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Comment by simonsarris | Hacker News Reader

The only knowledge I have of Radio Shack is when I went in and found the tinest of commodities - things like single LEDs and audio connectors and flashlights - to be priced so high it was almost unreal.

Is this still true of the place? Or did I go during a bad period in their history?

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I walked in last year wondering if I could get RJ45 ethernet caps at a decent price. As I recall, they were 8.99 for five (NB: used in pairs). After shipping, I wound up buying 100 from Monoprice, for about a dollar more.

are they even still called "Radio Shack"? or is it "The Shack" now? They use to be the most amazing place ever, and would supply components and things to keep you busy beyond your wildest imagination. and at cheap prices too! Some kids went to the mall for the arcade. Radio Shack was my arcade. But that was decades ago..

No, they're still called Radio Shack. Not that they bear much resemblance nowadays. I saw (and programmed) my first TRS-80 there. Ah, halcyon days - now they're a phone store and the bookstore in the same mall - the bookstore where I bought Gödel, Escher, Bach and I Will Fear No Evil on the same day - is dead.

We need new cool stuff. The old stuff's all sad.

It has been a while since I've even considered buying components from them but over the past couple of years I've gone into them looking for things like USB cables and HDMI cables, only to leave in disgust when seeing the cost was about twice what the same thing would cost at Best Buy (and Best Buy itself is already ~4x more expensive than buying such things online at monoprice, etc).

Wire. I buy wire at Radio Shack.

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