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Planned Obselescence....A Good Thing?

B

Bob Urz

Jan 1, 1970
0
Alan said:
On 14 Jan 2007 18:19:35 GMT, [email protected]
(Michael Black) wrote:

snip



Planned obsolescence has been a tenet of the automobile
industry since the '30s. General Motors, in particular
used styling to make a 2 or 3 year-old-car look "old" and in
need of replacement with a newly styled model.

A bigger engine, prettier colors, new styles, all those
things are at the heart of 'planned obsolescence.'
Well, when i was growing up having a car at 100K miles meant it was shot
and junk. Cars routinely go 150/200K miles if there properly maintained
and not some boner motor or tranny combo (always exceptions to the rule).

Electronics, while in some respects is miles ahead do to large scale
integration has its own issues. Heat build up has caused many devices to
fail from bad solder joints or component failure. Electronic CRT chassis
are so flimsy that if you take the chassis out the plastic wont support
the CRT. So progress is both good and bad. CD players have lasers that
get dirty and get tossed long before the actual laser diode is gone.

Bob
 
R

Rod Speed

Jan 1, 1970
0
Ross Herbert said:
Ecnerwal said:
This raises an apparent contradiction.

Perhaps you've not been adequately involved with your appliances to
see that there is not a contradiction, even "apparently".

The old ones were, for the most part, designed to be repairable.
"This part always breaks eventually, we'll isolate it and make it
easy to replace".

The new ones are, for the most part, designed NOT to be repairable,
and/or parts prices/availability are manipulated to render them
effectively non-economic to repair. [snip]

What you say speaks to the issue of why did we repair in the past
and why don't we repair now, but it says nothing about the
comparable reliability. If appliances in the past were "built to be
repaired" that can be interpretted to mean that failures were
expected. If failures were expected and people could make a living
performing those repairs then that suggests that the appliances were
not that reliable.


The main reason we don't repair modern electronic appliances is that
the cost of parts and labour to carry out the repairs is often nearly
as much (or more) than the appliance cost new. Why would anyone pay
for a repair on an item, which may be as good as new when repaired,
when a brand new item may only cost a little more. The new item also
comes with a new warranty.
This will only change when the standard of living in countries
producing the majority of appliances goes up considerably
thus making the cost of producing items more expensive.

It wont change even then, the manufacture
will just move on to new low cost countrys.

That has already happened a number of times now.
However, along with that, in order to make them economical
to repair, they must also be designed for accessibility to
components such that they can physically be repaired.

Not necessarily. You can replace components, like
you do with cell phone batterys most obviously.
Designing in repairability also adds a bit to the cost of production.

Not much tho, again most obviously with cellphones.
Personally, I am all in favour of repairability if for no other
reason than it saves energy and resources across the board.

Its a tiny part of world energy consumption.
 
R

Rod Speed

Jan 1, 1970
0
Carl McIver said:
From their competitor? What manufacturer wants to take that
chance?

If you have to stock, for thirty years, a part that exists only on
a small handful of machines out there, how much would that part
_really_ cost after overhead for that _entire_ period gets figured
in? And since machines change design every few years, there are
simply thousands and thousands of parts all in the same situation. It's for that reason I quit
bitching about the prices of replacement
parts at car dealers. I may pay more, but I'm assured that it will
be there more so than any other source. That assurance costs money.



I'm calling you out on that one. Perhaps if all the brands and
manufacturers of appliances were consolidated so much that they _had_
to be in cahoots, I'd be more inclined to believe you, but your
appliances are built all over the world now, by a variety of
companies competing hard for your business, not just once, but again
and again, and that means that one company with a good product will
never say a word to a competitor about how they do a better job. I
certainly wouldn't, and the way to make money in appliances is to
build a better product that gives the customer the value for the
dollar they are willing to pay. Folks that want a top of the line
appliance will pay extra for the appearance of better quality, and if
it can be proved they're getting their money's worth, they'll spend
even more. What it costs me when a product fails, wastes my time, and
the hassle and frustration of resolving the situation, means far more
to me than the initial cost of a product. I've paid that price too
many times, as I'm sure we all have at one time or another, so back
to the point of the most bang for my buck is why companies competing
for my precious dollar will not conspire with each other. All it
takes is for one of them to refuse to conspire and the conspirators
lose, leaving that one to earn my money.

