So, what did Zenith do to make their CRT's fail quicker?

[MRX37]

Originally Posted by Carmine

You would be amazed at how many people believe manufacturers build things to "fail" at some pre-determined date. You'd think they'd be laughed-off like Elvis sightings, but sadly, no.

Mmmmm hmmmm...

I fixed a car door that fell off because the bolt between the two hinges had been designed with the center much thinner then the rest of the bolt. There was no reason I could find for this choice in design, other then eventual planned breakage. A 25 cent bolt from the hardware store fixed that, and it's still working fine. Lord knows how much the dealership would have charged, and they would have of course used another bolt designed to fail after a few years.

More on topic: pre 1992-1993 Zenith CRT's are still for the most part going strong nearly 20 years later, yet those from 1993 onward are weak and dim, if they're still functioning at all.

I wholeheartedly believe modern products are designed to fail after X amount of hours of usage. I've recapped lots of motherboards with caps that decided to fail right around the time when a new upgrade became available (sometimes as early as 6-8 months)