9 ms·
Silicon Valley finally has a big electronics retailer again: Micro Center opens
- modeless 1y agoIt's been more than four years since Fry's closed. I can't believe it took this long to get something better than Best Buy and bigger than Central Computers, in the middle of Silicon Valley of all places!
- mosdl 1y agoWe had a Microcenter that closed in 2012, took them that long to return.
- dylan604 1y agoWho in Silicon Valley uses actual computers and not something in the cloud? Do any start ups use actual hardware that you'd get at some place like MicroCenter? Don't they just get handed shiny new Apple hardware (something from HP/Dell if they're on a budget) to interface with the cloud?
- tdeck 1y agoI think many of the employees have gaming rigs at home and would buy parts there.
- Nextgrid 1y agoYou'd be surprised by how many "tech" people have no clue on about how to build a rig, nor have any willingness to learn.
- vladgur 1y agoYoure not wrong. I have a pc with 24GB 3090 card capable of running LLMs locally, but our electricity costs make API calls much more reasonable. Even gaming -- streaming geforce now is cheaper than ammortizing cost of power + hardware over time
- dimator 1y agoThe store has lots of other tech enthusiast stuff, like a huge selection of 3D printers.
- geerlingguy 1y agoAnd a full aisle of electronics / hobbyist gear, including decent soldering stations, fluke gear, tons of components, and a good smattering of SparkFun and Adafruit's catalog.
- nickthegreek 1y agoThey have great small business machines and more importantly, everything you need without waiting for amazon. Their in-house prebuilt brand PowerSpec have great prices for the hardware and work nicely whether you go for a gaming version or office build.
- kanbara 1y agosilicon valley-ite here: we have normal gaming machines and linux boxen too …
- Hizonner 1y agoI get the feeling the real Fry's died long before that. It seemed like it was going downhill when I left the area about 18 years ago. Less parts, less tools, less test equipment, more packaged gadgets.
- NelsonMinar 1y agoYeah Fry's was pretty awful.
- tgma 1y agoFry's had an interesting vibe and felt you time traveled to the 90s, but my gosh they were so weird. They searched your bag on the way out. Microcenter is a godsend although it'll be hard to beat B&H with Payboo card.
- tecleandor 1y agoI only use B&H site for checking general prices or reviews, as they won't stop discriminating people. A discrimination lawsuit almost every year since 2009. https://www.thephoblographer.com/2024/07/09/bh-photo-lawsuit-discrimination/ https://www.thephoblographer.com/2024/07/09/bh-photo-lawsuit...
- tgma 1y agoNot really familiar with their internal affairs but as a retailer they have been nothing but great in my experience as the customer. In the end, any large company will at some point be accused of certain things, rightly or wrongly, and I am willing to bet larger retailers simply have an easier time paying off the complaints before we hear about them. I mean, the primary alternative for me would be Amazon, which won’t win any prizes from me in employee affairs dimension, I can tell you that.
- toast0 1y agoI think a lot of that was following what sold. If nobody is buying these things at Fry's, it doesn't make sense for them to stock them. IMHO, there was a drop in good deals around the time they got rid of the purchaser who was doing the embezzleing (2008), and also new stores started opening with 'boring corporate store' theme ('new' sunnyvale store, vegas). If I'm gonna be at a boring corporate store and not getting good deals, why bother? Then there was the year? or so of circling the drain when there was some sort of credit problem and they tried to switch from owning inventory to a consignment model and most of their vendors weren't interested so they had no inventory.
- awful 1y agoAgreed; went into Fry's, off Lawrence?, just before it closed. Visited area on and off again over the years since. Central Computer did seem to have what I needed for that moment, but the area seemed barren, was simply not the same, and especially after experiencing Fry's, Weird Stuff, Halted?, Anchor, Computer Literacy, et al. in the late 1980s and 90s.
- ts4z 1y agoHear hear. I guess we still have Anchor.
- delfinom 1y agoPC hardware is a competitive and margin tight business, especially due to online sales. At the same time, the inventory can be very expensive on the books. It makes the calculus for viability of a physical store quite challenging. It's why Microcenter has relatively few stores for the US.
