thanks for commenting! I appreciate knowing I'm not alone in this. It's very unnerving when it happens. I pride myself in being spatially oriented, and when I get into huge spaces with lots of distractions, my brain does weird things.
    - wishinghand 6y ago
      Happens to me at Comic con, but not concerts before the band goes on. Not sure what triggers it. I’ve been to busy cities with lots of neon too.
- m463 6y ago
  I think they owned their real estate (although there were probably taxes)
- ridgeguy 6y ago
  My one memory of the Sacramento Fry's is buying a 5 lb GummiBear to prank a friend. Not 5 lbs of GummiBears, a single 5 lb GummiBear. Sorry to see the stores close.
- tanseydavid 6y ago
  Going to Fry's without a VERY specific shopping list was always dangerous for me. I could blow 3 hours in a Fry's just browsing and barely notice the time that had passed.
  - OkGoDoIt 6y ago
    That’s exactly why I used to love Fry’s. Some kids went to malls, I guess. Fry’s was my mall.
  - tornato7 6y ago
    I was in Bangkok and at one of the largest electronics stores in Southeast Asia, that place put Fry's to shame. I think I spent an entire day in there.
mc32 6y ago
Central Computer is still kicking around -for now. This is all changing. It's not the same. You used to have a bunch of grey market PC parts distributors all over the east bay (uProcessor, add on Cards, RAM, HDD, etc) that used to sell to beige box PC makers (and individuals) but they went the way of the dodo too (ASI is legit distributor now). Also, remember WeirdStuff? Gone too. It's a mature industry and the biz has gone largely to Amazon and NewEgg with some at BestBuy (regular people) and to large distributors like Ingram for larger players that can't buy direct from MFG or huge players who build their own. SARS-CoV2 might have hastened their demise, but it was coming none the less. PS. The sandwiches + a bag of chips/crisps & drink were not bad at all. Maybe it's nostalgia.
- noncoml 6y ago
  > Central Computer is still kicking around -for now. I used to be a big fun of them. But their markup + must be a bundle, buy 3 more items rule for RTX30x0 cards, really put me off.
  - ethbr0 6y ago
    GPUs were always the dumbest possible products for brick and mortar. Extremely limited customer base, fast tech iteration cycle, and inflexible margins.
    - mc32 6y ago
      CPUs and RAM used to go up and down weekly at least in the grey market "distributor" segment. Fry's and Central, etc, had enough markup they didn't have to worry too much about that. Also, I think Central and other smaller ones were more JIT for low margin products with unstable pricing (they'd have daily deliveries from their grey market distributors). But surprisingly, GPUs hold their value these days.
      - ethbr0 6y ago
        True! It's effectively come full circle. Although a ton of that seems like increased "industrial" (mining, render, etc) use of chips + retail segmentation + supply limits.
chris11 6y ago
I really liked Fry's years ago. It was depressing to see inventory go down so quickly last couple years. I would like a local Microcenter. Their prices are decent and they have good motherboard/cpu combos.
- BoorishBears 6y ago
  Semi-off topic but Microcenter needs to fix their online presence. I have five Microcenters within an hour of me, the closest is practically walking distance, yet I was so turned off by the few times I've tried to use their online services I essentially boycotted them. The first time was using their site for pickup during the pandemic... then not being told until I reached the store that this wasn't curbside/contactless pickup like every other electronics store in the state was doing: you were simply having them being your item to the front, and you would then have to wait upwards of an hour to get into the store and check out manually. (Kind of defeats the 5 minutes you save over picking it up yourself and any possible safety benefit for you and their employees) - The second time was trying to built my new gaming PC a few months back. I specifically wanted to buy from Microcenter to support a brick and mortar store... I added thousands of dollars of parts to my cart, went to checkout and it wouldn't let me. It declined my card despite no fraud alerts, confirmed billing address, etc. After two tries it cleared my entire cart. Go through my history, re-add everything, and it fails to checkout again and again until my cart is cleared again and I give up and go to Newegg. When I brought it up people said this was common, and the fix was to use another card because sometimes it randomly wouldn't accept certain types (!) - I get Microcenter is "physically-oriented" but I don't get how long they can stay relevant with their abysmal online presence. You shouldn't be losing sales because of a crusty checkout flow in 2021...
  - TimTheTinker 6y ago
