The world beyond Jameco, Digi-Key and Mouser

Sure, but when you look under test equipment, yaaaawn ...

I do have a heart for nostalgia but this is like selling new Belvederes:

Also, they might benefit from hiring a new web designer. Well, so would NXP ;-)

Yes, but I found most of those places to be really teeny. I used some, like SparkFun but you cannot send off a big list because their offerings are quite limited. Ok, we have Digikey, so no problem. However, they just don't have those specials. In Germany hobby places like Conrad are highish in prices for parts but often they run these equipment and tools specials and many smaller companies buy at those times.

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Regards, Joerg

http://www.analogconsultants.com

Yeah, well, they're mostly aiming for the "hobbiest" mark, and by the time you actually need a spectrum analyzer or a >500MHz scope, you've cut out all but a few relatively "advanced" hobbiests. :-) (Although I honestly think spectrum analyzers would be a lot more popualr if undergraduates were introduced to them in college -- they seem to think it's only RF designers who really benefit from them, which of course is silly.)

Hey, I have one of those! (The SG-9000 RF generator.) Bought it years ago while in school. The purity is really atrocious as is the leveling and I haven't used it in ages but... umm... it was cheap? :-) At the time the only other SigGen I had was a DDS-based unit designed by Eric Cox, and it only went up to 15MHz (and I didn't have anyone around to tell me what a decent used unit would be...).

Neat; that would be cool to have in the U.S.

---Joel

True. Some recent grads don't even know what a spectrum analyzer really is. But I was thinking more about the 100MHz Hitachi type scopes etc. That's what hobbyists use. Some shops have them, other don't go past multimeters with built-in "scope functions". Thing is, there simply seems to be no one-stop shop in the US that also has the typcial bargain transistor grab-bags on holiday sale.

It was really cool at times when the Russians were in dire need of Western currency again. Then they'd have super bargains on meters, power supplies and so on from there. The good stuff, made for harsh use in Siberia and so on. It was amazing, you'd get a meter for $50 and it came with a stack of quality control sheets stamped and signed by all kinds to people. The sad part was that we all knew that the kids our age over there had next to nothing. Only after the wall fell could you donate stuff.

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Regards, Joerg

http://www.analogconsultants.com

Ditto, here. I remember ordering some parts from them back in the late '60s when I was a kid, too. But after that, the minimum order 'killed' me so it was to the local electronics parts stores for me.

Tom P.

Digikey often seems to compete well on micro prices with PICs, if you can crank up to 25 of them.

By the way, since you were talking about "cheapest PIC," I saw this on Allied:

That's 85 cents for a 28-pin device, in 1's. Digikey is a little better, if you are buying 25. It's got 20 I/O, so that's about 4 cents per I/O pin. Not too bad.

Jon

And then all those started to close down :-(((

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Regards, Joerg

http://www.analogconsultants.com

If you're looking to buy PICs have you looked at Microchip Direct? Microchip accepts personal accounts these days and more than 3/4 of their PICs can be bought in single units.

You can get them direct from MicroChip, will cost you $1.60 though. Not sure how many you are looking to buy. I've ordered a lot (well a couple of 100 or so) of parts directly from MicroChip. Simple ordering, you just have to go through the create account stuff first. try

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Joe Chisolm
Marble Falls, TX

My impression of the US (almost 20 years ago) was that they had tons more DIY stores, with much better selection (and nicer staff to boot) than Germany. I don't know about electronics in particular, back then I needed some iron hardware and arts & crafts stuff, but to me the US looked like the hobbyist's paradise.

Conrad is OK as some sort of technical supermarket, but their over-the- counter electronics parts sale is as good as dead, and mail ordering you do at Reichelt (or even Farnell and RS, who still are cheaper and and faster than Conrad). Conrad's staff tends to be nice and helpful; I once had to wait ten amusing minutes during which a salesperson tried to persuade a customer that the thing he intended to buy wouldn't solve his problem; that Conrad didn't stock the correct part; he even recommended that the customer go to store XYZ, but any amount of in-depth technical consulting wouldn't deter him and he ended up buying the thing. Forgot what it was, some computer part I think.

My impression is that Europe doesn't have good hobby suppliers, and no Digikey or Mouser to boot.

Won't Digikey sell to hobbyists? RS and Farnell officially only sell to businesses, but you can simply place an order, pay your bill, and never get asked a question.

robert

Both are a wet farts compared to Digikey. I used to be an RS customer but switched to Farnell when RS revamped their webpage into a state of complete (albeit colorful) unuseability and subsequently found that Farnell had a better selection.

DigiKey is paradise in comparison, but ordering from Germany is slow and expensive.

robert

Yes, they sell to hobbyists. That's me. And they have since kept sending me these HUGE catalogs. I think I order about once every 15 of them, or so. Could almost heat my house using them.

Jon

Le Tue, 18 Sep 2007 21:46:38 +0000, Joerg a écrit:

How much is the average TV time a day? Here it's said to be about 3 hours a day which is very possible, but I find this terrific (it's about how much I spent a week).

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Thanks,
Fred.

An average of 1,745 hrs in 2003. That's almost 5 hours a day!!!

I watch exactly zero. No TV. None. Not ever.

Jon

Le Wed, 19 Sep 2007 10:34:45 +0000, Jonathan Kirwan a écrit:

Arghhh. And that's on average!

Lucky guy :-)

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Thanks,
Fred.

Close -- I was talking about the cheapest (DIP) PIC with a USART peripheral. I had to go through the cheapest-first list checking against Microchip's database app to come up with the 16F688...

I got my PICkit 2 from them, actually. Should have gotten it somewhere else, in retrospect. They insist on FedEx with required signature... meaning they will only try to deliver it when I'm at work, and when I'm not there to sign for it, they hold onto it only to fail to deliver the next day for the same reason. Taking the bus to their hub ate two hours out of my day that I should have been using to mess with firmware! :-(

So, yeah...not a problem with Microchip but with stupid FedEx. Way to fail to cater to the customer there, guys...

PSM

Un bel giorno Joerg digitò:

Digikey has subsidiaries in various european countries:

Of course it isn't the same thing as a "native" european supplier; you still have to pay the non-EU freight charges, the free toll phone number still answers in english, and for some reason several US catalog's items are still missing. But at least the shipping costs are no longer shameful. :)

I used to consider Farnell totally worthless, but lately (since it started to distribute Newark catalog) it gained several points too.

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emboliaschizoide.splinder.com

Yep, Allied's been around for awhile. Their 1953 catalog (no PICs listed in the index) doesn't mention their history, but the 1961 catalog says "Our

40th Year". Newark is another that's been around a loong time - their 2008 catalog weighs 5 pounds.

I still have a "DigiKey 10% Bonus Credit Refund" slip for $2.78 from back in

1979 when they were just a surplus house.I plan to turn it in just before I expire.

-Dave

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email: snipped-for-privacy@mindspring.com ANTI-SPAM: To email, replace "lastname" with "plumpe"

Same here, except for part of the evening news. Plus right now we are watching a 6hr+ movie that'll take another 3-4 days to complete :-)

Come winter I'll watch "Once upon a Time in the West" another time.

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Regards, Joerg

http://www.analogconsultants.com