First of all, I never accused anyone of trying to rip me off, and secondly, I haven't actually found anyone who makes what I need, hence my post here on this forum. I figure the fabrication costs of a high precision, low noise ZIF socket for a QFN chip are probably quite high and demand probably isn't high enough to justify large production runs that would bring the unit price down. If you're an engineer working on a high frequency, noise sensitive circuit or you need to test/burn/etc dozens of chips, I'm sure that they're necessary and the price is justified. I'm just asking if there are any cheaper quick and dirty alternatives that would better fit the budget of a college student who wants to hook an accelerometer up to a PIC.