- Animats 1y agoI've been happy with Central Computer. Three machines and two repairs in ten years.
- xhkkffbf 1y agoSo true. Fry's is still missed every day. This is a good replacement, though.
- orionblastar 1y agoMicrocenter is what Radio Shack should have become.
- macNchz 1y agoIt was founded by two Radio Shack employees!
- jbaber 1y agoThat explains a lot.
- myself248 1y agoAnd we all watched Radio Shack run face-first into the same wall, over and over and over and over. The market was exploding and it was theirs to lose, and boy did they ever.
- Spooky23 1y agoI worked at a CompUSA in high school and college. The money was around the PC sale, which was pretty high margin until around 1998/9. I’d come in in the morning before class to do freight… one time we built a pyramid of about 300 PCs. It was a money machine until it wasn’t. Radio Shack has to sell everything, couldn’t offer a good variety of devices, and didn’t have the staff to support people with complicated PC purchases. If cell phones blew up earlier radio shack would still be around.
- orionblastar 1y agoI had a small PC Business. When the Internet Rebates came out with a free PC, we couldn't match that. However, the AOL or MSN monthly fee was $35 or $27 for dial-up. We had Brick.net for $10 a month and $500 to $700 mid-end PCs. We couldn't compete and went out of business.
- Spooky23 1y ago
- absurdo 1y agoI am afraid of asking but what does Sayal classify as? I figured it would take negative time for someone to post Radio Shack in commentary because it’s basically a knee jerk reaction, but I do appreciate a store like Sayal although they’re proper electronics parts seller. These stores are more like finished product distributors. Maybe I’m too picky.
- tdeck 1y agoI haven't heard of Sayal, but there is Anchor Electronics in Santa Clara that sells what I would think you're looking for. In my mind microcenter mostly sells PC parts that you plug in or stick into a card slot, although apparently they do also sell some electronics components a hobbyist might solder to a board.
- modeless 1y agoAnchor Electronics is totally awesome. Very small but very interesting collection of stuff that you definitely won't find at any other store that still exists in the Bay Area.
- absurdo 1y ago> Anchor Electronics in Santa Clara Looks about right! I thought Sayal was scattered across US so my bad :l A big box product store opening that sells plug and play stuff is to me, personally, not worthy of bearing the title Electronics. It’s not news worthy for hackers. I could say that out of smugness but very often I’m confronted with sales staff that don’t know much about what they’re selling, and I end up (playfully?) educating them about the products, so I suspect this would be much the same. The “Maker” space as it’s called today is amazing but I guess done to death so nobody talks about it? There are of course no real contenders today that warrant bringing up Radio Shack in any way (but people still do as if it’s relevant). RS put a gorilla’s weight behind teaching people how to fish that when they left, they left a massive cultural void that nobody has since filled and is unlikely to fill. The world has moved on.
- HorizonXP 1y ago
- yahoozoo 1y agoAt first I was impressed with the number of people lined up to go in the store. Then I realized every single person was just an employee.
- khazhoux 1y agoThe third photo isn't employees
- datavirtue 1y agoI live next to the Cincinnati store and have been going there for more than thirty years. There are people waiting at the door every morning when it opens and it is swamped with people from open to close. The service is unmatched by any retailer.
- yahoozoo 1y agoThat’s cool, I’ll just use Amazon and wait 1 extra day though
- dimator 1y agoOther micro centers have a ton of employees so I'm not surprised. They're actually knowledgeable and helpful, the opposite of what Fry's had. And they're everywhere, not in a pushy sense, but just available.
- nickthegreek 1y agoThey also earn commission and are motivated to help you. I’ve actually had employees replace items I had chosen to save me cash. You don’t see service like that often.
- Braxton1980 1y agoI'm lucky to be about 10 mins away from the one in Westchester NY. They have a dedicated asile to custom water cooling items which shows how serious they are about enthusiasts. I used to order my new set ups on Newegg but now I just got to Microcenter
- nvllsvm 1y agoSame for me and the Wayne, PA store. Prices are competitive and they're one of the few places I know that carries Bawls energy drinks.
