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Record stores in TO
For my taste...
Release Records is my favorite store, the staff is very knowledgable and they get stuff WAY before anyone else usually, they have the best hookups for progressive in all of north america its seems. They get stuff was before even some of the biggest places like Satellite in NYC.
Metropolis has alot of quirky (read lots of ambient, dub, and underground techno, house, etc) sounding stuff but they have a nice place as well and you can find some good stuff there that you may not see in other places.
The Pit has a fantastic selection of techno, they also have alot of great trance, house and other stuff as well. Plus they have a ton of cds and tapes. The service there isn't the most friendly though, and you need to have a bit of a clue about music before going in there. But don't let the intimitade you, even though they seem like you are boring them they know what they are doing and will help you in a second.
Solid Sound Records is fantastic for trance and acid techno, they cover the "hard" spectrum fairly well and last time I was in they had the best selection of hard core in the entire city. They are very friendly as well and for true trance I don't think they can be beat.
Eastern Bloc gets TONS of good stuff in, in looking at it in pure numbers your best chance of getting stuff if you can't get to a record store the moment the shipment comes in. They will usually still have stuff a few days after other places have sold out. Again very knowledgable staff and great selection, probably the largest in the city for all forms of music.
Play de Record, is the place for hip hop, they have lots of great stuff as well. Its hard to find stuff but you can find some real gems hidden behind all the was sittin there. They carry pretty much absolutely every genre of music.
Traxx, I won't even talk about. The place sucks if you want anything but the latest top 40 record.
So all in all I usually go to Release as my first choice and pick up a bunch of stuff there (get there early shipment comes in at noon on Wed) then head down to Eastern bloc for more progressive and techno, then over to The Pit to find my techno. Sometimes I stop by the other stores and manage to find some nice stuff but those 3 are the top stores for me and the order in which I go to them and rate them. 
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