Symphonic mini B&W TV

[Jeffhs]

Originally Posted by CELT

Whatever happened to style? You never see anything as creative as that in the newer sets. I can think of many radios, record players and televisions when I was growing up that were at least interesting to look at. The new stuff has all the charm of a toaster-oven.

You can say that again! I see the small TV/AM/FM sets in discount and drug stores all the time, and yes, they don't look anywhere as nice as the original Symphonics, etc. of the '60s-'70s. They are about as nicely styled (!) as today's color TVs in black plastic cube cabinets. The Korean, Japanese, etc. electronics firms turning out these small sets (which probably don't last very long--one good knock or drop and there goes the CRT or the main circuit panel The CRTs in those sets probably don't last long either; if the set is used a lot, the tube will probably give out within a year or less) just don't have the sense of style the American TV manufacturers had in "the olden days" of the '50s through the '70s. The price tags on the new sets bear this out. Twenty bucks or less (I've actually seen these going for far less than $20--one time at a discount house I saw one for $11.97, and I swear I saw one a while ago for $9.99 listed in a catalog) for a new portable TV, with or without the AM/FM radio, seems incredible even in this day and age. How the stores that sell these cheapies can turn a profit on them is beyond me. As I always say of things like this, go figure.

Pardon me for bringing this thread back on topic.....but I always thought the TV in question reminded me somewhat of Spock's Tricorder.

Anthony

[Sandy G]

Yeah, it did...Did you ever have one? Got one now ? They ARE cute little buggers, cuter than the 1.5" Panasonics of the '80s...I've seen 'em in both white & black cases..Mine is black.-Sandy G.

A fiend of the family had one of these sets so I got a chance to play with one way back when. Can't recall for sure, but for some reason I keep thinking there was a cover that clipped on the front to "close up" and protect the face......not sure, might be thinking of something else.

Anthony

[Jeffhs]

Originally Posted by Whirled One

Speaking of Funai, I bought a Symphonic (Funai) Hi-Fi VCR a few years ago to use as a spare. Out of curiousity I opened it up a while back and just couldn't believe how few moving parts there were inside that thing..! Wow. Especially when you consider how the typical VHS VCR from the late 70's had such an incredible maze of belts and motors and gears, it's amazing to see how simplified they've managed to get these mechanisms. Also interesting about this VCR is the almost complete lack of connecting cables on the inside-- the mechanism portion of the VCR basically just "plugs into" the PC board just by pressing the mechanism down onto its mounting points and driving the mounting screws in place. Some of the microswitches and even the tape-end IR LED and sensor are actually mounted directly on the PC board itself rather than attached to the mechanism, presumably to reduce the number of electrical connections even further.

Yes, but these new VCRs don't last as long as the early VHS and Betamax machines did. I once had a Panasonic VCR with VCR Plus that ate a tape after only two years. I opened it to get the cassette out and wound up wrecking the mechanism. The next day I ordered a new Panasonic VCR from H. H. Gregg which has lasted two years and is still working, but for how long is anybody's guess. There may not be as many belts, etc. in these new VCRs as there were in earlier models, but the mechanism which is there is made almost entirely of plastic. It is no wonder these machines don't last longer than two or three years, but then again, VCRs were never meant to last years as the older TVs and radios often do. A friend of mine has his late father's Curtis Mathes VCR, which was new some 20+ years ago; the machine still works for playing back tapes, but doesn't record anymore. His father had the VCR repaired once or twice during those 20-odd years, but the machine cost something on the order of $800 when new so it was probably worth repairing. Today's VCRs aren't worth being repaired even once after they are out of warranty; the charge to simply have a shop look at the thing, let alone to have it repaired, is often equal to or even more than what a new VCR goes for these days. It's called planned obsolescence. VCRs are obsolete anyhow today, with DVD players now becoming ever cheaper every time one turns around, or so it seems (I have a CyberHome DVD player which sells for $30 at Best Buy and other electronics stores). With almost all new movies on DVD these days, tell me honestly, who needs a VCR except to watch old favorite VHS tapes? I have a rack in my bedroom with about 60 VHS cassettes, on which I have recorded movies and old TV series. About the only thing I use my VCR for, aside from occasionally time-shifting shows, is watching those old tapes once in a while. My DVD player is getting more use now, since I subscribed to Netflix some six months ago, than my VCR has seen in the same time period. As I said earlier, VCRs are all but obsolete these days and are being phased out in favor of DVD players, so the day will eventually come when the stand-alone VCR will be all but impossible to find except at yard sales, flea markets, Goodwill, etc. There are combo machines available now which will transfer non-copyguarded VHS tapes to DVD (not the other way around--the DMCA forbids it and all DVDs are copyguarded by Macrovision), but the industry has all but given up on stand-alone VCRs. There's no stopping progress. DVD is the wave of the future. VCRs are dinosaurs today, which is why the new machines still available are almost deliberately made to fail after only a year or two. The manufacturers of DVD players are counting on VCRs becoming things of the past, just as TV manufacturers are trying with all their might to declare CRT-based televisions obsolete--as they may well become, sooner than we may think, as flat-panel HDTVs come down in price. Heck, I saw a 17-inch Magnavox flat-panel advertised for under $500 in last week's Best Buy newspaper flyer that had me seriously considering replacing my 5-year-old RCA 19-inch CRT set, which still works well and makes a great picture on digital cable (using a cable box), with a flat-panel LCD. If these flat panels keep coming down in price (I'm waiting for 19-21" FPs to drop below $500), my CRT-based sets may well go into storage, with a new Magnavox or other brand of flat-panel HDTV taking the RCA's place in the entertainment unit in my living room. One of these days... Hey, I ditched my vinyl phono records five years ago in favor of CDs, and finally made the switch to DVD last year; my old TVs may and likerly will eventually be next, in favor of HDTV. To paraphrase a character in the 1970 movie The Graduate, I have only one word: Digital. And I'm all for it. The only thing holding me back is the currently steep price of 19-21" flat-panels. I could replace my present set with a flat panel tomorrow if I wanted a set two inches smaller than my CRT set is now, but wanting an even larger set when I do make the switch, I'll wait until the 21" FPs become reasonable.

