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Radio Shack at this point is a sad caricature of itself. I remember being able to buy all sorts of ICs, analog parts, interesting radios and kits. Now it pedd

Radio Shack at this point is a sad caricature of itself. I remember being able to buy all sorts of ICs, analog parts, interesting radios and kits. Now it peddles cell phones and overly prices things -- I recall needing a battery for my cordless phone recently, they wanted $23 for a battery for a $50 phone? Uh, no. Two other bay area places that have changed a lot are Frys and the now closed Quement Electronics. Fry's still has a few components, but nothing like the 80s and 90s. RIP.

unclebucknasty 12y ago
Ah Fry's. A wonderland of gadgets, electronics, and all kinds of fun toys, with an 80% defect rate. There was a period a few years back wherein everything I bought there had some defect. Literally 5-6 things in a row: cordless phone, monitor that could not be adjusted, LCD TV with a single dead pixel out of the box, DVD player wherein the drawer would close by itself within 2 seconds of opening, etc. The crazy thing is that it all worked. It just didn't work properly. I kept thinking I was having bad luck, so kept trying before finally declaring I wouldn't buy from there. I sincerely think they are/were selling used and/or known defective stuff as new. To make matters worse, the return process of our local store makes customers feel like criminals when just trying to get a refund for their crappy crap.
larrys 12y ago
"Two other bay area places that have changed a lot are Frys" One of my fondest memories when I was out in SV in the early 90's was Frys and Weird Stuff Warehouse. I think I first heard of WSW and Fry's in a book written by Guy Kawasaki [1] who was a big deal in the late 80's. Recently I had the opportunity to visit Fry's in 2006 when I was in town for an conference. Then later in Las Vegas last year. Fry's of 2006 was no match for what I remembered in the early 90's. But nowhere near as bad as the Las Vegas store which to me was like a large Best Buy. Another great store that changed was Micro Center. They had all sorts of little parts, tools, gadgets and a great book section. When I recently visited that it had also changed greatly and there was a slop of merchandise as well as empty shelves and little to call a book section (which was a total mess). That was the store in Pennsylvania. They still had the logos of companies in the store as part of the lighted signage such as "Okidata" , "Creative Labs", and so on. They never even took that info down even though from memory most of the companies from their golden era didn't even really exist anymore at least selling to that market (Oki exists but not selling the same type products that would be sold at a retail store like Micro Center). (I had an Okidata 2410 in the 80's loved the sound of that printing things high speed..) [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guy_Kawasaki http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guy_Kawasaki
- rootbear 12y ago
  Interesting. The Micro Center is Rockville, Maryland isn't bad. I don't do too much electronics hacking, but I've gotten into the Arduino and Raspberry Pi maker stuff and they have a good selection that is sometimes cheaper than mail order. The Pi B+ is currently on sale for $30, for example. And they have less-than-mail-order prices on some Intel CPUs, like the i7-4790K I just got for $250. I suppose Micro Center stores vary depending on management and customer base. (This sounds a bit promotional, so I'll add that I have no financial interest in Micro Center, I just shop there a fair amount.)
chrischen 12y ago
> I remember being able to buy all sorts of ICs, analog parts, interesting radios and kits. They still do. Most radioshacks I've visited carry arduino kits and ICs, electronic parts, LEDs, resistors, capacitors, etc.
- technomancy 12y ago
  IME it depends on whether they're inside a mall or not. The ones inside malls tend to just be glorified mobile phone sales depots, but you can actually get components at the standalone ones.
  - eropple 12y ago
    A lot of the standalone stores are franchises, where most of the mall locations are corporate. Big difference.
- ams6110 12y ago
  They do, but it's one little corner of the store. It used to be at least a full aisle.
dragonwriter 12y ago
> Now it peddles cell phones and overly prices things -- I recall needing a battery for my cordless phone recently, they wanted $23 for a battery for a $50 phone? Radio Shack always did that -- especially on batteries. High margins on things like batteries is what provided the cash flow that paid for the floor space devoted to more unique things that sold less but brought in customers who bought the batteries. The problem Radio Shack has now is that with the internet and big-box electronics stores, RS's dinky stores aren't particularly great places for hobbyists (and wouldn't be even if they devoted more of their floor space to them), and they don't have a competitive selection of mass market goods either, so the basic format doesn't work.
kenrikm 12y ago
I go to the Fry's Palo Alto store, it has a decent selection of parts/components if you stay to the right half of the store. (Left hand side is all TVs and Sales guys yuck..) If you want a larger selection of electronic components in the Bay Area - HSC is hard to beat and they have a ton of weird stuff too.
- spiritplumber 12y ago
  Also, the Jameco warehouse on highway 101 is open to the public. Super handy for same-day printer filament, ICs, or just picking cheap shipping and getting it the next morning anyway. And the lady at the will-call desk is a wonderful human being for being patient with me taking forever to fill an order.
russell 12y ago
Remember the original Fry's in Sunnyvale? It was pretty much a cross between a 7-Eleven and a components store and not much bigger. I remember thinking to myself, that it was certainly a strange place. Then they built the big Sunnyvale store and it became the go-to place for me. But not in this century. The prices are too high, the service is terrible. I realized that it is faster and cheaper to go online.
- Roboprog 12y ago
  I remember the bigger Sunnyvale store. Back in the late 80s / early 90s, a friend and I used to go out there about once a year (usually after the Borland/CompuServe picnic, of all things) to shop around for upgrades. Compared to what was available in the back country of the San Joaquin valley, it was pretty cool. More memories, made obsolete by change :-)
- jmspring 12y ago
  I remember it and the Weird Stuff Warehouse right near it. Now Weird Stuff is out off Carribbean. Still fun to go visit.

