Hardware SD readers becoming rarer?

FAST6191 · Jan 13, 2020

So my multi card (read SD and a few legacy ones I have to be cool) reader died. That is OK as I needed to upgrade to something that supported SDXC anyway.

Thought I would do the real life thing.

Went to a local computer shop. No we don't have anything like that and looked at me like I was strange.
Went to a supermarket. Plenty of rip off SD cards but no reader.
Went to argos. Plenty of surprisingly affordable SD cards and USB drives but reader was a £20 order in only affair for a piece of junk.

10 years ago I might have paid more in the real world but they would have been everywhere.

Why is this? Has the collective phone and tablet industry both taken out cameras, MP3 players and whatever else and then eaten all the lead paint to stop using expandable memory themselves thus meaning nobody wants one? Did PCs die and people only want them for the devices in question?

subcon959 · Jan 13, 2020

No Currys near you?

gamesquest1 · Jan 13, 2020

yeah I noticed they used to have them in Poundland, now they don't anymore, I guess its just that most PC's and Laptops have them built in at this point or people just go on eBay and get one for £3 so they aren't really worth the shelf space

zfreeman · Jan 13, 2020

After the recession, every company shrank their overhead. Economically, it only makes sense to carry the items that sell the most, like an SD card. In the age of online shopping, carrying something that is bought less often, does not help with cash flow for a brick-and-mortar store to compete.

On a side note, those that are literate in computers might not be the most suave with people.

AmandaRose · Jan 13, 2020

gamesquest1 said:
yeah I noticed they used to have them in Poundland, now they don't anymore, I guess its just that most PC's and Laptops have them built in at this point or people just go on eBay and get one for £3 so they aren't really worth the shelf space

To be fair the ones in poundland were absolutely terrible they worked for about 3 months then fucked up and stopped working. Anyhoo they are definitely hard to find nowadays I have only seen them in Asda and argos as of late. In saying that there are plenty sd readers available on ebay should the need arise to get one.

H1B1Esquire · Jan 13, 2020

I think you should go to random places--I found a lot of random adapters at cell phone (AT&T, Verizon, etc,) shops, some open-box stuff at Best Buy, random things from Wal Mart that were eligible for site-to-store. I don't know the scene over by you, but hell, maybe craigslist can lead you to a new rabbit hole?

AmandaRose · Jan 13, 2020

H1B1Esquire said:
I think you should go to random places--I found a lot of random adapters at cell phone (AT&T, Verizon, etc,) shops, some open-box stuff at Best Buy, random things from Wal Mart that were eligible for site-to-store. I don't know the scene over by you, but hell, maybe craigslist can lead you to a new rabbit hole?

Don’t know about the rest of Britain but its been years since I have seen phone stores selling them here in Scotland. As I said in my previous post yep Asda has them (Asda is owned by Walmart as you suggested) And As for your other suggestion I'm not even sure if we have craigslist here.

Mythical · Jan 13, 2020

Oddly enough all of the ones I won I got were bundles with other products such as sd cards, flashcarts, or console kits

H1B1Esquire · Jan 13, 2020

AmandaRose said:
I'm not even sure if we have craigslist here.

Edingburgh?
https://geo.craigslist.org/iso/gb
But, damn, you guys are lucky:
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/sex-for-rent-advertised-on-craigslist-despite-curbs-gpgkxzsmc

They took away all our sex worker stuff years ago

Originality · Jan 13, 2020

It's an interesting question. I still see them in some of the larger department stores, electronics stores, and the usual Curry's/PCWorld (always relegated to some shelf in a distant corner), but it is true that it's harder to find them in average supermarkets and stores anymore.

The best explanation I can think of is Amazon. It's probably harder for stores to sell them when Chinese sellers put them on Amazon for half the price, and the best salesmen can probably do is try to bundle them in with a more expensive product (laptop or camera). "Buy this amazing £1000 camera and I'll throw in this card reader worth £35! Great value!"

FAST6191 · Jan 14, 2020

Originality said:
It's an interesting question. I still see them in some of the larger department stores, electronics stores, and the usual Curry's/PCWorld (always relegated to some shelf in a distant corner), but it is true that it's harder to find them in average supermarkets and stores anymore.

The best explanation I can think of is Amazon. It's probably harder for stores to sell them when Chinese sellers put them on Amazon for half the price, and the best salesmen can probably do is try to bundle them in with a more expensive product (laptop or camera). "Buy this amazing £1000 camera and I'll throw in this card reader worth £35! Great value!"

