Is there still room for printed catalogs?

Until last year I used to prefer the printed catalogue. Now I have an Android tablet with a 10" screen, the more I can get in searchable .pdf format the better. In Australia we have the element14 catalogue in .pdf and it works very well:

http://au.element14.com/jsp/bespoke/bespoke4.jsp?bespokepage=e14/en_AU/publications_content/publications_catalogue.jsp

Adobe .pdf format is preferable as almost any device can read it. To any distrubutors out there - don't fall into the trap of only making an 'iPad' app and calling this an electronic catalogue... not everyone has or wants an iPad, and you will alienate customers.

I prefer paper based catalogues (maybe I'm now officially old), I find it easier to thumb through, make notes plus I can view two pages at the one time as well as fast flicking back and forth. I have to admit my eyesight isn't as good as it once was and I find concentrating on a monitor a bit hard on the eyes.

I have the same problem with datasheets, if it is more than two pages and contains information that I need to study deeply, I print them out. I miss the old datasheet books.

I do use online catalogues but really only when I know exactly what I'm looking for.

B

Both printed and digital catalogues have pros and cons.

I will give example from my experience:

- when I know the product (name) for which I need information it is easier to find it using a digital catalogue with the help of a find/search function.

- recently I needed to order a connector but I only knew how it looks. I found what I needed very quickly by browsing the pages of a printed catalogue and finding the picture of the product.

So: A and B

Printed catalogs are ok, it's easy o find something looking at the pictures, but I rather find more usefull a good online Search Function, with it you can easily narrow your search and find out about stock availability and current pricing. So I wouldn't be upset if printed catalogs disapear.

By the other hand I really don't like PDF catalogs. It has none of the advantages of printed catalogs or online searchable catalogs.

I'm with bodgy and Cristian-Gyozo on this one. While searching through a digital copy can be a time saver, searching through images can be time consuming. Not sure about others, but I don't always end up working with a computer in front of me. Having a paper copy of some things can be much easier (Reading datasheets on the train in the morning anyone?). While it is good to go for the more environmentally friendly, I'd quite like to see paper copies still available as an option. One option would be to make them available for a small charge. For some catalogs that I know will be a good reference, I wouldn't mind paying a few dollars/pounds/whatever towards it.

(B) - I'm for on-line all the way. The online version is always more up to date, and if done right allows for more information to be made available to me (sample code, for one). If the online version is done nicely, it should be just as easy to find something by picture or otherwise in the online version as it would be in the printed version. I guess a PDF or an app would be useful for off-line browsing.

I rather like the way BoltDepot.com does their online catalog, though it wouldn't work so well for all industries.

If you go to their site and click the Fastener Info link at the top it takes you to a set of pages with pictures of all the various types of fasteners so you can identify exactly what you want by what it looks like.  Very handy if you want, say, a split lock washer instead of a toothed lock washer.  Infact you don't even need to know what the piece you're replacing is, just match up the picture.

(Disclaimer: I don't work for boltdepot, or get paid to advertise them, I just think they're really cool guys and gals and love what they've been doing to support a certain Chris Boden .)

Most sites are not disimilar to how B&Q do their online catalog... if you know exactly what you're looking for you might be able to find it, otherwise you could be hunting a while.

Online catalogs are probably the way forward, purely for their "updatedness" though reach is much better since you don't have to actually get the catalogs to potential customers, but the bigger companies really need to make an effort to make their catalogs easier to navigate.

Printable datasheets are a must though.

While I still like the paper catelogues, the web has made them mostly obsolete.  I can now find much more information about components and subsystems much faster online than I ever could paging through catalogs, which were often years out of date.

So save the trees, use the internet.

DAB

I to find electronic catalogue better but it also fun to imagine what to build with a paper one

Anna