I looked around and didn't see a general thread dedicated to electronics stuff that is obviously more expensive that is should be. So here is it.
There is obviously a grey area here, where the manufacturer needs to recoup some engineering cost, but sometimes it's just expensive because it can be. (or sold to the government, as noted below)
Post up.
but sometimes it's just expensive because ...
... Its for the government
How about when it compounds... "mil-spec" crimp pin crimper!
Overpriced Stuff?
Pretty much everything at the moment. Even pasta. So.
Solder paste and flux are two that immediately come to mind! Dear, Lord!
Bendix 6900. I just want a pretty one for my shelf.
Just go ahead on Digi-Key, pick any category and reverse sort by price.
You will find things like $1000 opamps, LDOs, CAN transcievers etc... because they are some sort of milspec, space specified, extreme temperature range etc..
Also industrial stuff can be ridiculously expensive for what it is. You can easily pay 100s of bucks for a simple temperature sensor or indicator light.
Not test equipment, but how about a $200K record player?
https://www.safeandsoundhq.com/products/acoustic-signature-invictus-neo-turntable?
Anyway, sometimes things are expensive because they are low volume and have a relatively inefficient production process.
Who buys such a thing. Not my taste anyway, this new fangled design.
About overinflated prices, just look on aliexpress at stuff you bought a couple of years back and compare it with the prices now. Times two to three easy.
Any hardware containing the words 'enterprise', 'pro' or 'Apple'.
Actually it is not the stupid pricing that's the problem, it's the STUPID PAYING. People, just stop.
Audiophile or audio grade are often terms which overinflate the price.
Most SMD to breadboard breakout adapters. You can order for yourself a se of say TSSOP to 2.54mm breadboard pin self-designed PCBs dirt cheap, but buying such adapters as pre-made products (not with any SMD part on them yet though) is perhaps 10 times the price. This may only be the case for low volume users since the very cheap PCB houses have come in to existence, the prices for adapter boards would have looked more reasonable when ordering PCBs was trickier/pricier.
flux cleaner spray. If you use as intended, you get very little out of a can. Easy to use a whole can on a standard size equipment PCB (i.e. 10x8 inches).
HDMI cables from these guys
Featuring 72V bias technology for... er... ummm... better something or other?
Those prices are even dumber than I thought possible. $50k for a pair of 12-foot, 10 gauge speaker wires with connectors. For $15 you can make your own, even if you stick with such oversized wire.
flux cleaner spray. If you use as intended, you get very little out of a can. Easy to use a whole can on a standard size equipment PCB (i.e. 10x8 inches).
Yes, it’s easy to do that, but entirely unnecessary. You don’t use it by drenching the board and rinsing over and over, you use small amounts through wipes. Think of the way you clean windows with Windex. Sponge bath, not shower.
I used to clean boards with lots of liquid, but I realized that careful scrubbing with the wipe actually works better (less chance of redepositing flux elsewhere on the board), and uses
far less solvent.
I looked around and didn't see a general thread dedicated to electronics stuff that is obviously more expensive that is should be. So here is it.
There is obviously a grey area here, where the manufacturer needs to recoup some engineering cost, but sometimes it's just expensive because it can be. (or sold to the government, as noted below)
How about the $400 USB-to-RS485/RS422 adapter cables from National Instruments? (Things that are available from name brands for $30-100, $130ish for galvanically isolated ones.)
but sometimes it's just expensive because ...
... Its for the government
How about when it compounds... "mil-spec" crimp pin crimper!
Honestly, $500-1000 for a mil-spec crimper doesn’t seem all that unreasonable to me, especially in comparison to $2 to $60
contacts (for things which cost maybe 40¢ for non-mil-spec).
One of the most expensive substances in the universe: inkjet printer ink.
flux cleaner spray. If you use as intended, you get very little out of a can. Easy to use a whole can on a standard size equipment PCB (i.e. 10x8 inches).
Yes, it’s easy to do that, but entirely unnecessary. You don’t use it by drenching the board and rinsing over and over, you use small amounts through wipes. Think of the way you clean windows with Windex. Sponge bath, not shower.
I used to clean boards with lots of liquid, but I realized that careful scrubbing with the wipe actually works better (less chance of redepositing flux elsewhere on the board), and uses far less solvent.
if you have alot of parts its mad annoying to try to do that. Like a board that you solder a bunch of stuff too in the middle of equipment with tons of solder wires and bolts and brackets and other shit.
Like I replaced a bunch of composite resistors scattered around a PCB that had like 50 wires, a few brackets, caps, etc. Trying to go between all that with a brush is really bad. But I was able to tilt it, spray a whole can of flux remover in there, and it came out OK after 10 min of work rather then like an hour with probobly lifted traces, replaced wires (if you resolder the creep too much and they will be too tight with 1 more strip).. if you use the brush on the can with a flood, it does work pretty good, but only do it if you know that you just don't have the patience to make it brush accessible.
And its the only good way to get stuff like flux that is under transistor plastic/ceramic spacers for instance, where you solder the transistor with the loose spacer on top of it. When you add flux some comes out the top, unless you want to do a submersion, you won't get that out without a good flow from experience.
And no idea about stuff like QFP soldered with rosin flux... or BGA, I imagine you also need to flood that good. But at that point you pretty much need a ultrasonic I think.. how to be confident there is no flux under a BGA ?
One of the most expensive substances in the universe: inkjet printer ink.
Obviously at >1000$/L they can afford to use ID chips to protect you the consumer from only buying the good stuff.
Ugh.
Hilarious when during chip shortage, some printer mfgr couldn't get their ID chips so had to tell their customers on how to ignore/bypass the "warnings" that would appear as the machine thought it was 'illegal' ink.
This is a breakout board to go from a JLink EDU Mini to the full size connector.
[......]
And the EDU mini even includes the 10-pin cable as well, if that's the only thing you care about, as after some while it can develop some bad connections due to wire cracks..
Saw the EDU mini listed at Adafruit for 60$ this week. I got an email late at night saying it was instock with 200+ pcs. Thought I'd order one next day.. all gone. Thought I check if Adafruit@Mouser would have some in, but they still list the original price (25$ or so), and probably tons of backorders so no way they are going to send patiently waiting customers "cheap" JLinks.
Feels almost like scalping practices. I had ordered one last year at Mouser. Hopefully I will get it somewhere in 2024 I suppose
The SWD debugger market for hobbyists is really in a poor state. I don't care about OSS dongles or dongles that work via OpenOCD. Neither support my ERF32MG22 chipset with m33 security processor (which has some funny stuff around resetting and reprogramming). So I *need* the JLink GDB server for that. For time being I'm trying to work with a patched OpenOCD but with mixed results
Higher end FPGA's ordered in qty of 1.
They shouldn't be 10,20,50x their volume price.
Overpriced Stuff = rip off or ROI, take your pick.
BTW, what is the currently accepted ROI ?