I was planning on leaving the city today, but after seeing a hint of the electronics market yesterday I knew I’d have to stay another day. My friend said it is possibly the largest market in Asia. Since most of those factories are in southern China and most gets exported through Hong Kong, I think it is possible. Xbox hacker Bunnie has more to say about this market.
I entered the main building, 10 floors of vendors and small shops. The upper floors had a lot of computer accessories. The lower floors had mostly small electronics parts. There was probably about 100 tiny businesses on each floor, so about 1000 for the entire building. And there is not just one building, but many up and down the street. Across the street there were some brand new buildings, six floors each and they looked like they opened up last week and vendors are beginning to move in. Endless shops selling cables, chips, connectors, cases, computers, and everything else made in China.
There was one thing I was looking for: a new battery for my laptop computer. One year of heavy use has taken its toll on the battery. Even though there are so many shops, it is hard to find one thing in particular since there is just too much there! I brought my battery along and tried my luck with some shops selling Dell computers, but they don’t have batteries. One shop was able to find someone with an official Dell battery, but it was kind of expensive. I wanted the aftermarket one. One shop ended up finding the battery I was looking for and I got the eBay price (without the shipping) of $50. I’d have to say it is easier to buy on eBay over trying to find something in the endless rows of shops.
Another note about the battery. I was trying to find out how old it was, and I was looking at the sticker on there. It said 2008-03-11, which was today! I have no idea where the battery came from because I didn’t find a shop with those things piled high myself. But they must mark that date when it leaves this market in this city. So I must be close to the source!
I think I finally found the mysterious origin of all those cheap parts on eBay that say they are shipped from Hong Kong. People in Hong Kong must come here and buy here which is as close to a factory as you can get, then they can sell them overseas from Hong Kong.