Radio Shack to go under

[armdnrdy]

Another one bites the dust!

Radio Shack is leaving from a city near you! This one is in Greensberg Indiana (between Indianapolis and Cincinnati)

http://www.greensburgdailynews.com/local/x1196465629/RadioShack-closing-succumbs-to-online-big-box-competition

[tubegeek]

Radio Shack to close 1,100 stores:

http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/markets/2014/03/04/radio-shack-to-close-stores/6007317/

[Govmnt_Lacky]

Maybe they should have save the money from the Superbowl commercial... 

[therecordingart]

I wish Radio Shack wasn't just an overpriced crappy electronics store. If it were me, I'd gut the place and only sell name brand gadgets and expand the DIY parts selection, but priced more competitively.

Stuff like REAL r/c cars (Losi, Team Associated, etc), r/c helicopters, gizmos, and doo-dads...the electronics that people spend a fortune on. Kinda like a brick 'n' mortar version of thisiswhyimbroke.com or Think Geek.

[therecordingart]

Duplicate.

[armdnrdy]

I believe we are past the beginning of the end. Three more days will mark the 30th day that RS stock has traded below $1.00.

http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2014/jun/20/radioshack-stock-closes-below-1-share/

https://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4GGHP_enUS450US450&q=radio+shack+stock

[Mac Walker]

"Credit-default swaps now imply a 45 percent chance of default in December and 86 percent by June 2015, according to data compiled by Bloomberg."

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-05-13/radioshack-lenders-seen-escalating-default-risk-distressed-debt.html

I had on my list to buy their pre-calibrated hall effect sensor, lol......anyone know where I can get one, to quantify pickup magnet strength.....

[vigilante397]

Reasons I need Radioschack:

1) It's the only place in town I've found Ferric Chloride

2) Sometimes I don't have time to wait for Tayda or I left something off my Tayda order.

3) See "1."

[armdnrdy]

Reasons I need Radioschack:

1) It's the only place in town I've found Ferric Chloride

2) Sometimes I don't have time to wait for Tayda or I left something off my Tayda order.

3) See "1."

Well....I feel the same way! I don't want to see them go for much the same reasons but...
I don't think that your purchase of a few bottles of ferric chloride, or my purchase of a few items a year is going to make much of a difference whether they stay in business or close their doors.
It's all about profit. You cannot sustain a business losing millions of dollars per year!

[Mark Hammer]

Reasons I need Radioschack:

1) It's the only place in town I've found Ferric Chloride

2) Sometimes I don't have time to wait for Tayda or I left something off my Tayda order.

3) See "1."

There was a period during the mid-1980's when RS Color Computers were hugely popular with farmers and midwestern types.  At least going by the content of the magazines for the CoCo.  And the reason was pretty simple: for a lot of folks in rural areas, it was pretty much the only place around where you could actually buy a computer, and the various add-ons that went with them at the time.  Bear in mind this was long before we ever dreamed of ordering on-line.

[vigilante397]

Reasons I need Radioschack:

1) It's the only place in town I've found Ferric Chloride

2) Sometimes I don't have time to wait for Tayda or I left something off my Tayda order.

3) See "1."

Well....I feel the same way! I don't want to see them go for much the same reasons but...
I don't think that your purchase of a few bottles of ferric chloride, or my purchase of a few items a year is going to make much of a difference whether they stay in business or close their doors.
It's all about profit. You cannot sustain a business losing millions of dollars per year!

Very true. Last time I went in the worker told me that in the 5 years he worked there I was the first person to buy ferric What is the world coming to?

[armdnrdy]

Very true. Last time I went in the worker told me that in the 5 years he worked there I was the first person to buy ferric What is the world coming to?

You don't need ferric chloride to talk on a cellphone or play a video game! 

We live in a different time. The consumer generation. I believe that we are the last of the DIY, roll up your sleeves and get you hands dirty kind of folks.

[R.G.]

We live in a different time. The consumer generation. I believe that we are the last of the DIY, roll up your sleeves and get you hands dirty kind of folks.