    might be a legitimate complaint but I think it’s off topic in this thread.
Melting_Harps 6y ago
> I’m not surprised, but this makes me feel incredibly sad. I built my first PC using parts from there. I’m going to miss it. Same, the last one I stepped foot in was in 2018 at the one near the Tesla factory in Fremont after my interview, and it looked absolutely dead. I thought with so many tech nerds in that town you'd be bound to see a bunch guys getting together after work and just buying up carts of stuff of the shelves and working on a side project. But, nope... it was like 20 people max and it was actually really sad to me as years before I went to the ones in Orange County and we had lines out the door on certain days. Well, COVID claims another retailer and thus the brick and mortar get another nail in it's coffin.
- giantrobot 6y ago
  Fry's has been a dead company walking for a while. They went to their consignment model in 2019 before the holiday shopping season. I remember summer of 2019 there were fire sale prices all over the store. By late 2019 and into 2020 their shelves were empty or "stocked" with filler items. Even without COVID there hasn't been a reason to step into one of their stores for over a year.
- ergergwerga 6y ago
  "covid" didn't claim shit - the fucking piece of shit hair jell nazi from sacramento did
ocdtrekkie 6y ago
What mystified me was how they thought the consignment shift would pan out, and didn't immediately reverse course when it didn't: Fry's was always heavily trafficked with people purchasing there every time I was there prior to the consignment shift.
- Stratoscope 6y ago
  The consignment model was because they didn't have any money to pay suppliers for merchandise. So it was something of a choice between having nearly empty shelves and completely empty shelves.
joshcain 6y ago
"I’m not surprised, but this makes me feel incredibly sad. I built my first PC using parts from there. I’m going to miss it." Yeah, same here. I'm not sure if the first PC I built was from Fry's parts but the second+ definitely were. I used to love going there in the late 90s-early 2000s – they put a lot of effort into demo areas/displays back then and the selection was unbeatable, especially for components and things that Best Buy wouldn't (and doesn't) even bother with. I get that paying retail rents to stock $2 patch cables doesn't work these days but I will miss it.
wishysgb 6y ago
I hope microcenter doesn't go the same route as fry's. they need to keep the knowledgeable staff, I think they need to up their game in staff to be honest. also they need to update their fing stock more often and more accurately. also as much as it pains me to have to travel 40 mins to get to one, a limited number of locations is key, it helps reduce costs down.
joncrane 6y ago
I was pleasantly surprised by Microcenter in November of last year. I was looking for a laptop and apparently Microcenter has a house brand called Powerspec. It turns out they are a very user-focused brand that a) has no bloatware preinstalled and b) has high performance and every single port you could possibly want. When I went, there was a little bit of hovering but overall the staff were nice. Protip: whenever you shop there, even if no one helped you, choose an employee and let them put their sticker on the merchandise you are buying. They track who helped which customer by a sticker the staff can put on your item. If you like to be left alone to shop, find an employee who left you alone on your way to the registers!
- meepmorp 6y ago
  I was in a Microcenter over the holidays, and was pleasantly surprised by the variety of things they stock. And the pricing was unexpectedly, for me at least, the same as or better than NewEgg on the items I checked. Best of all, they weren't pushy and hostile when I refused to give my phone number, a pleasant change from years back.
- theschmed 6y ago
  Huh. I’m not sure about PowerSpec but they do have an in-house laptop and tablet brand: “WinBook”. I’ve owned 2 and had challenges with both. Most recently: - Touchscreen driver wouldn’t shut off when lid closed - Inadequate cooling leading to overheating - The worst touchpad I’ve ever had the displeasure to use I really do love MicroCenter, I built a gaming PC there myself, but I recommend using the known brands when it comes to systems.
- nickthegreek 6y ago
  I'm on a powerspec right now. I couldn't build this PC with the same parts this cheap and it comes with a windows license and as you stated, no bloatware. They are fantastic little machines.
- nerdwaller 6y ago
  I’ve always enjoyed micro center, other than a few of the employees trying to force their stickers on stuff. Similarly I’ll find someone I like to load up my items. I’ve found they often have the best prices, even beating online retailers. At least on mobo/cpu combos.

