I think A9 still exists as a search subsidiary, it's just that the consumer-facing portions were discontinued. A lot of A9 alumni now hold leadership positions in Google Search.

Not if you are looking for something outside the typical scope.

I buy tons of wierd automotive parts that are not 'well known' and usually end up using Google to find products on Amazon.

Their search engine is actually pretty limiting in some ways.

Really? I thought they have the worst. Check https://twitter.com/chx/status/360508662227292160 this for example.

Not really, almost every search requires me to apply filters. I wouldn't say it's very smart at all.

Last I checked, it's impossible to do a useful "sort by price" for many items. I was looking for...I think it was a 3.5mm audio splitter, and I wanted to find the cheapest one. Searching by relevance mostly returned 3.5mm audio splitters, but dozens and dozens in no particular order. Searching by price returned every single thing in the database with "splitter," "audio," or "3.5mm" in the name or description. Frustrating.