The internet--a technological and cultural revolution of endless free flowing knowledge--has completely changed the way I research and learn about new topics: instead of going to a book store to buy books, I order them off the internet and have them delivered.

Most brick and cement based book stores can only stock the most recent releases and a few of the classics. Special orders can take weeks or even months; books are supplied to stores from numerous warehouses, and even if a book is in stock within the country the store may have to wait weeks for enough orders to accumulate before they have satisfied the minimum order requirements and have a reasonable volume for shipping from a particular wholesaler.

You can get around these problems by buying from the largest technical book stores, ordering from the extensive stocks of internet sites, or by becoming a community member of one of the cavernous university libraries.

All prices and rates and conditions quoted in this article are as of September 2009.

Boffins Technical and Specialists Books

Boffins Technical and Specialists Books should be familiar to any tinkerer that has lived in Perth in the last twenty years. They have a good selection of electronics, engineering and mathematics books, but like most retailers tend to only stock recently released titles and a few of the top selling classics.

Boffins also handle high volumes of special orders, and can order most technical books in. Depending on the book it may take anywhere between a few days and a few weeks. Up front payment is usually required, either by credit card or an in-store payment, and you can call or e-mail the store for pricing and ordering times for special orders.

The Boffins web site lists a small selection of titles (when compared to the titles available under special order) and can also be used to check what books are in stock; the site includes an option to Show in-stock items only once a subject area has been selected. Books on the site tend to be titles that have been released recently and that are either in stock or were recently in stock.

Amazon

Amazon is the most well known online book store. Relatively hard to find titles like Oscillator Design and Computer Simulation (Rhea), High Speed Digital Design (Johnson and Grahame), Fields and Waves in Communication Electronics (Ramo, Whinnery and Duzer), and Communications Receivers (Rohde and Whitaker) are always in stock. It is a challenge to find books that Amazon do not have in stock.

A number of costs need to be factored in to an Amazon order:

• Amazon charges very competitive international freight rates for standard and expedited postal shipping (arriving by Australia Post), and for express courier shipping (DHL). The charges are calculated per shipment and per item, and are shown below for books shipped to Australia:

  Shipping	Delivery	Per Shipment	Per Item
  Standard Shipping	18 to 32 business days	$4.99 USD	$4.99 USD
  Expedited Shipping	8 to 16 business days	$13.99 USD	$5.99 USD
  Priority Courier Shipping	3 to 5 business days	$29.99 USD	$5.99 USD

  The per shipment costs make it more practical to wait until you have a few books to buy before placing an order. The amortized freight prices per book are:

  Books	Standard	Expedited	Priority Courier
  1	$9.98 USD	$19.98 USD	$35.98 USD
  2	$7.49 USD	$12.99 USD	$20.99 USD
  3	$6.65 USD	$10.65 USD	$15.99 USD
  4	$6.24 USD	$9.49 USD	$13.49 USD
  5	$5.99 USD	$8.79 USD	$11.99 USD
  6	$5.82 USD	$8.32 USD	$10.99 USD
  7	$5.70 USD	$7.99 USD	$10.27 USD
  8	$5.61 USD	$7.74 USD	$9.74 USD
  9	$5.54 USD	$7.54 USD	$9.32 USD
  10	$5.49 USD	$7.39 USD	$8.99 USD

  Priority Courier shipments can be tracked in real time on the web, and delivery to Perth usually takes 4 to 6 days, depending on the day of the week the order is dispatched. For Perth, the overnight leg from Sydney or Singapore usually prevents delivery from taking only 3 days. The downside to Priority Courier shipping is that you end up checking the tracking web site several times a day, somewhat like a kid waiting for Christmas.

• A foreign currency conversion fee of between 1% to 3%. Check the rate for your card and bank, as it might be cheaper to use one card over another if you have several cards.

