Mouser has the best prices
DigitalBob
Posts: 1,513
Looks like mouser prices are the lowest, the P1 dip 40 are $7.99, they are $11.19 at Parallax. The P2 edge is $49.00 at Mouser and $79.00 at Parallax. Why no discount for us forum nerds?
Comments
Wow! Looks like Mouser "is" the place for forum nerds
They won't be that price there for long. That's a good find!
I've noticed that, in many cases -- not just with Parallax stuff -- Mouser beats DigiKey, price-wise. But once you add shipping out of Texas, instead of Minnesota, that advantage tends to dwindle a bit on small purchases.
Now we're living in weird times due to chip shortages and the continued (#$%^&*!!!!) ridiculous tariffs on Chinese-sourced goods. If a product's current price is based on the dealer's last cost, that price will surely escalate when the dealer experiences sticker shock upon their next purchase, as VonSzarvas alluded to.
-Phil
My nerd self is buying up on Mouser, the P2's are only a few cents more than Parallax, but only $7 UPS 2 day. Digikey forget about it $26, P2's. 6-7 months ago, someone had 100 Q44's for like $5, I considered buying all 100, but only needed 10 at the time
Be careful, the P2 edge module at mouser is still the Rev. B version, the Parallax site is now showing/shipping the Rev. C version, which is more expensive due to the additional features...
I recently got two of the P2 Edge Rev. C version, so far they are working great...
I will second that - Yes, prices are definitely going up on just about everything, including our beloved IC chips.
Considering the new P2 Edge, Rev C, it is still a bargain with all the new features, and it always was. As an aside, We need to see more imaginative / innovative ideas and projects using the ADC and DAC available on this P2 chip. Most of us are still in the digital i/o mentality, instead of visioning to the new analog i/o .
Hm, in comparison to what exactly do you consider P2 Edge for $79 a bargain? Taking into account, that you need an USB serial and some sort of adapter for the edge connector? ( With still incomplete documentation and no official support of C, instead for a special language "SPIN2", for which there is a library, which needs to grow. )
This price policy together with the language policy force P2 into a really tiny niche. For makers the board with its needed support is way too expensive, for professionals the learning of SPIN2+PASM and the impossibility to reuse the code and the impossibility to scale processor power are high hurdles.
That is an interesting question. I'd like to know the answer too because I can't figure it out myself.
To use the P2 Edge module in a final, small volume product and still make a profit I would have to attach to that product a price tag almost nobody would accept. Going with the high volume product with such a module makes no sense either as it's way too inconvenient and, again, expensive. What remains is a wealthy hobbyist. Are there enough of them out there ? Let's hope so but I myself can't be counted in, unfortunately. Then there is an educational market too but what's the point if you can't convince your commercial employer to use the P2 ?
And please forgive me for saying this but I do not find even a $7.99 as an attractive price for a DIP40 P1 chip. At $11.19 it will just gather dust on the shelves for months or even years.
I suppose if you only use digital i/o the P2 Edge module is probably over kill... BUT if you have a project that uses any amount of ADC or DAC the time and cost of design, layout, testing and software will soon be excessive. Enter the P2. For all the complaints about cost and documentation, etc. it is my go-to choice.
Not withstanding the situation with China, the Covid and chip shortages, the tariffs, and unfair trade practices, pricing subsidies, and all the rest - I am so over it all. I will never buy anything from China again. China stuff is a bargain, an all in bet, until it isn't. Just sayin'
$7 bucks isn’t too bad for the P1, a pic24 is $2-$3 bucks, but only 16 bits. The P2 has 64 pins of I/O, eight 32 bit processors for $18 bucks. The key is making your own boards. The arduino uno is $23 bucks, and you get 14 I/O pins and 6 analog. I can make a P2 board for about $25 bucks.
The prices are less of a problem than that you can't get the QFP chips at all. I guess that's supposed to be resolved in mid November?
Looks like you’ll have to stock up on qfp’s when they come in. Used to be $750 for 100 at arrow, now your looking at $1250.
I was only looking for around 10. I guess we can hope that the prices come back down once the semiconductor and shipping bottlenecks clear up. I can wait.
