Cheap sets on the news
 

You know it's getting bad when you see something like this on the news!:thumbsdn: This video is of my '75 MGA.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wCZmaRl80Is

Yes, that's pretty bad. At least it's exposing this garbage for what it really is - garbage! About 3 years ago, a friend bought a 27" Apex TV from walmart for, I think, less than $200! Well, the thing died in a few months. He thought he could just lug it back to walmart and get another set or a refund - WRONG! They told him that it was out of their hands and he'd have to take it up with Apex. They said he'd probably have to ship the TV back to Apex at his expense. Well, I replaced a diode in the power supply and got it going for him. He grumbled about it being only a few months old and his Grandmother had a Zenith for 25 years before it died. I reminded him that the old Zenith was much better quality and cost a lot more than $179.99.

It's really bad when you're trying to sell a quality used TV and the potential buyer tells you that they can get a new one at walmart for $20 more. I don't even argue with them anymore. I just tell them to head to walmart.

I found an APEX TV last week. Got it home and opened it up, and the flyback had been ripped from the PCB, taking a chunk of it with it. The whole PCB was very thin and fragile! I could pluck transformers off it without much effort. The PCB snapped and crumbled almost like a cracker.

Its a shame that such a venerated & noble technology like the CRT is going to go down in such cheap & disgusting flames...Nobody but us old TV nuts will remember that once upon a time, a TV was something well-made & to be proud of, instead of the cheap, disgusting junk they've become...

It has been going on in electronics for decades and is not something unigue to televisions. I rememeber sitting in on Teledyne Olson Electronic meetings and hearing the company tell salespersons no replacement parts are available for their store brands. If it dies within the warranty, check with the service department as to availability of parts but more likely than not, take it back in exchange for another Olson unit of the same price or more but the warranty will only be the remainder of the 1st unit's warranty and if the customer brings it in after the warranty, take it in but most likely you'll need to offer a tradein b/c the parts are not available and they had a schedule of trade in values for each piece against another of the same value or more expensive that never dipped into their profits. In Massachsetts there was an investigation and Olson simply shut down the stores and moved out shafting everyone.

YES IT IS A SHAME:tears::thumbsdn::no: Even worse, EVERYTHING is getting like this. All we can spend money on these days are bills.:thumbsdn:

And the bills go up, up, up and the amount coming in goes down, down, down.

Its ironic that newer tv sets have to be made with eco friendly components, but you will throw away 3 of them in 10 years verses 1 made with some lead and other chemicals that last for 10 years or more. Just seems wasteful and counterproductive.

Just an afterthought. It's not just the cheap off brands that you have to watch. With older names like RCA, Sylvania, GE, Zenith, Magnavox, etc. being nothing more than rebranded crap, one has to be cautious. Some people don't realize this and think that a new RCA is the same RCA that built their 30 year old set that just died.

Exactly, everything is funai garbage. Brands mean nothing.

It's all WalMarts fault.

The sad part is that it's not that unusual for a good brand to be made by one of those off brand companies. For example, Philips VCRs were made by Funai.

On the flipside, I've seen cheap noname brand electronics soldier on and on well past their 1 year warrenty.

I know someone who has a cheap radio controlled toy car made by who knows, and that thing has survived 8 years of water, snow, sun exposure, and a leaky battery or two, but it still works.

As the guy said, it's like playing the lottery. Sometimes you win, but not very often.

I wonder which (if any) of these cheap brands will be a top brand in 10 or 20 years? I can still remember when Goldstar (LG), and Samsung were synonymous with garbage. Now many people put them up with the best Japanese brands.

Sony branded tv's are contracted through a different company that makes several other brands as well. The Phillips brand actually gives me the creeps these days.