- stevenwoo 1y agoNewegg has deteriorated in my experience and now not materially different from Amazon, with wrong items shipped and multiple dropshippers commingling inventory so provenance of stuff is questionable. Do not recommend.
- somat 1y agoIt is a shame. I think the tipping point was newegg the store vs newegg the marketplace. Newegg "the store" was pretty great, newegg "the marketplace" not so much. And unlike amazon at least newegg tells you who the seller is and keeps a big "only show results from the newegg store" filter present. but even despite that the store is not nearly as great as it once was. I wonder if there is anything left of amazon "the store", perhaps if you buy a book? Or has amazon "the marketplace" consumed everything.
- dpiers 1y agoAmazon has surpassed Newegg as my online parts provider of choice. It's not that things can't go wrong, it's just that they are much better at handling it than Newegg these days.
- bradfa 1y agoTotally agree. 20ish years ago Newegg was my one stop for computing purchases online. Now I just use it to gauge pricing as I find their search and filtering to still be the best. Most of my online computing purchases now come from B&H in New York City. Super fast shipping and I’ve never had a bad order experience.
- redwood 1y agoI miss Fry's
- JKCalhoun 1y agoI miss WeirdStuff.
- redwood 1y agoHow about HalTech?
- JKCalhoun 1y agoYeah, Haltek was great. A friend had a knack for finding valuable stuff — would go into Haltek and come out with a dozen of some obscure digital numerical display from the mid 70's or whatever.
- dehrmann 1y agoI remember strolling through there and seeing all the weird hardware childhood me drooled over. Adult me did not walk out with a Snappy video capture thingy or a Jaz drive.
- duskwuff 1y agoI walked through the store on their last day and was amazed at just how much unalloyed junk they had on the shelves - boxes of unidentified circuit boards with bent connectors and components broken off, shelves of empty binders, etc. Lots of neat, weird old stuff, but a lot of things which no one would ever buy.
- JoshTriplett 1y agoI miss Incredible Universe.
- epoxyhockey 1y agoThe store had pre-opening for the past 2 days. I drove by on Wednesday and the parking lot was completely full with folks parking across the street and walking over. I thought I would be able to stroll in and get the free USB drive but ended up not able to visit yet. Talk about pent up demand!
- sm_1024 1y agoInteresting part is they have actually been open for a week now. They did a quiet opening on the 25th and it was still busy that day
- a_e_k 1y agoNow if we could only get one near Seattle! (I've never really understood why a tech hub as large and historical as Seattle doesn't have one. It's weird that it's such a relative desert.)
- asteroidburger 1y agoThere's already a bunch of vacant Walgreens / Rite Aid / Bartell Drugs locations, with more to come. Surely one of the bigger ones would be adequate.
- devilbunny 1y agoInteresting. I've never shopped at one; though my home is near the intersection of two interstates, I'd have to drive about 7 hours to get to one. You're even worse off! It appears that the pole of inaccessibility for Micro Center for a place in the lower 48 on an interstate is around Spokane to Missoula (Santa Clara vs Denver), but that's only about 3 hours' longer drive than you would have.
- blindriver 1y agoWhen did Microcenter re-gain its popularity? I remember when it was around before it closed down, beside AMC Mercado, and the prices were crazy expensive even back then. Did they somehow lower their prices?
- datavirtue 1y agoTheir shoppers are all on the savvy scale and could easily use their prime membership to buy parts on Amazon, but they don't. If the customer isn't savvy the knowledgeable customer service adds a lot of value.
- tschwimmer 1y agoI am a "savvy shopper" and have no desire to buy components on Amazon anymore. Their stock co-mingling doesn't work for speciality computer components. I've received items marked as new that were clearly open box returns. I've received completely nonfunctional components. I've received the wrong item a few times. The component I've had the most success with are SSDs, but for anything beyond that I prefer to buy from brick and mortar because of their "curation." To be honest, it's a shame because the Amazon shopping experience is vastly superior but they send you crap, so it's unusable for this vertical. I still buy other junk from Amazon, but nothing that's particularly performance sensitive.
