Not only here but in all other forums related to electronics I participate, I find surprising the troubles that amateurs go into getting "good prices" for components that even in the most expensive places could cost little more than a sandwich, a beer, not even a full meal.

Before you read further, let me tell you that for a very long time I had zero funds to buy anything related to my hobby and even today, I seldom spend any serious money on it at all. I started salvaging components from very old RF equipment to build my first (succesful) modified CW transmitter for AM in the 80 / 40 m bands. My income does not allow to spend freely unless I plan seriously. Not a rich guy here.

Reading of people spending weeks, even months, to find a component costing just few cents less than what could cost buying near home and when ordered, taking weeks to reach their door, if at all, still amazes me. Always time involved.

I have seen EEs advicing noobs on buying cheaper components when all they try to do is to build just one board that, even if succesful, nobody would take the pain to replicate in the future. I know, for professionals, that should be / is kind a "knee jerk" reaction but with little use here I think. In my daily job we also do, plan and execute, thinking of several thousand dollars spent in every six-hours period but as an amateur my view is different.

Myself, already approaching the end of a long journey with an imperfect outcome in many aspects, I still try to avoid spending (or it is wasting?) my TIME, the sole asset that me nor nobody for the case, could bring me back.

This rant, please note, it is not about EEs; not at all. It is about amateurs and their TIME.

In case you did not think of it, I offer another line of tought: why did I spend my TIME to write this? Such is life, I guess.

Flaming expected but let me offer my (real) sympathy to all involved in this hobby.

 

There are a number of reasons why people do this -- some of them reasonable and some of them not.

It is often the case that people, particularly students, have lots of cheap time and very little available funds. So for them scavenging or hitting surplus stores is quite possibly a pretty reasonable approach. Plus, they learn a heck of a lot more about lots of things while doing it, so it's not time completely wasted. It's also often quite fun, in a young-person kind of way. To cap it off, they seldom think about the value of their time because, at that age, they have all the time in the world left to them.

Usually the money-value-of-time starts rearing it's head when they start doing something for other than fun (especially if someone else is paying them a wage to do it).

I've certainly found as I get older that I place an increasingly high value on my time -- simple supply and demand. I'm willing to spend it doing something I like that doesn't pay and consider that a good trade, so I have no real problem with folks that spend lots of time trying to save a few cents on parts IF they get a commensurate value of enjoyment out of doing so. Some folks do -- I just don't anymore.

But it would be nice if more folks gave more thought to the costs other than the purchase price of parts, including time to find the part, time to get the part, time to figure out why the part doesn't work, time to find a part that does, time to get their money back from the cheap parts, etc., etc.

 

I’ve noted the same tendency. Time is money. If it takes me an hour to save $0.10, I’ve just devalued my time to ten cents an hour. I used to bill out @ $250/hr. How far would I have fallen?

And there is another danger of a noob seeking the lowest price. He may not be familiar with datasheets and may order a device with different specs that won’t work in his design.

 

I'm thankful that I've finally reached a point in my life where I can afford to buy quality components and not worry much about the price-- and being retired, to finally have the time to play with them.

Life is good.