Panthip Plaza - IT Paradise or Rip Off?

A couple of days ago (seems longer), I wrote about a quick sortie my daughter and I made to Fortune Tower to buy a couple of IT items. This has not my usual destination for such purchases, but during the recent troubles in Bangkok, Panthip Plaza had been closed for business, and I didn't know when it was to re-open.

Yesterday, it opened it's doors once more, and I was off to spend several hours walking around (and round, and round) to check the latest "toys" on offer.

I prefer to catch the BTS Skytrain to Ratchathewi Station, then walk down Thanon Phetchaburi. A distance of approximately 750 meters. One of the first things I noticed as I approached the building, was the lack of people milling around the entrance. At first, I thought it may not be open, but as I stepped through the doors, the familiar vista of shops and signage welcomed me. It was a nice change to the normal hustle and bustle of my many previous visits. Most of the shops were open, and only some of the small outlets in the main foyer had been cleared out for reasons unknown.

Although I love to just wonder around and "window shop", I did have a short shopping list for the day. A hard disk drive for a Media Player I wanted to upgrade, an Apple Airport Extreme, and any other nick knacks that took my fancy.

I found the required drive relatively quickly. I wanted the largest IDE drive I could find. Being a bit obsolete, the largest I could find was 500gb. That should do very nicely. By my calculations, saved about $20 than if I bought it back in OZ.

The Airport Extreme. Now that was harder to find. I was only able to locate 2 shops that served up genuine Apple products. One didn't have the item, the other had it, but there was little to no saving by getting it here. So I didn't! I will continue to search through eBay for a second hand one when I get back to Melbourne.

Now for the nick knacks. A new cover and screen protector for my iPhone. A suction device for holding my iPod to the windscreen of my car. And that's about it. Savings on these? They were about half the price of back home.

Several hours later, perhaps kilometers of walking, I decided to call it a successful day. It was probably one of my best experiences at Panthip Plaza, mainly due to the reduce number of shoppers. With that, I returned home to play with my new "toys" and upgrade the Media Player. That job in itself was a marathon, but that's another story.

So what of the question I posed in the title of this blog? Well, Panthip Plaza it a little of both. If you know what your are looking for, and the prices you would expect be paying back home, you can find yourself a bargain or two. Just beware of counterfeits, and keep your hand on your wallet to ward off pickpockets.