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Electronics Surplus Shop 'WeirdStuff Warehouse' Is Closing (fastcompany.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the one-door-closes-another-opens dept.

Fast Company's harrymcc writes: When technological goods are no longer of use to anyone in Silicon Valley, they end up in the WeirdStuff Warehouse -- where, it turns out, there often is someone willing to pay for them. Sadly, the 32-year-old Sunnyvale store is closing forever on Sunday. I paid a final visit and, as usual, felt like I could rummage through this vast storehouse of obsolete gadgets and software forever. WeirdStuff first made an appearance on Slashdot in 2003 when editor chrisd asked Slashdotters about their favorite surplus stores. Also mentioned was Skycraft.

3 of 99 comments (clear)

  1. Modern bit-banging by DrYak · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Computers used to have hackable buses, parallel ports that were basically just pins on a TTL chip, and serial ports that were easy to bit-bang.

    This niche has since been reborn and taken back into our hands, thanks to Raspberry Pi, Arduino, and all the numerous other that came after and all feature GPIO.

    Today, I am afraid to even open the case on my Macbook. I need a microscope to see the traces on the PCB. Everything is BGA.

    But luckily, that iShiny still has USB ports and Ethernet/Wifi, so you can still communicate and control the modern devices that still allow the same level of fun.
    (Now with even less risk to blow up your expensive laptop, and only blow up instead a cheap credit-card sized computer or micro-controller)

    But home hardware hacking is dying.

    Until they reach the point where they want to do some cool hardware stuff (robotics, home automation): think arduino controlling valves to make a water show in the garden.

    --
    "Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
  2. Re:Silicon Valley is dying by thegarbz · · Score: 3, Insightful

    One thing is missing here - why it is closing? The answer is - because Google has

    Nope, wrong. The answer is because the world has changed. Shopping habits have changed. Desire to repair equipment has changed. People's life expectancy has changed.

    This has nothing to do with Google, and even less to do with Seattle. These places are closing all over the western world.

  3. Re: Silicon Valley is dying by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful

    Found the google shill.

    Can't you admen go back to Madison Avenue?