Accurian Display Issue

[Mike Walker]

I agree XTalker. I've actually refused, asking "Why the hell do you need that? I'm paying CASH!" They said it was "demographic information". VERY intrusive. Another really bad Radio Shack policy!

Let's give 'em their due, however. They bring many products to rural areas that wouldn't otherwise be available without a LONG trip. Tried buying a component audio receiver, shortwave radio, or antenna rotor at Wal Mart?

The Shack has it's faults, but electronics geeks just can't stay away for long. From capacitors and cables, to tubes and reel-to-reel tape, I don't know how small market radio would have made it all these decades without "The Shack". From pretty LED level meters to hands-free phones (long before the phone company offered 'em, and anyone had herad of a "hybrid"), remote control door latches to headphone amplifiers, remote starts for cd and tape machines to "cough switches", I can't name the number of hand-made, homebrew doo-dads I've seen (and even helped build) at various radio stations through the years. God bless "The Shack"!

 

[Chuck]

Let's give 'em their due, however. They bring many products to rural areas that wouldn't otherwise be available without a LONG trip. Tried buying a component audio receiver, shortwave radio, or antenna rotor at Wal Mart?

Perhaps they have brought some items to rural America, but maybe you ought to take another look at your local Wal-Mart. The Super Wal-Mart in Kilgore, TX, does stock an outdoor TV antenna, and I've even seen a rotor there as well. They have a couple of varieties of RF amplifiers, switches, RF splitters, cable, etc. They also have most common patch cables and a bunch of things I never thought I'd nerer see at Wal-Mart. I'd guess they have at least 30 varieties of HDTV's in stock, several surround systems, ranging from the abysmal to the reasonably good, quite a few computers, networking equipment, and lots of accessories. Of course, they have radios, cell phones from the major suppliers, conventional TV's, DVD players/recorders, VCR's, telephones and telephone accessories, as well as car stereos. A lot of it is recognized brand names like Sony, Pioneer, Panasonic, Sanyo, Sharp, Linksys, Compaq, Philips, Lexmark, Koss, etc. It looks kind of like Radio Shack, but a lot bigger.

 

[700WLW]

I agree XTalker. I've actually refused, asking "Why the hell do you need that? I'm paying CASH!" They said it was "demographic information". VERY intrusive. Another really bad Radio Shack policy!

Let's give 'em their due, however. They bring many products to rural areas that wouldn't otherwise be available without a LONG trip. Tried buying a component audio receiver, shortwave radio, or antenna rotor at Wal Mart?

The Shack has it's faults, but electronics geeks just can't stay away for long. From capacitors and cables, to tubes and reel-to-reel tape, I don't know how small market radio would have made it all these decades without "The Shack". From pretty LED level meters to hands-free phones (long before the phone company offered 'em, and anyone had herad of a "hybrid"), remote control door latches to headphone amplifiers, remote starts for cd and tape machines to "cough switches", I can't name the number of hand-made, homebrew doo-dads I've seen (and even helped build) at various radio stations through the years. God bless "The Shack"!

Best Buy, Circuit City, Target, etc. have taken most of RS's business away; RS is just a shell, of the electronics store, they once were - let's, ask the experts:

"Radio Shack........yuch"

"as soon as radio shack liquidates the few remaining quality goods it has
left in stock, it will be dead... btw, the parts bins, which i suppose
were brought in to make more display room, are now a real mess in
most stores... before, you'd go in and stare at 'em hanging on the wall,
but now you have to rifle through all the drawers and check adjacent
bins to find what you need - and the quality and quantity of parts is
going down, down, down, while the prices are going up..."

"I f'ing get annoyed how they don't seem to know jack about even the most
basic things, but they can spew out stuff about cell phones until your
teeth hurt ! ENOUGH WITH THE F'ING CELL PHONES !!!!!"

http://groups.google.com/group/rec....adio+shack+yuch&rnum=1&hl=en#0c751276af8c8821

Here ! Here !

"Other Radio Shack discontenued SW radios? More options"

"When RS closed out the DX-398, I remember they also discontinued
some other SWs."