The trouble is that there is no easy to way get a real handle on what
products on offer will last significantly longer with most appliances.

And its arguable how many really care that much about that sort of
thing now with the appliances so cheap and so trivially affordable.
 
R

Rod Speed

Jan 1, 1970
0
Well, when i was growing up having a car at 100K miles meant it was
shot and junk. Cars routinely go 150/200K miles if there properly maintained

And they dont need much maintenance either,
most obviously with suspension lubrication etc.
and not some boner motor or tranny combo (always exceptions to the rule).
Electronics, while in some respects is miles ahead do to large scale integration has its own
issues.

Not really.
Heat build up has caused many devices to fail from bad solder joints or component failure.

That doesnt happen much anymore and it isnt mostly
the large scale integration where that happens anyway.
Electronic CRT chassis are so flimsy that if you take the chassis out the plastic wont support the
CRT.

Doesnt need to, the CRT is the guts of the system everything is attached to.
So progress is both good and bad.

Not much bad with electronics.
CD players have lasers that get dirty and get tossed long before the actual laser diode is gone.

And even DVD burners are now so cheap that its just a yawn.
 
H

Homer J Simpson

Jan 1, 1970
0
And even DVD burners are now so cheap that its just a yawn.

We've gone from an 80K floppy drive that cost $800 to a DVD burner that can
store 9 Gb and costs $35.

From an 8 Mb hard drive that cost $7,000 to a 320 Gb drive that costs $100.
 
I

Ignoramus4939

Jan 1, 1970
0
I have a simple suggestion. Watch your neighbors' trash. When you see
them throw various equipment away, take it home and take it apart. See
if you see signs of intentionally poor design, trying to save pennies
at the huge expense of the customer, etc. See how many interchangeable
parts you see, how well made is the mechanism etc. If anything, doing
so is fun and educational.

i
 
J

Jeff Jonas

Jan 1, 1970
0
The main thing I detest with modern products is keyboards. I used
to be able to buy proper double injection moulded keyboards in the
pre PC days but they arent even buyable now even with the branded
produces like Microsoft and Logitech and the stupid cheap stuck on
lettering never lasts very long at all.

I'm pleased to agree with that comment since it's on topic
and something that's near and dear to my heart.
I use my computer keyboard every day so it's not just an appliance,
it's a tool. It ought to fit my hand and operate reliably.
You'll have to pry my original IBM PS/2 space-saving keyboard
from my cold dead hands - I ain't giving' this up for anything!
The keys FEEL RIGHT and really click, not fake springs here!
It's survived a lot of pounding and frustration
and NONE of the keycap legends are smudged.
Only recently I noticed that the matte finish has rubbed off
the left shift key and the "A" key, making the surface smooth.
The keyboard has been in daily use for perhaps 10 years.
But I wouldnt go back to corded mice and keyboards again.
In spades with non optical mice either.

I favor trackballs and I lament how the award-winning ergonomic ones
are not available anymore.
That's not planned obsolescence or feature-itis
so much as the "race to the bottom":
whoever sells the parts with the lowest price or highest markup wins
by slowly deleting or removing options until they're no longer available.
My Itac trackball's buttons are fully reprogrammable so they work without
any specialized drivers. Nobody else does that in hardware,
it's always part of their drivers (which are a nightmare to configure & update).

Similarly:
- VCRs have been stripped of all their buttons so there's no way
to use them without the remote control. If the remote is lost or broken,
then most of the features are "lost" because the universal remotes
don't give all the original buttons.

- home camcorders keep losing features such as aux mic input,
which several friends require for their taping.
They can't afford the $xx,000 "professional" cameras just to get
features that are no longer included in the $x00 home versions.

- high end audio equipment is hard to get: some is no longer made
AT ANY PRICE due to Chinese products flooding the market
with lower prices and lowered expectations.

- similarly, the Yamaha CD burners were top rated for reliability of
mechanism and firmware. They're no longer available thanks to market erosion
to Chinese CD burners. For the home-professional,
I don't care if I can buy a new CD burner every week or every day,
I need RELIABLE OPERATION that these new disposible ones cannot provide.
I need CDs that are burned precisely to read well a week, a year or 10 years later.
It's unsure if the cheapie CD burners can really achieve that :-(
And similarly, the CD blanks are sometimes crap-tastic
despite all the advances in manufacturing tech that makes it possible
to create high-reliability media, if anyone's willing to pay the extra pennies.
 