geocrasher 6y ago

The only time I've ever been into a Fry's (due to not living near one) was around 2010 in the Sacramento CA area. It was so huge that I genuinely got dizzy and had to work hard to focus to see individual items (It's a thing that happens to me when there is a lot of "input" for lack of a better term). I suspect that the cavernous real estate (and its cost) only hastened their demise.

BuyMyBitcoins 6y ago
Cavernous is such an apt description. Fry’s uses giant warehouse sized buildings and even the distance in between racks and aisles is wide. I also remember the checkout lines having dozens of empty checkout stations that I never saw used. I always assumed they were there for Black Friday or something.
- mc32 6y ago
  >Cavernous Apropos, didn't the one in Sunnyvale become an REI?
  - bigmattystyles 6y ago
    Sports Basement - they kept the enter key on the door though. To be fair when Fry's left that building, it's because they built a bigger one down the street, the one with the sinc function as a logo. It was a glorious experience in the 90s.
    - mc32 6y ago
      > they kept the enter key on the door though That's a nice touch/nod! Thanks for the correction, yeah SportsBasement. I went mostly to the one off Portage.
      - unsatchmo 6y ago
        I distinctly recall that location is where we bought the legend of Zelda back in the 80’s when it first came out. Gonna miss fry’s.
- bnjms 6y ago
  They were from back in the day when Fry’s would hire extra people for the holidays and staff nearly every register. Also back then stores would fill space with extra registers. I was nostalgic and sad when I saw they had removed half their local registers. They had (bought) one of the earliest web retail stores. They ought to have become New Egg with a mini Best Buy and RadioShack for locals. But that’s hindsight and I couldn’t have done it.
abc_lisper 6y ago
Hey, I have the same issue. I get dizzy inside malls too
- geocrasher 6y ago
  Thanks for commenting! I appreciate knowing I'm not alone in this. It's very unnerving when it happens. I pride myself in being spatially oriented, and when I get into huge spaces with lots of distractions, my brain does weird things.
  - wishinghand 6y ago
    Happens to me at Comic con, but not concerts before the band goes on. Not sure what triggers it. I’ve been to busy cities with lots of neon too.
m463 6y ago
I think they owned their real estate (although there were probably taxes)
ridgeguy 6y ago
My one memory of the Sacramento Fry's is buying a 5 lb GummiBear to prank a friend. Not 5 lbs of GummiBears, a single 5 lb GummiBear. Sorry to see the stores close.
tanseydavid 6y ago
Going to Fry's without a VERY specific shopping list was always dangerous for me. I could blow 3 hours in a Fry's just browsing and barely notice the time that had passed.
- OkGoDoIt 6y ago
  That’s exactly why I used to love Fry’s. Some kids went to malls, I guess. Fry’s was my mall.
- tornato7 6y ago
  I was in Bangkok and at one of the largest electronics stores in Southeast Asia, that place put Fry's to shame. I think I spent an entire day in there.

mc32 6y ago

Central Computer is still kicking around -for now. This is all changing. It's not the same. You used to have a bunch of grey market PC parts distributors all over the east bay (uProcessor, add on Cards, RAM, HDD, etc) that used to sell to beige box PC makers (and individuals) but they went the way of the dodo too (ASI is legit distributor now). Also, remember WeirdStuff? Gone too. It's a mature industry and the biz has gone largely to Amazon and NewEgg with some at BestBuy (regular people) and to large distributors like Ingram for larger players that can't buy direct from MFG or huge players who build their own. SARS-CoV2 might have hastened their demise, but it was coming none the less. PS. The sandwiches + a bag of chips/crisps & drink were not bad at all. Maybe it's nostalgia.

noncoml 6y ago
> Central Computer is still kicking around -for now. I used to be a big fun of them. But their markup + must be a bundle, buy 3 more items rule for RTX30x0 cards, really put me off.
- ethbr0 6y ago
  GPUs were always the dumbest possible products for brick and mortar. Extremely limited customer base, fast tech iteration cycle, and inflexible margins.
  - mc32 6y ago
    CPUs and RAM used to go up and down weekly at least in the grey market "distributor" segment. Fry's and Central, etc, had enough markup they didn't have to worry too much about that. Also, I think Central and other smaller ones were more JIT for low margin products with unstable pricing (they'd have daily deliveries from their grey market distributors). But surprisingly, GPUs hold their value these days.
    - ethbr0 6y ago
      True! It's effectively come full circle. Although a ton of that seems like increased "industrial" (mining, render, etc) use of chips + retail segmentation + supply limits.

chris11 6y ago

I really liked Fry's years ago. It was depressing to see inventory go down so quickly last couple years. I would like a local Microcenter. Their prices are decent and they have good motherboard/cpu combos.

BoorishBears 6y ago
Semi-off topic but Microcenter needs to fix their online presence. I have five Microcenters within an hour of me, the closest is practically walking distance, yet I was so turned off by the few times I've tried to use their online services I essentially boycotted them. The first time was using their site for pickup during the pandemic... then not being told until I reached the store that this wasn't curbside/contactless pickup like every other electronics store in the state was doing: you were simply having them being your item to the front, and you would then have to wait upwards of an hour to get into the store and check out manually. (Kind of defeats the 5 minutes you save over picking it up yourself and any possible safety benefit for you and their employees) - The second time was trying to built my new gaming PC a few months back. I specifically wanted to buy from Microcenter to support a brick and mortar store... I added thousands of dollars of parts to my cart, went to checkout and it wouldn't let me. It declined my card despite no fraud alerts, confirmed billing address, etc. After two tries it cleared my entire cart. Go through my history, re-add everything, and it fails to checkout again and again until my cart is cleared again and I give up and go to Newegg. When I brought it up people said this was common, and the fix was to use another card because sometimes it randomly wouldn't accept certain types (!) - I get Microcenter is "physically-oriented" but I don't get how long they can stay relevant with their abysmal online presence. You shouldn't be losing sales because of a crusty checkout flow in 2021...
- TimTheTinker 6y ago
  might be a legitimate complaint but I think it’s off topic in this thread.