"I stop at every RS I see. I have not seen any closeout radio since the war
started. Each RS has the same story, when the war started everyone has tried
to get any type of shortwave radio. The guy told me yesterday that they will
not get any shortwave in for a while cause their warehouse is e m p t y.
Don't know how true that is."

http://groups.google.com/group/rec....k+discontinued&rnum=16&hl=en#258b23fb98f49fda

"Radio Shack 2003 catalog More options"

"exactly... today i entered "antenna AM loop"... i had to repost the information 11 times... the search engine finally comes up with 550 matches... AFAIK they only have one &%$#ing loop in the store! then i start using their 'product catalog' drill-down menu... reposting 3 times.. getting nowhere... i'm off to 'view by catagory'... THIS looks better but upon closer inspection the catagories are screwy... there is no catagory called 'RADIO'... isn't this RADIO shack? this site sucks, screwed again... then i put 'loop' into the search engine, yes i'm getting desperate: great only 64 matches... number 13, i hit paydirt... AM LOOP ANTENNA... their website stalls again... report... i made it! 10 minutes later now i see their loop... i have climbed Rat Shack's equivalent of mount everest. deja vu." i hope that when the guy who made the site dies that God sits him down and says "and you know what your worst sin was?" "that time i didn't use a pocket protector and spilled ink on my shirt?" "NO, WORSE, IT'S THAT TERRIBLE WEBSITE YOU DESIGNED!" i doubt this offense will get him into hell but if there is a Radio Shack in heaven God may revoke his Battery Club Card.'

http://groups.google.com/group/rec....ck+catalog+2003&rnum=1&hl=en#0a839705966beec5

Only losers, like MSN Direct and Radio Shack, have agreed to team up, with the HD Radio Cartel:

http://www.google.com/trends?q="hd+radio",+"msn+direct",+xm,+sirius,+podcast

 

[hipporadio]

Agreed Hippo. The hell of it is, Radio Shack's original RCA receivers were identical to the previous Optimus brand receivers, which were re-badged Pioneer! OPTIMUS had a better name among audiophiles than RCA, for God's sake! If you're going to offer the same stuff under another name, how about PIONEER...the people who made the damn things? The Shack has definitely made some weird decisions in recent years!

I guess RS figured that Optimus was a bit more hi-fi-oriented and “90s” then was the old-school Realistic name from their days in Boston, but I could NEVER understand the RCA branding... RS did debut that doomed RCA tone-arm and stylus analog video disk player back in the 80s (just as Pioneer launched the Laser-Disk), but how could they have gained any traction from that boondoggle?

Since the Tandy bros from Texas seem to be taking a beating here today, let me fairly reflect on some fonder memories of “The Shack”... I have purchased (or acquired) nearly a dozen of their audio products from the 70s-90s and NEVER needed to return one due to defect or dissatisfaction. 37-years after power was first applied, I have a fully-functional and good-sounding Realistic STA-65B stereo receiver (even the dial and ss/center-tune meter lamps still glow). My first speakers were the Kloss KLH Model One copy-cats named the Optimist One (their first hi-fi grade offering)—remember the off-white fabric grills? They had very good sound (and cost me only $120 for two on sale)... All the legendary rock tunes I first heard and enjoyed thru that pair! Believe it or not—a “hi-fi salon” actually wanted them as a trade-in for my Advent Loudspeakers in the late 70s! I’ve had four additional pair of their metal and rare wood-cabinet Minimus “performance” speakers in various capacities over the past 20+ years. ALL are still working today. Their C-QUAM AM-stereo tuner was a fine unit—I regret no longer having it (I hear it’s in demand).

And then there were the annual catalogs... I looked forward with zeal to getting them—and still have every edition from 1967 thru the late 90s safely stowed as my electronics “time capsule”... Also those thick Allied Radio “books” (called catalogs) from 1969-1973—I hear that these gems are actually worth some bucks today.

Radio Shack...

“up”—the Optimus One Loudspeaker
“up”—the DX-440 AM/FM/SWL portable
“up”—C-QUAM AM-stereo
“up”—the Realistic TR-999 3-head stereo reel>reel tape deck (my first dream item)
“up”—battery-of-the-month card—the best marketing idea they ever had!

“down”—the RCA video disk
“down”—TRaShDOS PCs
“down”—their decision to scale-back on parts inventory
“down”—quitting publication of their catalogs
“down”—what they’ve “evolved” into today!

I’m going to miss the old “Shack” and those Christmas ’67 walkie-talkies that actually covered all 8-acres of our ground (license required that I never mailed in) Thank-you Radio Shack for saving me from my mother’s endless stays in the department store dressing room! I’ll miss you ‘cause you’ll never be the same again :'(

 

[Tom Wells]

Ahhh, for the parts and the semiconductor-interchange catalog, and stuff that was repairable.
I love my RS video sound processor, RIAA pre-amp, portable stereo cassette recorder, and FM amp.
The video sound processor with DNR (dynamic noise reduction) had some pop-pop-pop oscillations that were fixed by improving grounding internally.
I'm not suprised that the Accurian is disadvantaged by internal noise.
if they'd used an analog pointer, there'd be no need to fight internally generated noise.
Why must convenience be at odds with engineering?
Allied Electronics still exists, separate from RS, mostly catering to industry, but useful to hobbyists still.
Please bring back the days of discrete parts, and products intended to be repairable or "modifiable".
Software/firmware is not electronics.