A

Andrew VK3BFA

Jan 1, 1970
0
Rod said:
The reality is that that isnt done with domestic appliances.

Of course it is - if your making a million of anything, you minimise
costs to the last cent, because 1c by 1,000,000 is REAL money. We can
put a man on the moon - is it so hard to figure out MTBF of electronic
equipment. And if the factory costs millions of dollars to set up
(they do) its in their best interests to keep them running - the costs
of shutting down are prohibitive.

And, good people, if you want a new TV set, there has NEVER been a
better time to buy one. LCD, Plasma are killing the conventional CRT
market - havent you wondered why they are so cheap now? - its
desperation time till new plant comes on stream to make the new
consumer toys....
That aint designing it to fail just outside the warranty.

Oh? - how come PCB pads are barely adequate for the heat dissipation of
the component - as far as I know, thats been taught in engineering
courses for the last 20 years.....ANY tech will immediately start
looking for dry joints as a first thing to do issue...
They werent deliberately designed in. Just lousy design.

I beg to differ. You are saying EVERY manufacturer on the planet has
the identical "bad design" features.....and keeps on making them, model
after model, year after year?.....
Because it makes not sense to spend a high percentage of the cost of
a new VCR repairing an existing one. The new one gets a new warranty.

Yep. Thats why they are no repaired. I though this was why this thread
got started?
And most of that stuff just doesnt fail, most obviously
with plug packs and molded power cords.


Nope, due to the technology.

Idiot. The technology was partly developed to eliminate manual
operation, as well as speed/ease of assembly. Do some research. NASA
figured this out in the 1960's....a huge proportion of failures were
due to poor human made solder joints - the short term cure was HRHS
certification of operators, the evolution was rigidly controlled
machine operation....
And they hardly ever need to be repaired too.

Erk. Then whats the problem? - why are we having this discussion? - if
its so reliable, surely servicing isn't an issue?
And those arent designed to fail just outside the warranty.

But they do. 3 to 5 years from a modern domestic ANYTHING is good value
now....or has your experience been different from the rest of us? -
The reality is that costs a lot less to stamp out another in the
asian factory than it can ever cost to have a first world tech fix it.

Erk (again) yes, well, thats why things dont get repaired - so cheap to
buy new ones - pity about the quality issues....
And they are dirt cheap now.

That I will concede. And is not the quality the same as all the other
disposable products? And for those people out there proudly running
their Bridgeport or Monarch in their basement, they came from once
prosperous factories that got decimated by cheap modern crap. How else
could you afford them?

Its happened in my trade too - there is SO MUCH high quality test
equipment out there now, stuff I could not afford even 10 years ago.
Now I can - the companies that used it are no more, or its so cheap to
replace a "black box" that they don't need to maintain service
engineers and test gear. And in telecoms, I will grudgingly concede
that there is redundancy - but when BIG network fault happens, theres
a mad scramble to find enough techs to go out and fix it.....((because
the accountants says the new stuff is so reliable, (they read the
glossy brochures, sorta like IT people) why do we need to pay staff in
case it MIGHT break down?))

Corse they wont.

Good, you got one right.
And so do almost everything else too.



Even that is arguable, an operation like that should have decent redundancy.

Rubbish. Any machine thats down is losing money (ask the accountants -
they run things these days) - and there is virtually NO REDUNDANCY,
even in hospital situations - next time you visit someone in hospital,
look at the calibration tag on the machines (IV drips are a favourite)-
see how long since its been serviced. Have a look around the back - see
how much dust/muck is jammed into the air filter element on the cooling
fan....(ECG's are good for this.....

BTW - I think "redundancy" has been replaced by one of those marvelous
new management speak phrases - "Just In Time" - the premise that the
supply chain functions perfectly to avoid ANY down time.

Multiple redundancy is a thing we HOPE they put in nuclear power
stations, and aeroplanes -and even thats being pushed. Civil aviation
here - most commercial airliners have 3 generators, time was if one
failed, the plane was pulled from service. Not now - it waits till the
next "scheduled service"....(costs money to take it out of service for
"unnecessary repairs"...and besides, the thing will fly on 1
generator....)

Anyway, I just fixed a 20 yo VCR for a customer - worn plastic gears
not meshing. Cure - fit washer on shaft to raise gear teeth to unworn
portion.

