No Mini-PCI at Fry's. Bummer.
Today, I discovered that Fry's Electronics, once a bastion of computer/network/electronics geekery, is now completely irrelevant. I was shopping for a new mini-PCI wireless NIC, since my Intel chipset whatever-its-called OEM NIC that came with my IBM/Legend ThinkPad has always been weird and flakey, and I finally got sick of it. So, I packed one of the kids up in the car and bopped over to Fry's -- only to be told, "we don't carry laptop internal components except memory and hard drives." What?! Laptops aren't exactly alien technology... Maybe Fry's back in San Jose is still a 20,000 sqft flea market of every device you'd ever need, but at least here in Austin, it's basically a bargain-basement version of Best Buy, and I have the sneaking suspicion that I'm the last to figure this out.
Anyway, sure, I could have gone for the PC-Card or USB compact NICs, but I hate having stuff sticking out the side of the computer -- I move it around a lot in a pretty small backpack, and I fly occasionally, so I'm always afraid I'm going to snap stuff like that off. So I did what I should have done in the first place, and spent 20 minutes looking for a mini-PCI NIC online.
At the suggestion of a friend, I felt that if I'm going for a new NIC, I may as well get the hotrod of them all -- so I bought a Ubiquiti Super Range 9 from BSC for $129.95 -- so now I'll totally be able to see every network in my zipcode. Sweet! And all for only 3x the price of a typical Linksys/D-Link ugly-stick-out-the-side card.
Anyway, sure, I could have gone for the PC-Card or USB compact NICs, but I hate having stuff sticking out the side of the computer -- I move it around a lot in a pretty small backpack, and I fly occasionally, so I'm always afraid I'm going to snap stuff like that off. So I did what I should have done in the first place, and spent 20 minutes looking for a mini-PCI NIC online.
At the suggestion of a friend, I felt that if I'm going for a new NIC, I may as well get the hotrod of them all -- so I bought a Ubiquiti Super Range 9 from BSC for $129.95 -- so now I'll totally be able to see every network in my zipcode. Sweet! And all for only 3x the price of a typical Linksys/D-Link ugly-stick-out-the-side card.
Labels: wlan nic mini-PCI fry's retail
posted by todb at 2:42 PM
2 Comments:
Disaster!
I was going to present a lame little talk tonight at AHA! about how one goes about souping up a laptop with a badass NIC, but to my horror, I ran into the dreaded IBM Thinkpad 1802 error. And the stock workarounds don't work on my T43, which is post-Legend IBM. NOoooooo!!!!!
So now my talk is devolved into a DON'T LET THIS HAPPEN TO YOU! fable. Sucky.
I will have a fix by next month's AHA!, though.
AHA!, yes...Another piece of evidence that the seething morass of brainless know-nothings that Charles Fry employs have gone out of their way to drive a potential customer away from making an informed purchase. I had the same problem when I asked if they had a particular stick of RAM for my notebook. Bear in mind that they do carry memory, just not all types of memory. Not that they know everything/anything about their own inventory, but they gave me the "what a funny little purple 'alien' creature you are" look. It was as if I was speaking some form of language that their universal translators couldn't decipher. All I asked for was a Micro-Dimm and I suddenly had boils and an incurable disease that they didn't want to come in contact with.
So, I followed suit and did a little (un poquito) searching and got a terrific deal online. They really need to require that their associates keep up with the times and technology trends, so they might be able to generate a repeat customer, even if they didn't have what I needed THAT time.
Price aside, Altex was the place to be before the Fry's giant came to Austin. Ah, back in our good ol' days in Dell Online with Bob Sheldon, the parts guru, who could tell you where to get the very best deal locally for anything you ever wanted. Now that I have left the live music capital of the world to join up with Steve and Bill in Redmond, I miss that option. -Todd
Post a Comment
Links to this post:
Create a Link
<< Home