Symphonic mini B&W TV

[Steve D.]

I think if you go to the big box electronics store and turn every dvd, vcr, combo unit and tv around, you'll find the words "Made in China" printed on the back. There are probably 2 or 3 Chinese factories turning out this junk for the whole world. Oh, and be sure and turn all those rigs back around so you don't piss off the management.


-Steve D.

[bgadow]

I've been very happy with my vcr, bought 12-31-99 @ Wally World, a genuine Made in JAPAN Panasonic. One of several later model Panasonic products I've had that really impressed me. This VCR took, I think, a little lightning once cause I was walking through the room during a very bad lightning storm & heard an evil crackling from that vicinity. Since then the tv/vcr switch has not worked right. Other than that, no problems. Interesting, on the box it came in it stated, in large blurbs all over the box MADE IN JAPAN! so obviously they knew that we knew it stood for something!

[Eric H]

My Sony VCR is about 3-4 years old and has been great, it gets a LOT of use too.
It was fairly cheap for a Hi-Fi unit and it wasn't very heavy so I wasn't expecting much.

I just looked and it was made in "Malaysia"

Funny how "Made in the U.S.A." used to mean quality and "Made in Japan" meant junk...well not really funny but you know what I mean.

[andy]

I can remember when "MAde in Korea" meant junk, but now Samsung and LG are considered quality companies my most. I wonder when "Made in China" will be seen as a good thing. I can see it happening. They already make some pretty sophisticated products, but don't work out all the bugs before they sell them.

Couldn't agree more......when I tell youngsters there was a time when we'd look at the bottom of something and see "Made In Japan" we'd put it back down in disgust of the crappiness.....they cannot understand that! Not until I tell them that it was the equivalent to today's "Made In China" Then they get it!

Anthony

[jstout66]

Does anyone know if there are ANY US made sets now? I tried to "Google" and couldn't find a one. Here was an interesting article I found as to why that is to. Kinda sad.... http://yaleglobal.yale.edu/article.print?id=204

[Chad Hauris]

Seems like I remember some Sharp and Panasonic sets that were "Assembled in U.S.A." from U.S. and foreign components...don't know if they are that way anymore. There is the company in Tennesee that was the former Magnavox plant, don't know if they are still manufacturing.

[Steve D.]

I would say that you would be very hard pressed to find a company even assembling tv sets in the U.S. Even a non-union operation. Just basic economics as outlined in the previous post would prove this out. You can't pay American salaries and benefits to turn out a product and expect to compete with China i.e. in the marketplace. After figuring in all the costs from labor (salaries, health & welfare, pensions ect.) to plant overhead, parts and distribution, you would be selling your product at a net loss per unit. The current problem with U.S.auto makers is a good example of the next major industry to exit this country.That effort is already underway. General Motors is expected to have the worse sales record in it's history this quarter. They've dropped the Oldsmbile line and expect to drop either Pontiac or Buick in the near future. But that's getting off topic, and a long way from this original thread.

-Steve D.

[bgadow]

I think that Five Rivers Electronics plant (on one of these threads) mostly assembles sets for Samsung. If I had to guess I would say they would be bigger screen sets. Saw some remanufactured sets the other day in a store & they had American flags on them but I didn't go look. One of the "second tier" makes like Samsung or Orion or something.

[andy]

I think a lot of projection sets are assembled in the US because it's expensive to ship a huge mostly empty box. Sony makes virtually all their CRTs used in US market TVs in the US.

I saw a story on TV pretty recently about what they said was the last US TV manufacturer and the problems they were having with a Chinese company. Apparently the US company was accusing a Chinese company of unfair business practices in court and Wal-Mart sent in their own lawyers to fight for the Chinese side.

I know that Panasonic does or did have a plant back east and that Sony at least used to build their big screens in the former VW factory in Pennsy (they may still)

Last I heard, that Tennessee factory won their battle against the chinese dumping product and the US imposed some form of tariff which is essentially being given to the American company to offset their loss of production.

Anthony

Orion has been in Canada for about 5 years and the quality of the VCRs seem quite good. I bought an Orion VR5000 at a garage sale - it had hifi and 4 heads plus a badly designed remote. The chassis had plenty of steel and the machine had a decent mechanism which appears to come from JVC.

It did not look like the bare bones mechanism that Funai uses in their Emerson and other brand VCRs (which I swear could float on water).

Orion actually bases itself in Hungary and probably made a deal with Funai to make cheap VCRs to gain brand recognition in North America. In Europe they sell a neat line of multi-standard and higher end VCRs. They fought a lawsuit over patents in US courts with Funai and Orion may have gone its own way.

[domfjbrown]

Originally Posted by andy

I can remember when "MAde in Korea" meant junk, but now Samsung and LG are considered quality companies my most. I wonder when "Made in China" will be seen as a good thing. I can see it happening. They already make some pretty sophisticated products, but don't work out all the bugs before they sell them.

ARE YOU SURE??? My Samsung combi (grill/convection/micro) microwave has firmware issues - it only cooks above 200 degrees C if you heat from cold - try to preheat and it only maintains the temperature when it feels like it! Also, my old Samsung E700, and the newer E800 that's replaced it, BOTH have the same bug (you go to SMS texts and scroll down the received list, and sometimes the person's name doesn't appear until you go down-then-up the list). OH, and ALL Samsung region 2 PAL DVD players (first gen to last years') have issues with some discs (putting subtitles up when you don't ask) - so Koreans can't debug either.

I bought Samsung mobiles because my mate Kenny used to design and build their RF amps and do all the fourier analysis on the codecs. He's a total genius and the performance of making calls on them is much better (in my experience) than the equivalent Sony/Ericson and Nokia models

[andy]

I said most people seem to see them as quality, but I'm still not convinced. They are certainly a lot better than they used to be.

Software bugs seem to be the norm in modern electronics. My Toshiba DVD player has numerous annoying bugs. My Philips DVD recorder has a timer that's almost unusable because of the bugs and this is after about 5 updates. My Bose wave radio won't go from bright to dim when the alarm is on. My JVC SVHS VCR won't rewind at full speed unless you push menu while it's rewinding. My Sony dolby digital receiver occasionally won't produce any sound when turned on and has to be unplugged to reset it. I frequently have to reset my Toshiba PDA to get the wireless adapter to turn on. I could go on, but you get the idea. In software, close is good enough.

Programmers use hammers?

Anthony