And I will keep on doing things like this, and you will keep on buying
new consumer crap - whose the winner?

Andrew VK3BFA.

Thats it, no more from me - I am trying not to RANT....(and failing)
 
J

Jeff Jonas

Jan 1, 1970
0
Companies are setting up the situation that you are forced to buy new
Only partly true. Do you want to keep your computer forever? Do you think
you'd be on line here if you still had that 286 processor?

That's opening up a can of worms:
some PCs were upgradeable, with socketed CPUs and even
daughterboards for the CPU, but with raised expectations of our computers
and evolving motherboard chipsets and faster peripherals,
it's really hard to truly salvage much from a PC
other than disks and some peripherals.

BUT: some specialized applications require the "legacy" interfaces
that are being phased out, such as custom interface cards with the ISA interface,
or RS232 serial interfaced peripherals.
There are often items that have no equivalent in current production
so you can't just buy the PCI or USB version.

I still have some Z80 based single board computers
because they're now "old enough" to become embedded systems.
Many '486 systems /could be used again/ if anyone gave a damn
to find lightweight (NON-M$) operating systems to make them
dedicated devices, such as a digital answering machine, print server, etc.
 
T

Too_Many_Tools

Jan 1, 1970
0
You've never worked for a company that manufactures stuff have you?

Marketing (NOT accounting) might provide a price-point that their research
indicates a product needs to be at to be competitive and the
design/engineering/manufacuring departments might be given a mandate to meet
that price point by top level management, but there are no "accountants" telling
anyone where to cut costs.

I believe it is you who needs to work in the real world and ignore the
fairy tales of academic circles.

In a real company, engineers are under the thumb of accountants. They
are to make whatever cuts need to be made to make the desired profit
margin. Products are manufactured with intentional end lifes and
without any possiblity of repair...all required by MBAs who have
dictated what the product life and quality will be.

It is done to extract as much of your cash as possible.

TMT
 
J

Jeff Jonas

Jan 1, 1970
0
The main reason we don't repair modern electronic appliances is that
the cost of parts and labour to carry out the repairs is often nearly
as much (or more) than the appliance cost new. Why would anyone pay
for a repair on an item, which may be as good as new when repaired,
when a brand new item may only cost a little more. The new item also
comes with a new warranty.

YET despite that, there is still some favorable economics for
reclaiming and repairing stuff, even if it's sold as "refurbished".
I occasionally buy refurbished stuff since that means
"the parts that break first have already been replaced".
 
J

Jeff Jonas

Jan 1, 1970
0
I have a simple suggestion. Watch your neighbors' trash. When you see
them throw various equipment away, take it home and take it apart. See
if you see signs of intentionally poor design, trying to save pennies
at the huge expense of the customer, etc. See how many interchangeable
parts you see, how well made is the mechanism etc. If anything, doing
so is fun and educational.

I agree! If only the garbage collectors were to "close the loop"
and somehow report what products are failing the most
(dare I suggest that RFID tagging stuff from cradle-to-grave
could supply such data?)

I buy plastic storage containers since cardboard boxes
tend to fall apart particularly when stacked.
But some brands are /so bad/ that they're cracked and broken
WHILE STILL IN THE STORE!

I'm all for recycling but I bow to the economics that
transportation and storage may exceed the value of what's reclaimed
(yes, I've seen Penn and Teller's BULLSHIT show about recycling)
but there's no checks-and-balances system to correct for stores
getting credit for entire boatloads of crap that can't (or won't) be fixed.
It's not just a matter of landfill and garbage handling,
it's a lack of accountability for the merchanise that's arriving on our shores.
 
R

Rod Speed

Jan 1, 1970
0
I'm pleased to agree with that comment since it's on topic
and something that's near and dear to my heart.
I use my computer keyboard every day so it's not just an appliance,
it's a tool. It ought to fit my hand and operate reliably.
You'll have to pry my original IBM PS/2 space-saving keyboard
from my cold dead hands - I ain't giving' this up for anything!

The main problem there is that I need a proper modern cordless
keyboard. I compute from a deep armchair with my feet up and
have the keyboard in my lap when entering text like now.

Even the pre PC double injection moulded keyboard,
a DEC LK01, was much too heavy in that situation.
The keys FEEL RIGHT and really click, not fake springs here!
It's survived a lot of pounding and frustration
and NONE of the keycap legends are smudged.
Only recently I noticed that the matte finish has rubbed off
the left shift key and the "A" key, making the surface smooth.