 

[Mike Walker]

Software/firmware is not electronics, as Tom points out, but it's the "smarts" that runs electronics. I know old timers (myself included) don't want to hear that, but it IS true. And electronics are often "modifiable" in some very useful ways by upgrading the firmware. Look at the "Rockbox" firmware available on the 'net for Archos mp3 recorders. It turns what would have been also-run products into "whoa-nellie...Ipod will never learn that trick!" pocket-rockets, with nary a part-chage in sight!

Let's have open-source firmware for HD Radio!

Say...does anybody remember when Radio Shack once offered ELECTROSTATIC speakers? Oh yes they did...back in the late 60s/early 70s. And in the 80s there was a very nice reel-to-reel recorder, with solenoid controls that was obviously manufactured by TEAC. Then there were those HUGE speakers in the 80s and early 90s with the 15 inch woofers and horn tweeters. They were among the first embraced by the audiophiles who were just getting into single-ended-triode amplifiers at the time (amps wieh VERY low power...but the incredible sensitivity of the Optimus speakers made 'em roar like a superamp!)

I'll admit that since The Shack has cut back on parts and accessories, there's less that they carry that you can't just go to Wal Mart and pick up for less. They really need to take stock of themselves, and remember what the hell makes 'em Radio Shack in the first place! You're telling me that if I want to whip up a pair of speakers in my woodshop, I can't buy the drivers, crossover, and acoustic foam at Radio Shack? What about the damn book with speaker plans?

 

[XTalker]

I still have an old TRS laptop in a box somewhere. Does that make me a geek?

 

[Chuck]

Let's have open-source firmware for HD Radio!

That would be a really great start. That way, smarter people that us might figure out how to make it work right.

 

[jim8230]

Sorry...see below

 

[jim8230]

Hipporadio wrote: "Their C-QUAM AM-stereo tuner was a fine unit—I regret no longer having it (I hear it’s in demand)."

I still have one of these C-QUAM AM-stereo tuners. I thought I was the only person that bought one! (It still works.)

 

[Mike Walker]

Amen, Jim. Open software is actually rather common these days for "radio-geek" products from companies like Icom and Ten-Tec. Why the hell not give us the opportunity of choosing between firmware from other talented radio geeks?

 

[RadioStarOne]

Hipporadio wrote: "Their C-QUAM AM-stereo tuner was a fine unit—I regret no longer having it (I hear it’s in demand)."

I still have one of these C-QUAM AM-stereo tuners. I thought I was the only person that bought one! (It still works.)

I've got one of those C-Quam AM Stereo Tuners sitting on a shelf in my storage unit and it hasn't been used in the last twenty years, or it seems to be at least that long! What are they worth to someone that wants one? Heck I've got a QTA-770 Quad stereo radio receiver sitting on one of the other shelfs in there too! Those were the days!

 

[hipporadio]

Hipporadio wrote: "Their C-QUAM AM-stereo tuner was a fine unit—I regret no longer having it (I hear it’s in demand)."

I still have one of these C-QUAM AM-stereo tuners. I thought I was the only person that bought one! (It still works.)

I've got one of those C-Quam AM Stereo Tuners sitting on a shelf in my storage unit and it hasn't been used in the last twenty years, or it seems to be at least that long! What are they worth to someone that wants one? Heck I've got a QTA-770 Quad stereo radio receiver sitting on one of the other shelfs in there too! Those were the days!

RadioStar... You may wish to dust it off, make sure AC still makes it happy, and drop a line to a really nice music AM station in Myrtle Beach, SC that remains excited about C-QUAM. They have a web-based station contact page at:

http://www.wnmb.net/contact_us.htm

The owner's name was mentioned once in a thread here which was later moved by the "mod" and several posts up and disappeared--including the ones referencing WNMB. Just a thought, but this guy may wish to get his hands on one in decent working order.

Mine was used at a prior AM station, and I forgot to "rescue" it before the sale. I had since aquired a Carver TX-11b with C-QUAM, so I had little need for it. It was a nice AM radio, though!