- lotsofpulp 1y agoA lot of the physical open to the public stores took a beating before South Dakota v Wayfair was decided in June 2018, since it was trivial to spend ~7% less by shopping from a website with a presence outside of your state. I doubt Microcenter ever expands to the number of locations that BestBuy /circuit city/compusa/etc had, but it might have enough of a market for one or two locations in the top 10 to 20 metros.
- dminvs 1y agoI always liked going to well-stocked stores and browsing for stuff. That was Fry's until they shot themselves in the foot. Micro Center might not be optimal on price, but sometimes you just want to wander a store full of cool stuff and maybe walk out with something you didn't expect, instead of another anonymous box of schmutz from Amazon or wherever
- av3csr 1y agoWas nice seeing that the 5090 exists, but boy, those prices.
- neilv 1y agoThe Micro Center in Cambridge, MA, has improved a lot over the years. When they have the thing that I want, I'd prefer to go there, rather than order online. Also, I've never seen opened returns re-shinkwrapped and sold again as new at Micro Center, unlike in stories about Fry's. There are some wire shelves where opened returns are sold at a small discount, clearly labeled. Incidentally, would be nice to also have a good surplus and e-cycling store browsing adventure in town. But I guess the economics are difficult, when real estate is so expensive, and most of the few customers for unusual stuff are online. (That local hobbyists could save a lot of money on shipping cost of decommissioned corporate and lab gear, or make impulse purchases they wouldn't online, probably isn't enough, I'd guess.)
- arprocter 1y ago>When they have the thing that I want, I'd prefer to go there, rather than order online. Worth mentioning that they price match Amazon I bought a CPU cooler there a few months back - the guy at checkout told me to pull up the Amazon listing on my phone so he could knock some cash off https://community.microcenter.com/kb/articles/6-do-you-price-match https://community.microcenter.com/kb/articles/6-do-you-price...
- 3eb7988a1663 1y agoHow is that possible? Amazon has to have lower overheads than a brick and mortar.
- seattle_spring 1y agoIt's not too uncommon for retail stores to match Amazon, as long as it's specifically both "sold by Amazon" and "shipped by Amazon". Best Buy does too, for example.
- fzzzy 1y agoThey hope you'll buy a soda and a magazine or whatever. They always try to upsell protection plans.
- 1y ago
- rayiner 1y agoI grew up going to the Microcenter in Vienna, VA. Bought a monitor there just a couple of years ago. Hasn’t changed at all in 25 years!
- walterbell 1y agoFry's Electronics discussion threads "Demolishing the Fry's Electronics in Burbank", 100 comments (2025), https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43677862 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43677862 "Fry's Electronics is closing all stores", 300 comments (2021), https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26246435 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26246435 "Is Fry’s Electronics in trouble?", 350 comments (2020), https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21945492 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21945492 "The Fry's Era", 150 comments (2019), https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20853834 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20853834 Electronics Surplus Stores "Sundown for Surplus" (2018), https://www.eham.net/article/41444 https://www.eham.net/article/41444 "End of an Era: Weird Stuff Warehouse closed" (2018), https://www.mercurynews.com/2018/04/08/sjm-l-weirdstuff-0408/ https://www.mercurynews.com/2018/04/08/sjm-l-weirdstuff-0408...
- roughly 1y ago> “Fry's Electronics is closing all stores", 300 comments (2021), https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26246435 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26246435 > "Is Fry’s Electronics in trouble?", 350 comments (2020), https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21945492 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21945492 This made me chuckle. Betteridge’s law is more of what you’d call a guideline than a rule.
- mcbuckeye 1y agoI got my first computer, an Apple ][+, at the original Micro Center store in Upper Arlington (Columbus), Ohio. The store was tiny and then grew over time to be huge. I live in NJ now and they have a store about 40 minutes away from me. I'm surprised they are still around given e-commerce and all the other stores that have collapsed. Happy they are--it's always fun to walk through the store like in the good old days and see what you can find.
