[XGJFilmsX]

Looking for sites and possible electronic waehouses to buy mass amounts of OP amps.

Got any ideas?

 

[Vergency]

Quote:

Originally Posted by XGJFilmsX /img/forum/go_quote.gif Looking for sites and possible electronic waehouses to buy mass amounts of OP amps. Got any ideas?

Buy direct; the semiconductor will probably give you the best offer for bulk.

 

[balou]

Could you define 'massive'? 1k, 10k, 50? Almost all distributors have quantity discounts. And as Vergency said, if you hit the 1k barrier, you can buy directly from the manufacturer (they usually show their opamp price for 1k orders)

 

[XGJFilmsX]

i guess will say 1k,
any manufactures that i should know about?

 

[applegd]

Quote:

Originally Posted by XGJFilmsX /img/forum/go_quote.gif i guess will say 1k, any manufactures that i should know about?

The real question is what opAMP chip you want? e.g. 627/367, you should know who is manufacturer...

 

[balou]

Analog Devices, Texas Instruments, National Semiconductor. These three hold the lions share of the high quality opamp business. New Japan Radio has quite a big marketshare too, but they target more the low-end market.

 

[pinkfloyd4ever]

if you don't mind me asking, What do you need this many op-amps for?

 

[XGJFilmsX]

^^^^^to make a massive mountain of op amps and to role around in them,

actually i was thinking of making an investment, buying OP amps and them selling them on ebay, from what i have seen it looks like a nice investment.

 

[majkel]

Buy LM4562's in SOIC package and let me know when you offer them on ebay shipped to Poland.

 

[XGJFilmsX]

I'm possibly planning on buying a wide variety
some nice ones and some lower quality ones
I just want to find some good places to buy

and i plan on shipping world wide if i get this started

 

[XGJFilmsX]

any other suggestions on some to buy, of various qualities?

 

[balou]

I second the LM4562.
OPA627/OPA637 should be very easy to sell (and you could probably achieve the highest absolute margin on them - they're expensive, but that means that a say 10% margin will pay off much more). ok, 12.25$ @1k would be quite an investment...
AD744 - PPA says they're the best he ever heard
OPA2132/OPA2134 - the cheapies everyones buying at some point in his amp-making career

 

[majkel]

AD744, OPA627 and OPA637 are overhyped IMHO. They sound natural, realistic but actually dead, with no impact. The best I ever heard is probably AD825 but it's not perfect, either. What you can do with the op-amps is to look for the synergy between different types cooperating in the same circuit.

Places to buy: Spoerle, DigiKey, Farnell, RS Components, Elfa - depending on the localization

When really high amounts are considered, talk to the vendors: Texas Instruments, Analog Devices, National Instruments, Maxim IC, Linear Technology

 

[threepointone]

In my chip-hunting experience, it's not easy to get most audiophile chips any cheaper than retail unless you're really buying in bulk (honestly, if you're just doing an ebay operation the pricing even at 1k isn't going to be cheap enough to justify the investment). The "warehouse" discount stores I've seen generally don't have any nice chips like the opa627/opa637, which I'd imagine have already been eaten up by the companies that really need them (i.e. non-audio purposes) every time TI screws up with keeping them in stock (as in right now). Also, despite the fact that they're supposed to be "warehouse discount stores," the fact that they often target to hobbyists usually means that a whole lot of their stuff is actually more expensive that mouser/digikey prices.

Then there's those gray market chip supplier people (like the 100+ IC buy/quote websites you get when you type, say "buy OPA627" in google), some of whom might actually have some excess stocks of some good chips, and most of whom are probably counterfeiters or have counterfeit stocks. Probably not a good place to go.

Of course, then you could get them direct from the manufacturer--the problem with this, as a lot of people have mentioned before, is that they usually have a minimum order of about 1,000 or so, which, considering the fact that you want to stock up on several different chip types and that you want to sell to individuals over ebay, is probably just not worth it (at these quantities IC manufacturers don't sell things for much more than the distributors, who probably have special pricing from the manufacturer) and beyond the investment you're willing to put into this.

Honestly, I don't see much of a profit margin in reselling these chips, especially at ebay-ish quantities. However, it probably would be a good idea to help purchase parts and resell them internationally (see majkel's post), as many of them cannot easily purchase a lot of electronics parts. You'd be doing a good service to them, and you might also make a bit of money off of it.

 

[ericj]

Frankly, most of the people turning a profit on high quality opamps on ebay are selling free samples they got from the manufacturers.

And if you start doing that, we'll have to hurt you.