Hacker News Reader

Reminds me of the late stages of Circuit City where the stores were just there ... but empty shelves, strange patterns in inventory, employees who just have given up on work .. look like they gave up on life.

I was always amazed how long Circuit City stuck around like that.

Reinforces Apple's decision to launch their own retail business. Circuit City was where I rediscovered Macs after having been away for a decade.

I didn't even know they had Macs...

They formed a partnership, didn't last long: 2000-2002.

At the time I went there to look at their hardware prices, when I was contemplating building a replacement for my desktop Linux box, the only computer they had on the floor with an Internet connection was a Mac. I used it to do some quick price comparisons, then remembered Macs were UNIX too, and decided it was time to give Apple another try.

My retail days....we sold Macs at Sears (low end crap like Performas), and we sold them at Best Buy back in 1998 or whenever it was the original iMac came out.

But nobody wanted them. We got 25 at our store and almost every one of them came back. People wanted PC's....

> nobody wanted them. We got 25 at our store and almost every one of them came back. People wanted PC's....

I thought the iMac was a massive success? Didn't it save Apple from ruin almost single handedly?

It did...but this was the first one, and we were just Best Buy. Not sure if it was just or store or what.

The iMac did get a lot of bad reviews and was $1299, in the days of $399 eMachines

OOOf.

Those eMachines chugged badly out of the box even.

eMachines, not to be confused with the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EMac

...the overweight, less colorful cousin of the iMac.

I remember my school had hundreds of them in the library and across different labs. Maybe it was education rather than home user / consumers who bought the bulk?

Not surprised. Apple spent most of the 90's cranking out one turd after another. There were a few hits for well-heeled professionals, but their consumer offerings were generally a bunch of fatally compromised Road Apples. https://lowendmac.com/2014/road-apples-second-class-macs/

MacOS was behind the times vs. Windows. Still sticking with cooperative multitasking until 2000. Crazy!

iMac was the start of something different, but Apple had a decade of second-class product to atone for, first.

Even the first iMacs were pretty terrible. It took them a while longer to get OSX stable and ditch the Fischer-Price aesthetic. The G4s (iirc and IMO) were the first ones since the Macintosh that were what you'd call 'professional'.

> Still sticking with cooperative multitasking until 2000. Crazy!

To be fair, sticking with it until 2000 wasn't Apple's intention; they'd expected to bring the new "Copland" Mac OS to market by the end of 1996.

I don't know how well the iMac may have sold at the OP's Best Buy, but my recollection -- and a web search just now seems to back this up -- is that the iMac sold very well pretty quickly after its 1998 introduction. For instance, a NYT article from January 1999 which begins:

"Apple Computer Inc.'s popular iMac desktop computer was the No. 1 selling machine through retail and mail-order channels in the 1998 holiday season, according to the research company PC Data.

"In overall sales, the iMac fell from the top spot in November to No. 3 in December. It is still the top-selling computer since its mid-August introduction and led overall sales in the fourth quarter, PC Data, of Reston, Va., reported."

https://www.nytimes.com/1999/01/22/business/apple-s-imac-led...

You certainly can't be a premium type brand / provide good service ... in someone else's cavernous store.

Back then Apple was focusing on the computer-as-appliance design philosophy. They were computers for people who were too cool to know anything about computers. It took a while for their pendulum to swing back to supplying premium computers instead of toasters.

Like GameStop stores now. Zombie company.

Is there still a market for kids with cash and no debit/credit card?

Is that still a thing to build a market around?

I'm surprised that kmart is still around. And staples too, but to a lesser degree.

Staples isn't doing great but there's certainly a market for a local office supplies and services company. Neither Walmart nor Amazon is really a replacement.

There aren't a lot of Kmart locations still around, and I suspect that some of them are in spots where the land is owned and there's some competitive advantage to being there (like the ones in the Florida Keys, where there's no Walmart closer than the mainland).

In NYC I've had good luck with Amazon Prime Now for urgent computer parts. I've gotten an SSD, power supply, and CPU fan for various work needs within a couple hours and without having to go on an excursion.