- kevinsync 1y agoYup, I go in the Columbus store semi-frequently -- have since the mid-90's. They've kept up with the times so it's a little less "smells like nerd" (which bums me out), but they are very competent, very good on price, and sometimes it's just NICE to zip up 315 to get something instead of hitting Amazon or Ebay. In comparison, Best Buy is a disaster lol; I hadn't been since Obama was in office, needed to buy a new tv, and it felt more like "electronics" Value City Furniture crossed with TJ Maxx than anything that came before it (Sun TV, Incredible Universe, etc). At least at Micro Center you can expect a disheveled-yet-tucked-Oxford salesperson to come bother you until you say "I'm good, just put your sticker on the stuff I'm gonna buy" rather than some burned-out retail drone in a blue polo who tries to hard-sell you on a sound bar you didn't ask for!
- monksy 1y agoIt's amazing for the area that claims it's the tech center didn't have a microcenter until now. I like having a microcenter in Chicago.
- dehrmann 1y agoThey had one in Santa Clara in or near the Mercado shopping center until around 2012.
- spacecadet 1y agoOne of us.
- uqual 1y agoIt's good to finally have something "between" Best Buy and Central Computer (et al) back in the SV after Fry's died its slow and painful death as the previous Micro Center in Santa Clara closed. Unfortunately this new one is in the same shopping center as Harbor Freight and it's close to where I live - this could get expensive... Mean to shop at one, end up shopping at both... The lines on the "insider" opening day 5/28 were pretty long - I waited about an hour in line just to get into the store and the checkout line was over an hour long. However, based on my purchases that day, I fear they will be unpleasant to shop at - even when busy, they were annoyingly upselling extended warranties. The sales associate on the floor tried to sell me on a plan for a laptop I bought and then, while there were hundreds of people waiting to checkout, the cashier spent time doing so AGAIN. Both were just following their mandated scripts and were at least nice about it all. They apparently also have some sort of rule that the customer buying something like a laptop also needs to "meet" with the sales associate's manager/supervisor - which was a completely useless awkward perfunctory handshake (and the customer survey asked if this meeting had happened so it appears to be an annoying institutional rule).
- arcanemachiner 1y ago> the customer survey asked if this meeting had happened so it appears to be an annoying institutional rule Whenever I get a survey that asks dumb questions like that, I just answer "yes" so that the employees don't get harassed for not asking those dumb questions to me in person. "Were you warmly welcomed by a team member?" You bet I was! "Did one of our team members tell you about our partnership with the Heart and Stroke Foundation?" Sure, why not?
- vunderba 1y agoThere's a great parody of the whole customer satisfaction thing on a very underrated comedy series called "Corporate". Five out of five! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvHZfAT0F94 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvHZfAT0F94
- dustbunny 1y agoMy mind is blown that this is new. My small city in Canada has an awesome Memory Express in it. And it's packed with ~16 year old gamers and their dads spending big $ on stuff.
- grg0 1y ago$3719 for a GPU certainly is new. I'm fucking pumped for brick-and-mortar, though. Bring more bricks.
- evbogue 1y agoI've been shopping at Microcenter in Chicago since I was a kid. I bought my last 3 computers there. I couldn't believe upon moving to the bay in the aughts that there was nowhere to buy a decent computer. I'm glad they finally have a place to buy a computer out there.
- mixmastamyk 1y agoWish there was one near Los Angeles, especially now that Fry's is gone. There's a MC in in Orange County, but it's a bit too far with Best Buy close and online deliveries.
- reid 1y agoParking lot is completely full. I parked nearby and walked over. They’re giving away free mugs today with Micro Center Silicon Valley on it. Huge Ubiquiti display and demo area. I didn’t buy anything today because the checkout line was too long. My daughter liked the Magna Tile selection in the toys area. Really great to have this much selection nearby.
- vunderba 1y agoI used to love visiting the Microcenter near our family home back in the early 90s. In those halcyon days, they had a exceptionally LIBERAL return policy - 30 days even on opened software. (the L.L. Bean of electronics). As a child whose modest income was derived solely from weekly lawn mowing, needless to say I coincidentally became quite accomplished at beating PC games within a month's time. In defense of my somewhat dubious behavior, I did go back as an older teenager with far more disposable income and purchase a ton of big-box PC games from them. Most of which I still have including one of my all-time favorite RPGs, Betrayal at Krondor.