Yeah, thats the only effect I ever got with those.
The keyboard has been in daily use for perhaps 10 years.
I favor trackballs

I dont, I prefer modern scroll wheels.
and I lament how the award-winning ergonomic ones are
not available anymore. That's not planned obsolescence
or feature-itis so much as the "race to the bottom":

Its not that so much as just that hardly anyone liked trackballs.

There is no race to the bottom with high end
cordless mice like the Logitech MX700 etc.

And they use standard AA NiMH batterys so its trivial
to replace those when that is necessary, for peanuts.
whoever sells the parts with the lowest price or highest markup wins
by slowly deleting or removing options until they're no longer available.

That isnt happening with high end cordless mice.
My Itac trackball's buttons are fully reprogrammable so
they work without any specialized drivers. Nobody else
does that in hardware, it's always part of their drivers

Which is a much more cost effective approach.
(which are a nightmare to configure & update).

Doesnt have to be.
Similarly:
- VCRs have been stripped of all their buttons so
there's no way to use them without the remote control.

Yes, because so few use those buttons and so few are
silly enough to use them even when they lose the remote.
If the remote is lost or broken, then most of the features are "lost"
because the universal remotes don't give all the original buttons.

It makes a lot more sense to have replacement remotes available
than to have the buttons on the front of the VCR itself.
- home camcorders keep losing features such as aux
mic input, which several friends require for their taping.
They can't afford the $xx,000 "professional" cameras just to get
features that are no longer included in the $x00 home versions.
- high end audio equipment is hard to get: some is no longer
made AT ANY PRICE due to Chinese products flooding the
market with lower prices and lowered expectations.

And because its such a tiny niche market now.
- similarly, the Yamaha CD burners were top rated for
reliability of mechanism and firmware. They're no longer
available thanks to market erosion to Chinese CD burners.

Reliability is irrelevant now with DVD burners so cheap.
For the home-professional, I don't care if I can buy a new CD
burner every week or every day, I need RELIABLE OPERATION
that these new disposible ones cannot provide.

Thats bullshit.
I need CDs that are burned precisely to read well a week, a year or 10
years later. It's unsure if the cheapie CD burners can really achieve that :-(

Anyone with a clue burns more than one copy on
different media even with something like a Yamaha.
And similarly, the CD blanks are sometimes crap-tastic despite
all the advances in manufacturing tech that makes it possible to
create high-reliability media, if anyone's willing to pay the extra pennies.

I've never had a problem with CD blanks except one
spindle that someone else bought for me at a dollar store
which were so bad you could literally see right thru them.

All the rest have never been a problem.
 
T

Too_Many_Tools

Jan 1, 1970
0
I'm calling you out on that one.

LOL....Electric staplers at ten paces?

It is a conspiracy.

The MBAs are working from the same play book.

Companies have consolidated to just a few...and they have combined
their operations so your selection is limited. They control what
repairs are available...if available...so the prices are fixed.

The third party repair depots...whether for your car, washer or
electronics ..... are being squeezed out of business.

And when it breaks...well ever hear of brand loyalty? People go back
and buy more junk. Ever wonder how Walmart makes its money?

And the end play....to make the consumer pay more....is being played
out well.

Ever wonder why consumer debt is at an all time high...if things are
getting cheaper, why don't you have more money instead of less?

TMT
 
R

Rod Speed

Jan 1, 1970
0
Andrew VK3BFA said:
Rod Speed wrote
Of course it is - if your making a million of anything, you minimise
costs to the last cent, because 1c by 1,000,000 is REAL money.

Nice theory. Have fun explaining how come the absolute vast bulk
of cellphones still have assembly screw and replaceable fronts etc.
We can put a man on the moon - is it so hard
to figure out MTBF of electronic equipment.

Pointless when the absolute vast bulk of it never fails.
And if the factory costs millions of dollars to set
up (they do) its in their best interests to keep them
running - the costs of shutting down are prohibitive.

Nope, happens all the time when technology moves on.
And, good people, if you want a new TV set,
there has NEVER been a better time to buy one.

Yes there will be with the changeover to digital TV.
LCD, Plasma are killing the conventional CRT market
- havent you wondered why they are so cheap now?
- its desperation time till new plant comes on stream
to make the new consumer toys....