So thank you, Rube Goldberg machine of human misery, for saving my work day on more than one occasion.

Microcenter has worked for me in NY. And they match Amazon pricing.

Second thumbs up for Micro Center. I like that they have a combination of consumer-level electronics, mid-level stuff like Raspberry Pis, and low-level stuff like resistors and whatnot.

It's a bit of a pain for me to get to MicroCenter (about an hour one the train), but it has always been useful for me when I'm in a pinch.

When I visit my parents in Orlando, there's a smaller place called "Skycraft" which has a lot of low-level components, but I haven't been able to find an analog to it in NY just yet. Do you know of any?

Tinkersphere Electronics, 152 Allen St (Manhattan) - as the name indicates, hobbyist focused.

Allstate Electronics - Jamaica Queens - Old school distributor, has basically every electronic component under the sun.

If you head out to NJ, there's a couple big shops as well (Wayne Electronics, Green Brook Electronics) but they're not transit-accessible or closer to the city.

Used to be an Allstate Electronics in the Chicago suburbs. Fond memories of that store.

+1 for Tinkersphere, I walked there a few hours ago to get a micro HDMI-to-HDMI and some headers.

Since I first saw the on-going demise of my local Fry's, I've been attempting to buy any computer parts from my local Microcenter, even if it is a little more expensive.

I don't want them to go out of business too!

7 years ago I moved from a place with a microcenter to a place with frys. I was really excited since I heard so many great things, I was instantly disappointed. It just doesn’t compare.

Microcenter does the job here. I do miss heading to frys and just browsing around though :(.

I want to love microcenter, it is the type of store that should be my favorite place to be.

Unfortunately, I haven't had a single good experience. Many issues were smaller things, but the single most upsetting was the time I found what I wanted (after being ignore by sales reps for awhile) only to be swarmed by reps trying to put their stickers on the box to get a commission while I walked to check out.

And then people wonder why my first instinct to buy anything is to go online and have it shipped to me.

Perhaps ironically, Microcenter's Santa Clara store endured a death spiral a decade(?) ago that looked similar to what Fry's is suffering now.

Back in the day, I had an expense budget at Intel that allowed me to purchase anything I needed for my lab from Frys...

I used to buy gear there and often would find failures...

I would return them to Fry's but in doing so would mark the box with a sharpie in a known place (to me)

I would always check back in the aisles for my returned items and would frequently find them replaced on the shelves to be sold again - knowing that they were bad items.

So Frys would be wasting multiple peoples time, plus their own resources on throwing shit that I tested bad in my lab at Intel back on the shelves...

One time, I went through ELEVEN returns of some SuperMicro mobos that were all bad... (SuperMicro had a REALLY shitty run in the late 90s, early 2000s)

Frys is dead to me know though, for the most part.

The prices in these flagship Akihabara stores are much higher than you'd see online though (20%). You can either search the side alleys there looking for a good deal, or try to negotiate with the salespeople on the floor there. Here in the US, at Fry's and Best Buy I've seen, they'll match Amazon's price without having to do any deal-making.

Most Japanese electronics stores including Yodobashi Camera have point-based discount systems. If you have a membership card, you get 10% of your purchase back in points, which can be used on the next purchase. Of course, prices can still be high.

And yes, you can often negotiate with salespeople, particularly on higher priced items. At a store like Yodobashi Camera, I think it's possible to negotiate for more points on your point card.

At smaller electronics stores, particularly out of the city, negotiating price is more common. I was once looking at a TV at a store (I think K's Denki) towards closing time and the salesman walked over with a calculator and gave me 20% off without me even initiating the negotiation.

I didn't know about Fry's closing until this article, and that makes me sad. It's one of the first places I went to when I moved to the bay area in 2002.

But yeah since I moved to SF it just doesn't make sense to drive down to Palo Alto to buy computer stuff. The traffic kills it :-(

I think the last time I went to Fry's was like 2011 or 2012 :-( I think part of the loss of customers may have to do with younger people moving to SF instead of Palo Alto / Mountain View? In addition to them buying online.