Melting_Harps 6y ago

> I’m not surprised, but this makes me feel incredibly sad. I built my first PC using parts from there. I’m going to miss it. Same, the last one I stepped foot in was in 2018 at the one near the Tesla factory in Fremont after my interview, and it looked absolutely dead. I thought with so many tech nerds in that town you'd be bound to see a bunch guys getting together after work and just buying up carts of stuff of the shelves and working on a side project. But, nope... it was like 20 people max and it was actually really sad to me as years before I went to the ones in Orange County and we had lines out the door on certain days. Well, COVID claims another retailer and thus the brick and mortar get another nail in it's coffin.

giantrobot 6y ago
Fry's has been a dead company walking for a while. They went to their consignment model in 2019 before the holiday shopping season. I remember summer of 2019 there were fire sale prices all over the store. By late 2019 and into 2020 their shelves were empty or "stocked" with filler items. Even without COVID there hasn't been a reason to step into one of their stores for over a year.
ergergwerga 6y ago
"covid" didn't claim shit - the fucking piece of shit hair jell nazi from sacramento did

ocdtrekkie 6y ago

What mystified me was how they thought the consignment shift would pan out, and didn't immediately reverse course when it didn't: Fry's was always heavily trafficked with people purchasing there every time I was there prior to the consignment shift.

Stratoscope 6y ago
The consignment model was because they didn't have any money to pay suppliers for merchandise. So it was something of a choice between having nearly empty shelves and completely empty shelves.

joshcain 6y ago

"I’m not surprised, but this makes me feel incredibly sad. I built my first PC using parts from there. I’m going to miss it." Yeah, same here. I'm not sure if the first PC I built was from Fry's parts but the second+ definitely were. I used to love going there in the late 90s-early 2000s – they put a lot of effort into demo areas/displays back then and the selection was unbeatable, especially for components and things that Best Buy wouldn't (and doesn't) even bother with. I get that paying retail rents to stock $2 patch cables doesn't work these days but I will miss it.

wishysgb 6y ago

I hope microcenter doesn't go the same route as fry's. they need to keep the knowledgeable staff, I think they need to up their game in staff to be honest. also they need to update their fing stock more often and more accurately. also as much as it pains me to have to travel 40 mins to get to one, a limited number of locations is key, it helps reduce costs down.

joncrane 6y ago

I was pleasantly surprised by Microcenter in November of last year. I was looking for a laptop and apparently Microcenter has a house brand called Powerspec. It turns out they are a very user-focused brand that a) has no bloatware preinstalled and b) has high performance and every single port you could possibly want. When I went, there was a little bit of hovering but overall the staff were nice. Protip: whenever you shop there, even if no one helped you, choose an employee and let them put their sticker on the merchandise you are buying. They track who helped which customer by a sticker the staff can put on your item. If you like to be left alone to shop, find an employee who left you alone on your way to the registers!

meepmorp 6y ago
I was in a Microcenter over the holidays, and was pleasantly surprised by the variety of things they stock. And the pricing was unexpectedly, for me at least, the same as or better than NewEgg on the items I checked. Best of all, they weren't pushy and hostile when I refused to give my phone number, a pleasant change from years back.
theschmed 6y ago
Huh. I’m not sure about PowerSpec but they do have an in-house laptop and tablet brand: “WinBook”. I’ve owned 2 and had challenges with both. Most recently: - Touchscreen driver wouldn’t shut off when lid closed - Inadequate cooling leading to overheating - The worst touchpad I’ve ever had the displeasure to use I really do love MicroCenter, I built a gaming PC there myself, but I recommend using the known brands when it comes to systems.
nickthegreek 6y ago
I'm on a powerspec right now. I couldn't build this PC with the same parts this cheap and it comes with a windows license and as you stated, no bloatware. They are fantastic little machines.
nerdwaller 6y ago
I’ve always enjoyed micro center, other than a few of the employees trying to force their stickers on stuff. Similarly I’ll find someone I like to load up my items. I’ve found they often have the best prices, even beating online retailers. At least on mobo/cpu combos.