Author Topic: Need a one stop component shop (Read 11685 times)

izdalion · « **on:** January 23, 2012, 01:00:38 PM »

I've been trolling around a crap load of component sites but it's either big bucks or not all the things I need are there. Does anyone know a good place to go that has decent prices, decent shipping time, and a variety of stuff? I have tried digikey, mouser, cascade to name a few but not to sure on if there's better options out there. No Ebay please most of them take forever to ship or the shipping is more then the product unless you can prove me wrong on that.
Thanks everyone

Breaktru · « **Reply #1 on:** January 23, 2012, 03:48:24 PM »

I buy 90% of my stuff from Digikey. Shipping only takes a couple of days and only a couple of bucks.
I agree not to buy from ebay. Most of the parts are crap. I only buy quality parts because I take pride in what I build and what I put in it. Resistors, caps, pots, IC's are cheap enough and saving a few pennies on ebay for lesser quality is not worth it. Of course unless you are buy thousands of a part and looking for a high profit margin and don't care how crappy the part and tolerances are.

CraigHB · « **Reply #2 on:** January 23, 2012, 05:48:02 PM »

Buying electronic components from eBay is not a consideration for me either. It's just not reliable enough. If you get sent an incorrect or faulty part and don't realize it, you can pull your hair out for hours trying to figure out why your circuit doesn't work. For things like switches and adapters, no problem, eBay has some good deals.

For chips and other components, I always go to one of the major electronics vendors like Mouser, Digikey, or Newark. There's some other major vendors that have better prices though. Pretty much any vendor listed at http://www.findchips.com/. Digikey seems to have the highest prices followed by Mouser. Sometimes, you can get small quantities factory direct for good prices.

izdalion · « **Reply #3 on:** January 25, 2012, 01:12:22 AM »

Okay so I been trolling around even more component sites now and still no luck on price. I keep pricing stuff out at digikey hoping this time I don't cry like a girl when I see the price

but it never changes LOL well I guess it's going to be awhile longer so unil then anymore ideas guys

Haileah · « **Reply #4 on:** November 18, 2013, 02:35:30 PM »

What are you looking for exactly?

c1truz · « **Reply #5 on:** November 20, 2013, 09:30:57 AM »

I was having the same problem. One place has half the parts in stock. The other place has the other half. As much as I wanted to order from a single location, I had to eventually use multiple. Not what I wanted because paying multiple shipping charges adds up. Especially when you are only spending 10 bucks here and 10 bucks there with 3-5 dollar shipping each place.

DjKiDD · « **Reply #6 on:** November 22, 2013, 11:44:35 AM »

Yes it can be very frustrating when Digikey has some of the components you need and Mouser carries the other ones...

CraigHB · « **Reply #7 on:** November 22, 2013, 03:14:34 PM »

If you only need a few small items, Mouser will use USPS first class mail if you ask them to in the shipping instructions. It's usually only a buck or two. It slows down processing time, but it avoids the annoyance of paying for priority mail on a couple dollars worth of parts.

I don't use Digikey much because their prices are higher, but I've used them before when they're the only ones that have something in stock. Don't recall what the deal is on shipping with them, they're my last stop usually. If Mouser doesn't have something, I'll check Newark next. They have pretty good prices, usually better than Mouser, but they dont' have nearly the stock.

c1truz · « **Reply #8 on:** November 22, 2013, 11:36:13 PM »

I just used digikey because they had usps first class as an option on shipping. Which was better than their higher prices. Didnt know u could request it at mouser. Shipping was $2.85 vs $5.99 If I remember correctly.

CraigHB · « **Reply #9 on:** November 23, 2013, 04:01:05 AM »

I just got something from Mouser via first class mail yesterday, needed some capacitors right away for something. I asked them to send it first class and they charged me $1.86 for shipping. It was only a couple bucks worth of parts so that was great, got them really quick too. The parts were 11 cents each from Mouser. Just to see, I looked at Digikey and the same parts are 29 cents each.

Typically I try to wait until I have a parts list to some extent to justify shipping costs. Sometimes I need something right away and don't really have anything to combine to make it worth the shipping. Requesting first class mail does cause a delay of about a day, but it's about a day faster than priority between me and Mouser's warehouse. Comes out the same in lead time and it's a lot cheaper.

DjKiDD · « **Reply #10 on:** November 23, 2013, 01:01:47 PM »

I buy almost exclusively from Mouser unless they don't stock the part I need... I like that you can make projects and add parts to them on Mousers site. Then you can order the whole BOM at once as a package.

CraigHB · « **Reply #11 on:** November 23, 2013, 01:13:08 PM »

Their parts search and other tools like the project manager are unrivaled. Every time I have to use Digikey's parts search I cringe. It's like why don't you people upgrade your damn web site, it's been like that for years. Newark's parts search is tolerable though.