Interestingly I remember my first roommate in 2002 was the one who told me about Newegg.

I just visited Yodobashi in Akihabara and was impressed with the energy and selection, but the prices were awful: At least 50% higher than US prices for many things. Some of this might be due to the yen/dollar exchange rate but I didn't notice particularly high prices on other products in Japan--just stuff at Yodobashi.

But unlike Best Buy, at Yodobashi and BIC Camera you can buy a personal radiation monitor!

Still, you're right — you're paying for convenience and selection when you go to the big electronics stores in Japan.

I try to be conscious of where the things I buy are manufactured. Sadly, the last two items I bought at Yodobashi (a radio and a voice recorder) were made in China. When I asked the salespeople if they had any made in Japan, they seemed very sad (ashamed?) to deliver the answer.

I'd bet they stock the radiation monitors since Fukushima only. And that when another one blows up in another country it would be the same. Though i'm not absolutely sure about that, because i remember reading news headlines about a run on them, and being out of stock in germany because of that at the times.

I think smartphones, laptops, streaming and online shopping really decimated this retail sector.

Even lots of power users just use laptops (and AWS) and don't buy components. And sales of consumer electronics like point and shoot cameras, DVD and CD players, GPSes, etc. have fallen off a cliff.

I'm not sure what the numbers show, but I think, as people who are interested in tech, we often forget a large segment of the population needs some in-person assistance when choosing new devices. My dad asks me every time he needs a new laptop, TV, or whatever. He has no interest in doing the research himself.

Anecdotally, my local Best Buy is always packed. I do a good amount of shopping online, but I also like to get certain things in person when possible. To me, it's much more satisfying to buy something and be able to use it on the same day.

> I'm not sure what the numbers show, but I think, as people who are interested in tech, we often forget a large segment of the population needs some in-person assistance when choosing new devices. My dad asks me every time he needs a new laptop, TV, or whatever. He has no interest in doing the research himself.

Sounds like you could make a good business out of being an "online shopping guide", to help people pick the right [whatever] out of an endless array of [whatever]s. Do credit cards offer this as a concierge service at some level?

That sounds like what wirecutter.com does these days across a pretty wide selection of product categories. Just got a new pillow through them after drowning in Amazon reviews looking for a good side sleeping pillow.

Sure, there are reviewers that publish "objectively best for use-case X" reviews. But they don't review niche product-categories on demand, nor do they filter by your weird personal requirements (say... needing the tool you're buying to be made out of a material that will survive having other parts TIG-welded onto it.) Though I guess you could track down the people that write for one of these sites and commission them?

Those are good points, for sure!

I recall a point where I was had to go to Frys because places like Quement Electronics, etc. closed down. Frys was always a "hold your nose" and "be careful/picky" sort of place. Often they restocked bad returns, I had problems with them giving out bad ram at times, etc. Generally, the employees weren't particularly knowledgable either.

It's sad to see it go, especially Palo Alto. It felt like they expanded incredibly rapidly - including to Sacramento/Roseville, southern CA and WA state.

I've been using Newegg almost exclusively these days for components. But, yes, the lack of instant gratification can be trying.

I wouldn't call it hold your nose but I did run into problems with bad returns getting restocked and what I assume was employee theft in the form of putting bad items in new boxes that weren't marked as returns. (And for which the serial # wouldn't match, that's how I realized what was up.)

> I recall a point where I was had to go to Frys because places like Quement Electronics, etc. closed down. Frys was always a "hold your nose" and "be careful/picky" sort of place. Often they restocked bad returns, I had problems with them giving out bad ram at times, etc. Generally, the employees weren't particularly knowledgable either.

Yup. I remember a whole lot of scammy behavior on the part of reps, too. After I picked up a box running after me to try and get me to let them write it up for commission. Lies from sales reps. RAM inventory being 80%+ bad, taking 3 trips to try and get a working set and realize that I had been being sold the same DIMM I had just returned (I finally put a dot on it with a sharpie).