Its been onstream for quite a while now.
Oh? - how come PCB pads are barely adequate
for the heat dissipation of the component

Just the usual, lousy design. Nothing to do with deliberately designing
it to fail when its just outside warranty, which isnt even possible except
with microprocessor controlled devices and no one is that stupid even
with them. Completely pointless trying to do it with the pcb pad sizes.
- as far as I know, thats been taught in
engineering courses for the last 20 years.....

You dont know that the chinese 'designers' get taught that sort of thing.
ANY tech will immediately start looking
for dry joints as a first thing to do issue...

Only the ones stupid enough to be doing that sort of thing anymore.
I beg to differ. You are saying EVERY manufacturer
on the planet has the identical "bad design" features.....

Nope, and I deny that modern electronic devices all fail that way.
and keeps on making them, model after model, year after year?.....

Even you should have noticed that the power use keeps dropping dramatically.

There's **** all in say a PC or cellphone
that is due to that alleged pcb pad problem.
Yep. Thats why they are no repaired. I though this was why this thread got started?

Nope, this thread got started with the silly claim about planned obsolescence.
Fuckwit.

The technology was partly developed to eliminate manual
operation, as well as speed/ease of assembly.

Yes, but not due to OPERATOR ERROR.
Do some research.

Go and **** yourself.
NASA figured this out in the 1960's....a huge proportion of failures were
due to poor human made solder joints - the short term cure was HRHS
certification of operators, the evolution was rigidly controlled machine operation....

Nothing to do with why its done with domestic appliances.
Erk. Then whats the problem? - why are we having this discussion?

Because the stupid claim about planned obsolescence,
which clearly cant be happening when they fail so rarely.
- if its so reliable, surely servicing isn't an issue?

It isnt indeed. That means that dinosaurs like you get stuck with
the complicated failures which are completely uneconomic to fix
because you expect a first world income in return.

Taint gunna happen while ever it will always be much cheaper
to stamp out another in an asian factory with the few that do fail.

No one is silly enough to attempt to repair hard drives anymore,
because they are so cheap to stamp out in asia etc.
But they do.

No they dont.
3 to 5 years from a modern domestic ANYTHING is good value now....
Bullshit.

or has your experience been different from the rest of us? -

Just how many of you are there between those ears ?
Erk (again) yes, well, thats why things dont get repaired -
so cheap to buy new ones - pity about the quality issues....

No quality issues with anything I have bought in the last few years.
That I will concede. And is not the quality the
same as all the other disposable products?

Nope, everything I have bought in the last few years has been fine quality
wise with the exception of the electric chainsaw chain tension adjuster
which they were happy to replace for free without a receipt.
And for those people out there proudly running their Bridgeport or Monarch
in their basement, they came from once prosperous factories that got
decimated by cheap modern crap. How else could you afford them?

Irrelevant to the mass market.
Its happened in my trade too - there is SO MUCH high quality test
equipment out there now, stuff I could not afford even 10 years ago.
Now I can - the companies that used it are no more, or its so cheap
to replace a "black box" that they don't need to maintain service
engineers and test gear. And in telecoms, I will grudgingly concede
that there is redundancy - but when BIG network fault happens,
theres a mad scramble to find enough techs to go out and fix it.....

Nope, because the BIG network faults are just multiple stupiditys.
((because the accountants says the new stuff is so reliable,
(they read the glossy brochures, sorta like IT people) why
do we need to pay staff in case it MIGHT break down?))

The reality is that the failure rate really is very low.

Nothing to do with any brochures.
Good, you got one right.

I got it all right thanks.

Nope, with the hardware so cheap, its stupid not to have decent redundancy.
Any machine thats down is losing money

Wrong when there is decent redundancy.
(ask the accountants - they run things these days)

No they dont.
- and there is virtually NO REDUNDANCY,
Bullshit.

even in hospital situations - next time you visit someone in
hospital, look at the calibration tag on the machines (IV drips
are a favourite)- see how long since its been serviced. Have a
look around the back - see how much dust/muck is jammed into the
air filter element on the cooling fan....(ECG's are good for this.....

Irrelevant to what happens outside hospitals redundancy wise.
BTW - I think "redundancy" has been replaced by one of those
marvelous new management speak phrases - "Just In Time"

Nope, completely different concepts.
- the premise that the supply chain functions
perfectly to avoid ANY down time.

