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#46
07-06-2009, 12:15 AM
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#47
07-06-2009, 01:20 AM
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I don't think my player will quit on me now, however, as I have owned it ten months and it is still working as well as the day I bought it, last September. But you can never tell with electronics these days. The person at Big Lots who wrote up the sale was all but gushing about how well made these Memorex DVD players were; I guess I'll just have to wait and see what actually happens with mine. One brand of DVD player I would not touch with a ten-foot pole, however, is GPX. I bought a GPX radio/cassette player about 25 years ago; the cassette deck went bad within three weeks. If this was how GPX's merchandise was made in the mid-1980s, I don't want to think how cheaply built their DVD players may be now. I also had a CyberHome DVD player that lasted all of three years, then quit, but not suddenly. At first I could get the thing to work if I fiddled with it long enough; however, it eventually reached the point where no amount of insertion/ejecting/re-insertion of the disc would get the player to work. The on-screen display would show "no disc" at this point (even with a DVD in the deck), so the player wasn't even trying to read the disc.
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Jeff, WB8NHV Collecting, restoring and enjoying vintage Zenith radios since 2002 Zenith. Gone, but not forgotten.
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#50
07-06-2009, 09:52 PM
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Mom (1938 - 2013) - RIP, I miss you Spunky, (1999 - 2016) - RIP, pretty girl! Rascal, (2007 - 2021) RIP, miss you very much
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#51
07-06-2009, 11:32 PM
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IMHO, it will be quite a while before flat-panel TVs will have a picture as good as a good CRT set. I would put either of my own CRTs, my RCA XL-100 CTC185 living-room daily watcher or my 1995 Zenith Sentry 2, up against any offshore-made FP with an obscure name any day. Your Zenith TV has really held up over the last 27 years--typical Zenith (some years before the Gold Star takeover--I wouldn't expect a "Zenith" branded TV made since the late '90s to now, however, to last nearly that long). Does yours still have its original CRT? How much service, if any, have you had done on that set in all that time? If your answer is "none", I won't be surprised. My own Zenith Sentry 2 has 14 years on it and has needed absolutely no service or repairs whatsoever; still makes a beautiful picture on cable. My RCA CTC185 hasn't required any chassis repairs, either, and still works very well on cable, in the nine years I've owned it; however, I did have a problem with the RF port for the antenna/cable snapping off the tuner PC board after I'd had the set about a year. It happened twice; the repairs were not cheap, on the order of $60 each. The second time, however, the repair tech not only resoldered the port to the board, he reinforced it so that it wouldn't snap off again (it hasn't, so far; this TV has fallen off its stand once since then, with the cable connected--but it still works) and also resoldered the ground points around the tuner, which were a real problem with all RCA sets from the CTC18x until about the CTC203. The problem was loose ground connections around the onboard tuner that would cause noise to enter the EEPROM chip, rendering the entire TV instantly unusable. The CTC203 and later sets had the tuner mounted separately from the main chassis, eliminating the grounding problems that had plagued the earlier sets.
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Jeff, WB8NHV Collecting, restoring and enjoying vintage Zenith radios since 2002 Zenith. Gone, but not forgotten.
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#52
07-06-2009, 11:41 PM
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Jeff, WB8NHV Collecting, restoring and enjoying vintage Zenith radios since 2002 Zenith. Gone, but not forgotten.
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#53
07-07-2009, 06:34 AM
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Yesterday I stopped by the local TigerDirect and all they had was an Apex converter. Converters up here don't seem to be common. The box said it qualifies for the $40 coupon. I doubt Otawa would send a check for $40 if I sent them the receipt.
More importantly, they had a couple of off the air indoor antenna on the cheap. As no salesperson was willing to go the tele department I did not do other than look. On the way home there is a home theatre center so I stopped. The 2 salespersons were busy so I wandered around and into the high end room. Really big and nice Sony on the wall with an amazing picture. The remote was there so I started clicking channels and did note they seemed to be locals. I did not think about it though. A salesperson came in and asked to help. I explained I was interested in the off the air antenna systems and whether it actually could deliver. Nice guy but, did not answer the question. He asked if i liked the picture of the Sony and changed channels a couple of times asking the same question. He then asked if I could live with something less than the quality I was wathcing. Come on question if there was ever one. I answered yes as I was not a HT person but more interested in cutting out the cable bill which this morning I learned was going to be increasing again. He told me I could do both. Yeah, the sales pitch, can see it coming. He then told me that all the time I was looking at over the air. Yeah, right. He took me to the front and showed me the square encased antenna. All the time I had been holding the remote. He then unscrewed the cable and we went back into the room and there was no signal. He then went out and reconnected the lead and it was back. The store is furthernorth than I am from downtown Toronto but the store as a pretty clean line shot down the 404/DVP. Needless to say, I am impressed. The antenna from them is $150 and was mounted just above head height in a window. He did mention that when a big rig turns the corner and passes between the antenna and downtown from time to time it will interfere but they prefer not mounting it outside of higher so persons can get an idea as to what it can do. I'm thinking about picking up the Apex box and one of the TigerDirect antennas just to se what it will do and then getting the antenna the store had mounted if wifey can live with the channel selection. While still torn between the converter and getting a new tele, I think this way for the immediate time will do.