There's fewer choices than ever for electronic components and misc fixings in the Silicon Valley. Fry's is gone, Radio Shack is gone, Halted is gone, Weird Stuff is gone, a lot of the computer shops are gone (and the ones that remain are dodgier than ever), Triangle Machinery is gone, etc. We've got Alltronics and Jameco and Excess Solutions now...

Weird Stuff is probably my most missed place. I always found something worth buying even if wandering by on lunch. It was dangerous when I worked a few blocks away from there.

I've stayed away from newegg since they got bought by a chinese company and allowed third party vendors. The prices are rarely the best anymore

And selection seems terrible.

The last time I bought something from Newegg was maybe five years ago. Since then, I've never been able to find what I want in stock on their web site.

What's a reliable alternative to Newegg nowadays?

Honestly, Amazon. I usually find a microcenter because the drive (90miles) results in money saved anyways

I usually purchase my computer components from Newegg.

It’s unfortunate to see Fry’s in the zombified state that it’s in.

I'm not trying to be a jerk, but what did you think was going to happen?

Your mention of the Akihabara market brought to memory a thread at theradioboard filled with useful info and photos. http://theradioboard.com/rb/viewtopic.php?t=5558

That market is a dream place for any electronics enthusiast, at least those who grew when an electronics shop wasn't a cellphone reseller. I wish there was some way of purchasing those Aitendo modules in the EU at decent prices. Unfortunately some stores are closing over there as well, albeit much slower than in other places.

> the electronics stores of Tokyo, particularly Yodobashi Camera and Yamada Denki

And not only Tokyo. Yodobashi has a couple of dozen stores throughout Japan, some of them, such as Yokohama and Umeda (Osaka), as big as the flagship in Akihabara. They're a good source for household appliances, too.

I live in Yokohama, and I shop at Yodobashi not for the prices but for the service: More than once a salesperson has saved me a lot of trouble by confirming that whatever I bought (a monitor, a hard drive, a cable) was actually compatible with the computer I was using. The staff know their products, and they are willing to give up sales in order to keep from selling people something they can't use. That makes me a more loyal customer.

Yodobashi seems to have a lot of Chinese-speaking staff these days, which is understandable considering the large number of Chinese tourists in Japan in recent years. Probably some of the staff speak English, too, though I've never asked.

They do assist English speakers, but it's the usual deal for Japan: If you ask a question in English, they recognize it immediately and call a staff member over who can at least speak some English. If you begin your query with "Ohayo Gozaimasu" and are courteous, they try very hard to help you.

Everything in Tokyo is because of density.

> I travel to Japan regularly

Sorry for prying, but I'm curious. Is this for business? Do you plan your flights around travel sales? How's your Japanese?

I'm asking because I'd like for similar arrangements.

we dont have big akihabara tech marts like japan does and frys was the closest but there are still some good local shops

for computer stuff and some consumer electronics there are a bunch of central computers and in the south bay theres anchor for electronic components and excess for surplus

Well I guess the problem is everyone else uses the store in the same way.

Our Fry's in Austin had a "real tough front" on returns. You had to go through a lot of BS to return anything. I wonder if that contributed to the downfall, and if Fry's in other states were tough on returns as well . . . obviously Bezos and company has had an impact

Same here in CA, you had to wait in line forever, have them dig through your boxes taking everything out, then stand waiting for a manager to also come over and do the same thing and then approve it.

That happened to me the last time I seriously shopped there (excluding subsequent visits with my kids for historical/tourism reasons). Returned a brand-new, unwrapped HP PC and watched in horror as the returns clerk clumsily defiled its pristine seal right in front of me. I assume it was later wrapped right back up again, but there's no way a roughed-up item like that would have ever been the same.

I get the risk of fraud and all that, but it seems the Palo Alto Fry's didn't understand the corresponding brand cost of selling blemished merchandise as new.