unclebucknasty 12y ago

Ah Fry's. A wonderland of gadgets, electronics, and all kinds of fun toys, with an 80% defect rate. There was a period a few years back wherein everything I bought there had some defect. Literally 5-6 things in a row: cordless phone, monitor that could not be adjusted, LCD TV with a single dead pixel out of the box, DVD player wherein the drawer would close by itself within 2 seconds of opening, etc. The crazy thing is that it all worked. It just didn't work properly. I kept thinking I was having bad luck, so kept trying before finally declaring I wouldn't buy from there. I sincerely think they are/were selling used and/or known defective stuff as new. To make matters worse, the return process of our local store makes customers feel like criminals when just trying to get a refund for their crappy crap.

larrys 12y ago

"Two other bay area places that have changed a lot are Frys" One of my fondest memories when I was out in SV in the early 90's was Frys and Weird Stuff Warehouse. I think I first heard of WSW and Fry's in a book written by Guy Kawasaki [1] who was a big deal in the late 80's. Recently I had the opportunity to visit Fry's in 2006 when I was in town for an conference. Then later in Las Vegas last year. Fry's of 2006 was no match for what I remembered in the early 90's. But nowhere near as bad as the Las Vegas store which to me was like a large Best Buy. Another great store that changed was Micro Center. They had all sorts of little parts, tools, gadgets and a great book section. When I recently visited that it had also changed greatly and there was a slop of merchandise as well as empty shelves and little to call a book section (which was a total mess). That was the store in Pennsylvania. They still had the logos of companies in the store as part of the lighted signage such as "Okidata" , "Creative Labs", and so on. They never even took that info down even though from memory most of the companies from their golden era didn't even really exist anymore at least selling to that market (Oki exists but not selling the same type products that would be sold at a retail store like Micro Center). (I had an Okidata 2410 in the 80's loved the sound of that printing things high speed..) [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guy_Kawasaki http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guy_Kawasaki

rootbear 12y ago
Interesting. The Micro Center is Rockville, Maryland isn't bad. I don't do too much electronics hacking, but I've gotten into the Arduino and Raspberry Pi maker stuff and they have a good selection that is sometimes cheaper than mail order. The Pi B+ is currently on sale for $30, for example. And they have less-than-mail-order prices on some Intel CPUs, like the i7-4790K I just got for $250. I suppose Micro Center stores vary depending on management and customer base. (This sounds a bit promotional, so I'll add that I have no financial interest in Micro Center, I just shop there a fair amount.)

chrischen 12y ago

> I remember being able to buy all sorts of ICs, analog parts, interesting radios and kits. They still do. Most radioshacks I've visited carry arduino kits and ICs, electronic parts, LEDs, resistors, capacitors, etc.

technomancy 12y ago
IME it depends on whether they're inside a mall or not. The ones inside malls tend to just be glorified mobile phone sales depots, but you can actually get components at the standalone ones.
- eropple 12y ago
  A lot of the standalone stores are franchises, where most of the mall locations are corporate. Big difference.
ams6110 12y ago
They do, but it's one little corner of the store. It used to be at least a full aisle.

dragonwriter 12y ago

> Now it peddles cell phones and overly prices things -- I recall needing a battery for my cordless phone recently, they wanted $23 for a battery for a $50 phone? Radio Shack always did that -- especially on batteries. High margins on things like batteries is what provided the cash flow that paid for the floor space devoted to more unique things that sold less but brought in customers who bought the batteries. The problem Radio Shack has now is that with the internet and big-box electronics stores, RS's dinky stores aren't particularly great places for hobbyists (and wouldn't be even if they devoted more of their floor space to them), and they don't have a competitive selection of mass market goods either, so the basic format doesn't work.

kenrikm 12y ago

I go to the Fry's Palo Alto store, it has a decent selection of parts/components if you stay to the right half of the store. (Left hand side is all TVs and Sales guys yuck..) If you want a larger selection of electronic components in the Bay Area - HSC is hard to beat and they have a ton of weird stuff too.

spiritplumber 12y ago
Also, the Jameco warehouse on highway 101 is open to the public. Super handy for same-day printer filament, ICs, or just picking cheap shipping and getting it the next morning anyway. And the lady at the will-call desk is a wonderful human being for being patient with me taking forever to fill an order.

russell 12y ago

Remember the original Fry's in Sunnyvale? It was pretty much a cross between a 7-Eleven and a components store and not much bigger. I remember thinking to myself, that it was certainly a strange place. Then they built the big Sunnyvale store and it became the go-to place for me. But not in this century. The prices are too high, the service is terrible. I realized that it is faster and cheaper to go online.

Roboprog 12y ago
I remember the bigger Sunnyvale store. Back in the late 80s / early 90s, a friend and I used to go out there about once a year (usually after the Borland/CompuServe picnic, of all things) to shop around for upgrades. Compared to what was available in the back country of the San Joaquin valley, it was pretty cool. More memories, made obsolete by change :-)
jmspring 12y ago
I remember it and the Weird Stuff Warehouse right near it. Now Weird Stuff is out off Carribbean. Still fun to go visit.