I think I'm in love...

...with a website!

If you need to find a datasheet for a part, check out:

www.freetradezone.com

You need to register to use it, which means the Partminer people get your
contact info, but you can at least opt-out from their e-mail list.

The cool thing is that they seem to have the extire CAPSExpert database
online and searchable. CAPSExpert was/is(?) this huge pay service for
finding data and crosses on electronic components. We had it at work (this
horrible DOS thing with like 75 CD's worth of database!), but I never got
around to using it.

HOWEVER...

Having it on a website is VERY cool!

For example I just signed up and grabbed datasheets (in PDF form) for:
82S09, MB3730, TMS29F816, MC3245, BU409D, BU207, HA11244, MR1-1600, etc...

A couple very nice things:

1) "Family Docs"- often it knows parts in the same family, so my search on
the 82S09 yielded a nice list of all the Signetics bipolar PROMs, Bipolar
SRAMs, etc.

2) "Status"- for everything it finds it shows
"Active|Discontinued|Historical" status. So if you type in "AM6012", you'll
see that Philips has discontinued it, ST Microelectroncs has discontinued
it, AMD has a couple active parts still, and Maxim has some active parts
still.

It also lists app-notes, etc. It's hard to tell how up-to-date the
information is for crosses (for example, I'd be surprised if AMD was still
making and AM6012's-- but if you ordered a millions supposedly it's still
"active" if you can get their attention to build 'em).

You can do wild-card searches, parametric selection, partial numbers, etc.
It works for transistors and diodes too (like that MR1-1600 HV diode for
GO-5's!).

So what's the catch, I hear you ask? Aside from the contact info you have
to provide (which I suppose need not be entirely accurate ;-)...

During the week it's the SLOWEST WEBPAGE I'VE EVER USED!!! However, here on
Saturday, it's totally peppy. :-) Friday though, it was completely unusable
for me (I'm on a cable modem too).

Have fun!

-Clay
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Received on Sat Sep 30 11:02:31 2000