I don't necessarily disagree but many of said same places still sold SD cards and the like. I could write off the £10 USB cables and £20 chargers as some combo of idiot/granny/desperation tax and "I'm already here" but all the SD cards and no SD reader... just seemed odd.

gamesquest1 · Jan 14, 2020

FAST6191 said:
I don't necessarily disagree but many of said same places still sold SD cards and the like. I could write off the £10 USB cables and £20 chargers as some combo of idiot/granny/desperation tax and "I'm already here" but all the SD cards and no SD reader... just seemed odd.

I do think it just boils down to demand, if I plucked a number out of thin air and use it as an example, I'm willing to bet for every 5,000 SD cards sold they only sold a couple of SD readers, people buy them for other devices a lot too, likes phones and cameras etc and don't really need a SD card reader to use them, plus the fact pretty much every laptop and even desktop since around 2010 has had a SD card reader built in, or the device your using it on doubles up as a SD card reader in the case of camera/phones, you're left with a very small customer base, you might as well just use that store space to hold another 50 SD cards that will sell regardless

don't get me wrong I would've imagined places like Argos would have 1 or 2 overpriced SD readers in stock at all stores just to bag that desperation sale or to have the staff lay on the pressure sale at the till for the gullible granny "did you need the reader to go with this card, your grandson might be really disappointed if he can't use his SD card on his birthday", but I'm sure they did their costs and figured that 1 sale per month isn't worth the effort

FAST6191 · Jan 14, 2020

I imagine that is the case (had mine not died I would still be using that, and I only got that as SDHC was becoming something I could not ignore, plus as you mention most devices managing their own data for the most part -- time was you had to prep an item but today I mostly only copy photos across for phones) and until recently they likely had maplin (and maybe poundland to hear others tell it -- I did mean to get one but never did, did quite like their small mice and their HDMI and VGA cables though) to compete against as well.

The thing is though Argos didn't, other than the ordering in thing. I do agree someone probably ran a number and thought it not worth the effort but given the amount of wasted space in shelving in most of those places I would have thought a run of SD readers would still be worth having, even if you have to remember to dust it occasionally.

Mostly I just found it odd though so I thought I would make a thread to continue the "times are a changing" theme.

AdenTheThird · Jan 14, 2020

Interesting. There were (are) plenty at my Target when mine died... maybe you just got a bad batch?
I don't think the SD format is outdated just yet-that would be too bad if it was. All the formats we grew up with are slipping right underneath our fingers!

Psionic Roshambo · Jan 15, 2020

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/327...chweb0_0,searchweb201602_2,searchweb201603_53

I ordered the blue one like 2 years ago? As a huge bonus it works with literally everything I have stuck it in.

I even used it to hack my Original Xbox with Splinter Cell and a USB cable adapter.

FAST6191 · Jan 15, 2020

Nice. SD readers that play with the original xbox are not the most common things.

Anyway went to currys. No joy. Went to a bunch of local electronics shops. No joy. Went to carphone warehouse (not that I would have paid what they likely would have asked going by their usual accessory prices). No joy.

Went to asda. £6. Seemingly their in house brand. Batch says middle of last year but didn't see the shelf it came from. Only does up to SDXC but as I don't think I have even knowingly seen SDUC at this point and even had to look that up I doubt it will bother me, at least until it does (to be fair it has only been the last year that places were selling SDXC such that people buy them as a cheap "just need something" card). Sadly no sim card reader on this one.

Oddest thing is it connects via mini USB (as in the one larger than microUSB). Don't think I have seen a new device use one in about 12 years at this point but still. Indeed I might have to remember that in case I am fixing an old GPS or something again.

AdenTheThird · Jan 15, 2020

FAST6191 said:
Nice. SD readers that play with the original xbox are not the most common things.

Anyway went to currys. No joy. Went to a bunch of local electronics shops. No joy. Went to carphone warehouse (not that I would have paid what they likely would have asked going by their usual accessory prices). No joy.

Went to asda. £6. Seemingly their in house brand. Batch says middle of last year but didn't see the shelf it came from. Only does up to SDXC but as I don't think I have even knowingly seen SDUC at this point and even had to look that up I doubt it will bother me, at least until it does (to be fair it has only been the last year that places were selling SDXC such that people buy them as a cheap "just need something" card). Sadly no sim card reader on this one.

Oddest thing is it connects via mini USB (as in the one larger than microUSB). Don't think I have seen a new device use one in about 12 years at this point but still. Indeed I might have to remember that in case I am fixing an old GPS or something again.

Huh. That's odd. Glad you found something though.

Hardware SD readers becoming rarer?

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