- mrbluecoat 1y agoReminds me of when I started working at a new Best Buy back when they were the cool new kid on the block
- MPSimmons 1y agoMan, I am glad I live near a Microcenter. It's great that they have a big maker section now, too.
- whalesalad 1y agoI used to live a mile or so from the location in Michigan. Previously I lived a few miles from the one in Tustin, CA. Growing up I was a few miles from Fry’s in Burbank and went there all the time. Now I live out in the boonies and it’s certainly made me realize how fortunate I was all these years
- bdcravens 1y agoWhile I've built machines using parts from Microcenter, it's been several years, as I eventually went all-in on Macbooks (though you can often get one cheaper there than at the Apple Store). However, as I've gotten into 3d printing and other maker tech in the last year, I'm now there at least once a month, and have spent more than I ever did.
- maz1b 1y agoSurprising - but a good change! I recently picked up an M3 Ultra from there.
- bschwindHN 1y agoI got into electronics around 2016, right around when I was visiting my hometown from living abroad. There's been a Micro Center there for years and I ended up spending hours there looking at all the ESP8266 boards they had there, along with the various supplies of Arduinos and Adafruit boards. Pretty "recent" in terms of electronics tech, but somehow this is already close to 10 years ago :c
- pss314 1y agoPer this reddit post, at the Santa Clara location there were some 5090 GPU retail boxes filled with crossbody backpacks instead of the GPU. Microcenter did eventually track this to a particular supplier. https://www.reddit.com/r/Microcenter/comments/1kymzcd/update_the_scam_zotac_5090_with_backpacks_inside/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Microcenter/comments/1kymzcd/update...
- mtlmtlmtlmtl 1y agoAm I the only one amused that nVidia flagship GPUs are now so large that you can fit 3 backbacks inside their packaging?
- edgan 1y agoI see they opened a store again in Santa Clara. I remember the old one next to AMC theater that was a Walmart last I saw.
- sylens 1y agoI love MicroCenter. Why do they seem to be flourishing as Best Buy seems to be closing stores, reducing staff, and locking items in the back?
- bitwize 1y agoMicro Center! I used to go to the one in Massachusetts. Really good stuff and a wide selection. I miss Fry's in its heyday, but Micro Center comes close to that ideal.
- daviddever23box 1y agoMicro Center is not trying to be a white-goods (refrigerator, washer / dryer, etc.) store, as Fry's was. I've had great luck with Cleveland, Cincinnati, and Chicago stores, and there is now one in Indianapolis that is clean and up-to-date.
- vondur 1y agoI love the one here in Orange County California. They always have these combo deals with Motherboard/CPU/RAM that are good deals. My current Ryzen 9 7950x was build from a deal at Microcenter.
- mnky9800n 1y agoI wonder if it will include an old bin with unopened copies of dark forces Jedi knight and other old stuff that just never sold all the copies for sale in a discount bin. The Microcenter in Atlanta was a treasure of old software that you had to have at some point in the past.
- johnea 1y agoAll I can say is: It's about time. I'm amazed there aren't more of these stores nationwide. I live in San Diego, and (luckily) the closest one is an hour drive away in Tustin. California, 1/8 of the US population, and the world's 4th largest economy, has "after years of waiting" 2 stores 8-/ I can only reminisce about the olden days when there were dozens of "bin stores", with electronic components, test equipment, new and used gear of every variety, and staff that knew about the stock. Apparently, modern electronic developers feel that ordering from Alibaba is some kind of viable substitute 8-/ This whole disappearance, coupled with the disappearance of the many many small local electronics development firms, is a clear sign of the demise of the American republic. The elimination of small independent tech companies, and the supply chain that went with them, from our communities and our economy has been a disaster for the american people, and quite frankly, I couldn't care less how many vulture capital fanbois disagree with me...
- rufus_foreman 1y agoI sort of hate Micro Center and I sort of love it. My theory of how you tell you're rich or not is that you walk into a store and you can buy whatever you want without caring what the price tag is. I'm rich at the grocery store, I'm not rich at Micro Center.
- Fairburn 1y agoHell yea! Shame we moved from the bay area. Right next to the theatre! Good times.