PC builders in Northern California, prepare for electronics heaven: Micro Center is opening a store in Santa Clara, bringing the holy grail of computer parts shopping to the heart of Silicon Valley.
The store at 5201 Stevens Creek Blvd officially opens to the public on today, May 30, but the retailer held a soft opening on Wednesday, and I checked it out. It attracted well over 100 customers; a long line developed outside the store about 30 minutes after it opened at 10 a.m.
(Credit: PCMag/Michael Kan)
Micro Center gave me a tour before the store held its soft opening on Wednesday morning. (Credit: PCMag/Michael Kan)
“I came here just to see the store,” said Thomas Moore, an IT worker and PC builder. “It’s been painfully obvious that [Micro Center] was missing a presence here.”
Ohio-based Micro Center once had a store in Santa Clara, which is home to several major tech companies, including Nvidia, Intel, and AMD. But in 2012, the retailer shut down the location after failing to reach a lease agreement at its previous location. Now, Micro Center is back with a more modern, brightly lit 40,000-square-foot facility that’s likely to be popular among enthusiasts looking for a hands-on shopping experience.
The store’s full stock of PC parts, including Nvidia’s RTX 5000 series GPUs. (PCMag/Michael Kan)
“It’s the right time, it’s the right place,” said Dan Ackerman, Editor-in-Chief for Micro Center. “There’s such an uptick in people’s interest in build-your-own, and people’s interest in repairability and upgrading.”
That demand was on display as the first customers entered the store. In addition to the line outside, over 40 consumers were also lined up inside the facility to buy a graphics card or CPU, which are locked inside cabinets.
Shoppers crowd the ‘Build Your Own’ PC section. (Credit: PCMag/Michael Kan)
PC builders love Micro Center because its stores are full of PC parts you can actually see and touch. It also carries the most popular PC graphics cards, such as Nvidia’s GeForce RTX 5090 and 5080, which have been hard to find in stock through online retailers.
It truly was a sight to behold. The Santa Clara store had shelves full of not just GPUs and CPUs, but also PC RAM, NVMe storage, power supplies, liquid coolers and fans, along with custom keyboard kits and all kinds of cables and adapters.
(Credit: PCMag/Michael Kan)
Vendor-specific displays inside the store (Credit: PCMag/Michael Kan)
Pedro Rodriguez, who was hoping to snag an RTX 5090, told me, “There’s just something different about seeing [the products] in person,” he said.
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One corner of the store also featured dozens of PC cases, giving customers the chance to physically inspect them. Meanwhile, another side was full of PC monitors and prebuilt desktops and laptops, giving consumers a wide range of computing options.
(Credit: PCMag/Michael Kan)
(Credit: PCMag/Michael Kan)
Micro Center features a much larger selection of PC hardware inventory than traditional retailers. The store also offers 3D-printing filament. (Credit: PCMag/Michael Kan)
A consumer named Erik told me the Santa Clara store was the first time he had ever visited a Micro Center. “It’s a PC gaming wonderland,” he said. “It feels like a de-normified Best Buy. Take a Best Buy and grow it out, where you have more PC-specific things.”
The Santa Clara store also features some more niche products, such as steering wheels for racing sims and an automated shelf that can dispense 3D printer filament in whatever color you desire. Employees at the site can also assemble your desktop PC after you buy all the parts.
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Despite the wide selection, don’t be shocked by the steep prices. Some RTX 5090 models were listed at a staggering $2,999 or more, even though the starting price is supposed to be $1,999. The RTX 5080 wasn’t far behind, with similarly inflated pricing. But in other areas, the Santa Clara store is offering deals on memory and prebuilt desktops and laptops.
Like other Micro Centers, the store offers price matching and accepts online orders for in-store pickup.
Micro Center, which currently only has stores in 19 states, is in the midst of an expansion. The Santa Clara location is its 29th store, and features a design that’s similar to Micro Center’s two other new stores in Miami and Charlotte, North Carolina, which opened last year.
“I think there will definitely be more. I think it’s a very careful consideration,” Ackerman said. “The three stores I have been involved with, the amount of research into exactly where and exactly when is very in-depth. It’s not a lightly-made decision.”
The goal is to ensure the longevity of each Micro Center store. In the meantime, the new Santa Clara location “expects to have over 4,000 graphics cards” this week.
About Michael Kan
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