[TriLUG] [more and more OT]: Hobby Parts for Electronics

[Mike M]

On Thu, Apr 15, 2004 at 10:16:13AM -0400, Frye, Matthew wrote:
> >My problem with Radio Shack is their horrid selection of anything 
> >resembling an electronic component. 
> 
> One of the reasons that Radio Shack has changed so much is because of the
> press attention (and litigation) surrounding "hackers."  You just can't walk
> into a RS asking for a 6.5536 MHz crystal anymore.  I would guess that RS
> got some heat from phone companies and other large corporation$.  
> 
> Matt
> 
> PS - If you know what a 6.5536 MHz crystal is, then you know why it's hard
> to get them at RS these days.  



1. LD is so cheap that what you are suggesting is not worth doing anymore.  
I remember sitting in
meeting with reps of a major service provider. We were discussing fraud
detection and suppression methods.  There was speculation that these 
systems would eventually be mothballed because they could not pay for
themselves in a deflationary environment. Beside that this there is that
people generally don't steal stuff that is free or almost free.

2. Radio Shack is driven by demand.  Remember Heathkit?  I used to pour
over RS catalogs of kits.  It's the discrete world.  It's like tube
based circuits. Nostalgia.  It's quaint that RS still carries axial lead
components.  If I were in charge of RS, that stuff would be gone and 
I'd move the operation to the web entirely.  RS is a consumer gadget
and gadget connectivity store.  Forget discrete components.  Learn
DSP.  Build at the board level.  PC-104 boards are $200 and EMJ in 
Hillsborough sells 'em.

3. If you want connectors, use Connect-It
on Millbrook in Raleigh - they get it right every time.  They taught me
how to make my own RJ45/Rj11 cables with a righteous tool and pointed
out how the Tyco connectors kick butt over cheaper models.  Nobody
building lots of cables wants cheap parts because you loose savings
in debugging.

I think that's .06 worth of strong opinion.
-- 
Mike

Moving forward in pushing back the envelope of the corporate paradigm.