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#54
07-07-2009, 09:54 AM
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JeffS, I did not have anything to write with, so did not write the name down. I believe the off brand Fry's carries started with a C. They had several.
On strange thing was that the Channel Master and the off brand converters were in completely different locations in the store. The off brand was near the other TV accessories while the Channel Masters were near the parts section. The only reason that I saw the Channel Master converters was that I was looking for parts.
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#56
07-07-2009, 11:56 AM
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I can't say that I've ever had anything by Coby that was worth a flip. I'd stay away from that brand unless you have no other choice.
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#57
07-07-2009, 01:51 PM
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I have a telephone and a pair of stereo headphones made by Coby. Both work very well; in fact, I've had compliments on the transmit audio quality of the phone. (I'm not using the phone at the present time, as it does not have caller ID.) The headphones sound excellent with my Aiwa bookshelf stereo system; as a matter of fact, these phones sound much, much better (better overall frequency response) than the Sony MDR-24 stereo phones they replaced several months ago. I wouldn't dream of comparing the Coby phones with, say, Koss or Sennheiser headphones (there is probably no comparing them to these high-end phones anyway), but the Coby headphones sound excellent in their own right as far as I am concerned. The only thing I could find wrong with my Coby stereo phones when they arrived here from Radio Shack (I had ordered them online) was that the plastic piece which fits over the stereo-mono switch was missing. However, I didn't notice that until I'd had the phones a month or so. Since it doesn't affect the sound of the headphones, I didn't bother sending the phones back to RS.
I can't imagine why RadioTVNut in Mississippi doesn't like Coby equipment, unless he has had bad experiences with it.  As I said, I've only had experience with two pieces of Coby gear; I don't know about their DVD players and other equipment. Perhaps that's what he is referring to--maybe Coby's DVD players are made with such flimsy, cheap plastic parts that they break within a month (!) of initial purchase of the device.My own "stay away from" off-brand of electronics (one of them, anyhow) is GPX. As I mentioned in another post, I had a GPX radio/cassette recorder about 25 years ago in which the cassette deck failed within three weeks after I bought the device. I didn't take it back to the store, although I could have (probably should have), as the store from which I purchased it was only a block or so from my home at the time. However, I made up my mind after that experience that I would think at least twice before ever again buying any piece of electronic gear bearing the GPX logo. I saw a GPX DVD player in an ad flyer for Target in my Sunday paper last week; the player was selling for something like $15. I can just about guess how long one of these players will last. It's probably made with flimsy, thin plastic parts, the cheapest electronic components available, and may, for all I know, have a non-resettable timer in it set to disable the thing after X number of hours (!), days, weeks or months after initial purchase, this being a hint (a very strong one) to the owner that the unit will fail soon and will have to be replaced. I realize nothing lasts forever, but sheeesh--this is ridiculous. It wasn't so long ago one could buy a TV set, for example, and expect it to last 10-20 years; in fact, I had two Zenith color portables that were at least that old when I got rid of them 10 years ago, and they were working as well as they did when they were new. These days, one can purchase a small-screen flat-panel TV for under $200, but he or she had better not expect the set to last anywhere near 20 years; more likely, the set will fail within a year or two if it's an obscure offshore brand, but that's the way it is in the 21st century, like it or not. LCD flat-panels need a backlight to brighten the picture enough to be watchable; these bulbs cost some $200, more than many small FPs sell for, so I predict in a few years, or perhaps even sooner, we will see a lot of FPs (those that aren't being recycled, anyway) on curbs and treelawns with nothing more serious wrong with them than a burned-out backlight. There will as well be a fair number of FPs thrown out when the video driver ICs go bad, as these are molded into the cable between the panel and the chassis. And so it goes.
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Jeff, WB8NHV Collecting, restoring and enjoying vintage Zenith radios since 2002 Zenith. Gone, but not forgotten. Last edited by Jeffhs; 07-07-2009 at 02:08 PM.
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#58
07-07-2009, 02:13 PM
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My main experience with Coby is with their DVD players and their boomboxes. Very cheap made and they usually don't hold up. My Brother-in-law couldn't understand why his new Coby DVD player went south after just a few movies. He's the type that goes for the lowest possible price with no regard for quality. I tried to explain to him that he's not saving any $ if he's constantly having to replace his low cost equipment. I suggested that he spend a little more and he might actually get a DVD player that will last more than 10 hours play time.
I agree that GPX is a junk brand. They were very common finds at the dollar stores around here during the '80's and '90's. I put Lennox Sound in the same category.
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#60
07-07-2009, 05:36 PM
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I'll post some details after I get it all hooked up and whatnot.
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