Thanks for that completely superfluous proof that you
have never had a clue and why you got the bums rush.
Multiple redundancy is a thing we HOPE they put in nuclear
power stations, and aeroplanes -and even thats being pushed.

No hope necessary with heavy aircraft.
Civil aviation here - most commercial airliners have 3 generators,
time was if one failed, the plane was pulled from service.
Wrong.

Not now - it waits till the next "scheduled service"....
(costs money to take it out of service for "unnecessary
repairs"...and besides, the thing will fly on 1 generator....)

Wrong again.
Anyway, I just fixed a 20 yo VCR for a customer

More fool you.
- worn plastic gears not meshing. Cure - fit washer
on shaft to raise gear teeth to unworn portion.
And I will keep on doing things like this,

More fool you.
and you will keep on buying new consumer crap - whose the winner?

Me when I have enough of a clue to have replaced the VCRs with decent
modern digital TV tuner cards which will leave VCRs for dead reliability wise.
Thats it, no more from me - I am trying not to RANT....(and failing)

And making a spectacular fool of yourself in the process.
 
R

Rod Speed

Jan 1, 1970
0
Jeff Jonas said:
That's opening up a can of worms:
some PCs were upgradeable, with socketed CPUs and even
daughterboards for the CPU, but with raised expectations of our
computers
and evolving motherboard chipsets and faster peripherals,
it's really hard to truly salvage much from a PC
other than disks and some peripherals.

BUT: some specialized applications require the "legacy" interfaces
that are being phased out, such as custom interface cards with the
ISA interface, or RS232 serial interfaced peripherals.
There are often items that have no equivalent in current production
so you can't just buy the PCI or USB version.

I still have some Z80 based single board computers
because they're now "old enough" to become embedded systems.
Many '486 systems /could be used again/ if anyone gave a damn
to find lightweight (NON-M$) operating systems to make them
dedicated devices, such as a digital answering machine, print server, etc.

And anyone with a clue just buys a dedicated hardware router etc.
 
G

Gunner

Jan 1, 1970
0
From dozens of relatives and friends who had major problems from 4 to 6
years. My stepmother replaced a GE washer and dryer pair that was less
than two years old because they were crap. Not much to go wrong? cheap
parts, poor designs and sloppy assembly work. Something is making noise
and you find a broken weld, sheared off bolt or bad bearing that SHOULD
NOT HAVE HAPPENED.


A prime example would be a belt tensioning pulley with a bronze bushing
in it, rather than a proper sealed bearing..and no way for the average
end user to maintain it. When the bushing wears out..the pulley needs
replacement, along with the long spring loaded rod it runs on. And when
the dryer tub bearings..simply a pair of HDDP or teflon pads wear
out..the drum starts rubbing holes in itself, or putting such a load on
the belt the belt busts

Repaired all of the above in a a couple Kennmore dryers in a 10 yr
period. Turned a new pulley out of aluminum, put in proper sealed
bearings and put in a quadruple row of skate board bearings to replace
the pads.

Could hardly hear the thing running after the repair.

oh..and using a bronze bushing for the drum support bearing..same deal.
Replaced it with a pair of cheap skate board wheels. Both have been
running at least 10 yrs since then..no issues noted.

Gunner

"Deep in her heart, every moslem woman yearns to show us her tits"
John Griffin
 
G

Gunner

Jan 1, 1970
0
Doesnt happen like that with the chinese products.

Just another reason why bugger all is made in
the US anymore except for stuff like aircraft etc.


Ill be sure to tell my machine shop clients that.

Gunner

"Deep in her heart, every moslem woman yearns to show us her tits"
John Griffin
 
A

Andrew VK3BFA

Jan 1, 1970
0
Just curious - what do you do for a living? - you seem to have an
amazing lack of knowledge across many fields - is it accountancy?. And
how do you manage to translate crayon to ascii text?

Andrew VK3BFA.
 
A

Andrew VK3BFA

Jan 1, 1970
0
Gunner said:
On Mon, 15 Jan 2007 14:40:48 +1100, "Rod Speed"




Ill be sure to tell my machine shop clients that.

Gunner

"Deep in her heart, every moslem woman yearns to show us her tits"
John Griffin

Gee Gunner - how come your so good at the snappy reply - I get sucked
into arguing with idiots.....

Andrew VK3BFA.
 
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