XPost: rec.radio.amateur.boatanchors   
   From: kludge@panix.com   
      
   Rob   wrote:   
   >>   
   >> Halted is one of, if not the last, surplus stores in the   
   >> Valley. I've always visited when in the area.   
   >   
   >This kind of stores (much smaller of course) have closed decades ago here.   
   >They need supply and demand, and both of them are diminishing.   
      
   The supply has changed and moved.  There are now huge components markets   
   in China and Korea that sell manufacturing surplus the way Halted and Poly-Paks   
   used to do.   
      
   The military surplus is still coming out of the pipe, though, and I am seeing   
   lots of people bidding on test equipment and junk at the military auctions,   
   but I am not seeing where it's going.  It's definitely less interesting than   
   it was when I was a kid... lots of generic computer equipment now.   
      
   >The owner says that he lost the profitable business because people search   
   >the internet before buying something, and the only business left basically   
   >was low-value stuff.   
      
   Or stuff that people needed urgently.  As hardware has become more reliable   
   and cheap enough that people could keep spares, there is less of that than   
   there used to be.   
   --scott   
      
   --   
   "C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)