Actually, I think we live in the resurgance of DIY. I actually thought I might be the last person on the planet that wanted to build guitar effects in the late 80s. The movement in this and other DIY areas is astonishing. It's so big that, as one example, main stream electronics suppliers have started stocking parts specifically for electronics build. Mouser, for instance, now has footswitches, 9V dc relays, and Bourns "guitar series" potentiometers. That was simply unheard of in the late 80s. Finding **A** dpdt footswitch was a major undertaking, let alone having choices.

At that time, simply getting a PCB of any kind made in quantities under 100 of each meant you were going to hand-draw and hand-etch your own. Places that would make under 100 pieces of a design for under several hundred dollars simply did not exist.

We are, comparatively, living in the Second Golden Age. The 80s also provided no way to find information on electronics if you were not in the industry. Today's pedals sites are a cornucopia. Someone who came to this only after, say, 2000, thinks that today's state is normal. That's astonishing to me, but I realize that many effects builders could not yet READ when the internet started passing around information about circuits.

But then I remember days when I had to walk to school in the snow, without shoes, up-hill, both ways... 

I suspect the third golden age will arrive with the improvements in programmed manufacture when the economical quantity to manufacture will tend towards one. Interestingly, that third step may be getting closer. I just saw a news story about a fashion designer using knitting/sewing robots to make high-fashion ladie's dresses. See "Natalia Allen". It's not replicator technology, quite, but it's getting better.

[armdnrdy]

Actually, I think we live in the resurgance of DIY.

I have to agree with you there but...
I think the internet has everything to do with it. Information, (schematics, board images, sites such as this) as well as access to components.

The point I was trying (but failed) to make is: I'm not sure if the torch is going to be carried or even lighted after this round is over.
From conversation content, I get the impression that the average age of DIYers hovers closer to my age (51) than post pubescence.

I also see a trend in the workplace where the younger generation is good at technology based tasks, but not so good at physically fixing or building things....to the point of possessing absolutely no mechanical ability whatsoever!  

[Jdansti]

>I think the internet has everything to do with it. Information, (schematics, board images, sites such as this) as well as access to components.

Yep. Radio Shack hasn't kept up with the availability and pricing of components online. Probably because they focuses their business model on trying to sell phones in brick and mortar locations. 

>I also see a trend in the workplace where the younger generation is good at technology based tasks, but not so good at physically fixing things....to the point of possessing absolutely no mechanical ability whatsoever!

Another yep. It's sad that we have a whole generation of wussie men who can't change a tire, oil, or belts on their cars and women who can't boil eggs.

[nocentelli]

Actually, I think we live in the resurgance of DIY.

I have to agree with you there but...

+1

I tried to build a fuzz pedal around 1992, aged 16, with a 1970's electronics projects book from the library and the parts from Maplin. Needless to say it didn't work, and there was absolutely no way I could find any information to put it right. Fifteen years later, when I searched the internet in 2007 for a possible way to fix my dodgy Smallstone, a whole new world was waiting...

[nocentelli]

It's sad that we have a whole generation of wussie men who can't change a tire, oil, or belts on their cars and women who can't boil eggs.

What about women who can't change a tire, oil, or belts on their cars or men who can't boil eggs?

[Jdansti]

^I guess my post might seem sexist. It was based my home's separation of duties.  It seems that in this new world of gender equality, both sexes have given up the ability to do anything for themselves. I still stand by my assertion that a man who doesn't know how to change the oil in his car is a wussie. 

Of course not all young folk are wussies.  There are exceptions as shown by some of the young stars on this forum.

[bluebunny]

We've learned two things here.

1. R.G. was clearly raised in Yorkshire.
2. John needs a little help boiling eggs (but not changing oil).

Everything else I agree with.   

[R.G.]

1. R.G. was clearly raised in Yorkshire.

Was the giveaway the snow, no shoes, or uphill both ways?   

I agree with one of Robert A. Heinlein's characters in that I think people should be versatile, and that specialization is for insects.

I can change oil, cook decent chili, construct stick-build buildings, make sabayon, replace piston rings, use a lathe. I have sewn myself a dress shirt from the fabric up, done cross-stitch needlework, and chipped flint into cutting tools as well as hunted with a cord sling. That last is a great way to diet, by the way.  You can eat anything that you run down and kill. 

I must admit that I'm somewhat baffled by reverse split arbitrage, though. Still studying that one. And I doubt I'll ever be able to remove my own appendix.