Well, we are not all geeks building our own walkie-talkies instead of buying them ready to go out of the box.
It sure used to be fun to pull out all those drawers and look at those part though.
Fun aside, I know what you mean. Most their activity seems to be as a cell phone store. But when I need a consumer electronic item it is the first place I go. They are very good at that.
Well if you were, Radio Shack wouldn't be going out of business! (/humor)
Seriously, Radio Shack isn't even good for the occasional spare part anymore. It used to be I could go to RS and find any resistor, transistor or capacitor I needed to fix something. As the years have gone by, the parts they stock and keep in the store just kept dwindling. Personally I knew they were doomed when it cost more to order a part from their catalog in shipping cost alone, than the part itself cost.
Not sure what they were thinking relying on cheap remote control cars and cellphones as their business model.
how about the days when the parts were displayed proudly on pegboards and not exiled in drawers? (or selling cables at 6x the price of anywhere else?)
What!?!?!? Soccer blue.
I used to wander through I brainstorm. I ended up designing a circuit around one chip I found in the early 90's. I got an article published (and some cash) out of that one. I may have been able to patent the device, but was a poor broke college kid at the time.