• For orders exceeding $1000 AUD (including freight charges), customs duties, goods and services tax and customs brokerage fees may be due. Customs duty is typically 5%, the goods and services tax is charged at 10%, and the carrier may charge between $10 to $20 for "security fees" or "disbursment fees". Amazon will calculate customs duties and take a deposit before delivery. Other suppliers may not; the carrier will contact you directly for payment before delivery. Check the Customs web site for details on how duties are calculated, and contact the carrier to check for any fees.

  Some number of years ago the limit for courier shipments was $250 AUD. This is no longer the case.

Amazon in general ships all of the books of an order in a single box, using plastic air bags to protect the books in shipping.

Be aware that in some cases Amazon will offer to sell a book from a third party seller. Make sure the title you are buying is marked as "Ships from and sold by Amazon.com"; if it does not, check if you are looking at the latest edition of the book. Usually books offered by third party sellers on Amazon are either previous editions or are very old and very out of print.

Book Depository

Book Depository have a very similar range to Amazon, but offer free shipping to Australia. As with Amazon, books like Oscillator Design and Computer Simulation (Rhea), High Speed Digital Design (Johnson and Grahame), Fields and Waves in Communication Electronics (Ramo, Whinnery and Duzer), and Communications Receivers (Rohde and Whitaker) are always in stock.

The free shipping service is by Royal Mail Priority Airmail and amazingly--while the quoted delivery time is 7 to 14 days--it usually only takes 5 to 7 working days for books to arrive in Perth, including processing times.

The books are shipped individually in cardboard carriers, and are delivered by Australia Post Courier vans. Because items are shipped individually and there are no shipping costs, it costs no extra to order one book at a time. Books are dispatched as soon as they are available; a single order may arrive as several packages over the space of a few days.

The costs for purchasing books from Book Depository are:

• A foreign currency conversion fee on your credit card, as discussed in the previous section on Amazon.

• Duties and taxes on orders exceeding $1000. Although books are shipped individually an order may still attract duties and tax, since the Australian Customs Department advise that they will apply the $1000 limit if a number of separate packages are sent to the same address in close succession.

Book Depository can display prices and charge orders in either British Pounds, US Dollars or Euros.

The University of Western Australia

The libraries of The University of Western Australia are colossal resources, and you don't even need to be a student or staff member to apply for a membership. A community membership gives you similar rights to a student, including borrowing rights for up to thirty books for up to six weeks. Memberships are $165 per year, or $99 for active members of the UWA Graduate Association.

When using the online catalogue, the location field of an item is important; there are numerous subject libraries around the University campus, and the main library is mainly dedicated to social sciences.

The Co-op Bookshop

The Co-op Bookshop at The University of Western Australia is also worth a visit if you happen to be in Crawley. They carry course related books for Engineering and Mathematics courses (and many others) and a very extensive collection of popular science books.

The co-op bookshop also offers a membership card for $20 that, in most cases, will pay for itself on your first purchase.

Also, if you look over 30 years of age you may be mistaken for a University staff member and given a staff discount.

Comparison

The following table compares books from an Australian retailer and Amazon and Book Depository. The comparison prices include:

• A currency conversion fee of 2%, which represents a typical rate charged on credit cards.

• Conversion from US Dollars to Australian Dollars at $0.70 AUD to $1.00 USD and $90.00 AUD to $1.00 AUD. Between 2005 and the middle of 2008 the (market) rate steadily rose from $0.70 to $0.95, and from 2005 to 2009 never went below $0.64.

• Amazon Expedited Shipping (8 to 16 business days) amortized for an order of five books, and no shipping charges for Book Depository.

The Australian Retailer prices do not include shipping.

Amazon uses dynamic pricing; the prices listed below are for a particular day in September 2009, using my personal Amazon account. I have a long history of purchases, which may affect the prices quoted.

The prices shown below are for comparison purposes only. Prices may vary due to dynamic and per account pricing, price changes and freight surcharges.

I have switched to buying most of my electronics related books from Book Depository. Amazon has slightly lower prices on most books, but require larger orders to get reasonable freight rates.

If you have any experiences buying books from various retailers or recommendations, please write in.