Those who need to compete in some particular niche market might want to take a minute and see if you can sweet-talk Ken. Published prices are just that. I bet if Ken took a shine to your idea he could make some concessions if it made business sense overall for Parallax.
It wouldn’t be me. I’m only working on hobby projects at present. I had considered using a P1 in a product with an ESP8266 but then we switched to an ESP32-S2 and had enough pins.
I wonder how much fat is built into the P1 and P2. They are custom chips so you have that up front cost to recover. Now the Bs2 is just a Pic16f57 that cost $1, then you flash it in the eprom programmer and sell it for $17-$18 for the dip Oem version. So if you use that as a model, there is some pretty markup in the products. But why be in business if you don’t make $$$$$$.
FLiP module (Parallax #32123) prices for one unit, as of the time of this post:
DigiKey: $37.45
Parallax: $39.95
Jameco: $39.95
Mouser: $43.74
-Phil
Will someone post here when the P1 Q44 chips come back in stock so we can order before they're sold out again?
You can order them right now. They'll ship to you when back in stock. That's it.
You do not have to wait until they have them back in stock to order. I've done that before and it works.
Some of the resellers even charge you the moment they ship, not when you place the order.
Good idea. I sent an email to sales asking them to reserve 10 for me.
I'm not sure if that works. Maybe it does. But what works for sure is just clicking "buy" and specifying quantity. I only used that option. Emails get lost. Orders stick out and you can track the status.
That doesn't seem to be an option at present. The store said to call them or send email to sales@parallax.com. I chose the later.
Ok. My solution is valid when purchasing from Mouser/DigiKey, Farnel.
I have no experience with purchasing directly from Parallax as this has no advantage for the customers from outside of US.
I got a response from sales@parallax.com and am now on the list to receive 10 P1 Q44 chips when they arrive. Too bad they're now over $11 instead of just $8. I guess that's what I get for procrastinating!
I just curious but at what price would be a deal with what you are pointing out in your post here
It really depends on an application you need it for. If the P2 Edge module was to be used in some specialized, highly sophisticated product that has it's market niche and individual product development costs are big enough you can expect to safely neglect the cost of the module itself as it's irrelevant when compared to other costs involved. The key here is the overall profit on the product.
When it comes to the P1 DIL40 packaged chip it's an absolute no go for new designs no matter what price tag it has attached to, with the notable exception of the educational market, where big size and ease of use (when swapping a faulty MCU) are advantageous. Other than that there remains only a spare parts segment of the market for already existing products that use that DIL40 package. I can't see any other use cases for this P1 DIL40 chip. The P1 itself, regardless of the package, can be replaced with other microcontrollers easily these days, if one is not bound to the requirement of actually using only a P1 and that for a fraction of the P1 price. The P1 might be convenient for some use cases but is not irreplaceable. The proof is omnipresent.
In a nutshell, I can't say what price would be considered a bargain. I only buy stuff based on my needs regardless if it's a bargain or not. I could easily spend $1400 for something I need rather than $10 on something that is a bargain but of no use to me.
All right. Maybe that "gathering dust" comment was a tiny bit too harsh. I can see they (Mouser) managed to sell 78 pcs of P1 in DIP40 package at the old $7.99 price over the last 10 days so it's 8 pcs a day on average. Worldwide. If that trend continues the DIL40 chips will be gone in a month or so. Will se how fast the new, $11 ones will sell. I'd be surprised if they sell faster than these current ones.
For those claiming P1 or P2 are expensive, here is a search I just did on Potentiometer, Rotary, Linear, 1K, 1W
https://octopart.com/search?q=P11H1F0G¤cy=USD&specs=0
Seriously?!!! $25 for lowly pot? Looks like it's time to start scavenging old radios and TVs again.
-Phil
To be fair, it is not quite a vanilla 'lowly pot', but an industrial-use targeting, high torque model.
The sort of pot an industrial P2 user might choose ?
That's a stretch. It's like comparing hammers to saws but yeah, the terms like expensive, cheap, fair are relative ones. Expensive for some may be dirt cheap for others, depending on who you ask.
Drilling a simple 1 mm in diameter hole can cost a fraction of a cent but it can cost hundreds of times that much if you have a specific tolerance requirement that is not so easy to be met.
If the price is right for me I do not really care if it's cheap or expensive. It simply doesn't matter.