[domfjbrown]

Jeff - you've bought hook line and sinker into digital...

Vinyl's still far more musically coherent than any silver beermat. VHS always was and still is crap compared to DVD, but Laserdisc, in many respects, can look better (especially in comparision to early DVDs with poor bitrates/blocking artefacts).

As for LCD/Plasma - I've still not seen one that can do what CRT does (decent dynamic range, colour fidelity); when an LCD 28-inch widescreen costs the same as an equivalent sized Sony Trinitron/Panasonic TAU in the UK *and significantly* outperforms these CRT sets, I might well be interested. My 9-year-old Sony Trinitron can produce a picture every bit as good as (though obviously smaller than) a £6000 Pioneer plasma that one of Exeter's hifi shops has - with NONE of the horrid blocking/banding/smearing artefacts.

Progress isn't always good, and it's forced on us. I for one resent having to rebuy all my music on CD, and when they ditch CD player manufacture (DVD players are crap for playing CDs - really flat and dull sounding) and force a new format on us, I might well say "stuff it" and give up on music altogether! Corporate greed = another word for progress.

I mean, I have a UK copy of "Hunky dory" by David Bowie on 8track that outperforms the 2001 EMI CD reissue. And I'm not joking. Sure there's a bit of hiss and some minor wow, but musically and soniically it's streets ahead. The timpani on the end of "Life on mars?" on the 8track sounds like a timpani; the one on the CD sounds like someone slapping a kipper against a kitchen worktop. Even the original US-pressed 1983 RCA CD copy I have of this pees on the 2001 copy from a great height! Let's not even mention the LP...

You can't claim that 30 years' age on the mastertape is why the CD sounds crap either - this 8track's been to hell and back and is the same age as the master, with much slower tape speed and no environmentally controlled long term storage (I got it from a carboot sale!). I blame digital for most of today's musical ills - it's what made Kylie Minogue sing in key, what made Oasis "talented", and what removed the soul from all bands' albums. Listen to "Elephant" by the White Stripes to hear what an album SHOULD sound like (direct to 8 track open reel - all valve; even on the grossly-inferior CD format, it sounds good; on vinyl.. well...). I tell you one thing - manufactured crap like The Spice Girls would have got nowhere without pro-tools and other digital malarky.

...and here's the killer; my turntable/arm/cart/phono stage cost a quarter of my CD player - and still sounds far better. Figure that one out.

I've heard pre-recorded (as in shop-bought) cassettes that outperform remastered CDs - my original 1982 unbarcoded tape copy of "Love over gold" by Dire Straits is one such example.

As for washing machines that are designed to break after 5 years, and computers that have, what, a six-month lifecycle at best, and other such crimes to our bank balances and the environment, SOMETHING'S got to give...

[Chad Hauris]

My comments:
I mostly listen to records for music...I remember buying 45's of favorite songs heard on the radio, wish I could still do that.

I do listen to 8-tracks in my old car that has a player. However, 8-tracks are subject to physical/mechanical problems such as pressure pad and pinch roller degradation so that many 8-track cartridges do not have nearly the sound quality they did new.

I do not have any nostalgia for VCR's except for some of the old Betamax and 3/4" machines. DVD's are superior to video tapes in every way I can see...better picture and audio quality and you can instantly skip to portions of the show. Yes, laser discs may have these advantages too, but the discs and players are a lot harder to find and don't have the current movies.

Am so glad for the advent of direct TV/digital satellite...can finally watch TV shows that I want to in a rural area where there is no cable.

[Jeffhs]

Originally Posted by Chad Hauris

Am so glad for the advent of direct TV/digital satellite...can finally watch TV shows that I want to in a rural area where there is no cable.

No cable? I find that difficult to believe in this day and age. You must live in an area so rural that no cable company wants to extend its network there. I would have thought that there is at least one good-sized city near you with a cable system willing to connect your home to it. IIRC, you are near Odessa and Midland, Texas, both of which very likely have cable systems. How far are you from either or both of those cities?

Satellite is good, I guess; however, I wouldn't know for sure, as I never had it, though some folks here do. My small northeastern Ohio town of 3,180 population has had digital cable (Comcast) for years--we cannot get decent TV reception here without it. Satellite service, however, has its drawbacks; you sometimes lose the signal in rain or snowstorms (or even if a good wind blows against the dish), and sometimes you might lose your picture for no reason at all. (I know this from having seen a commercial running on Comcast cable for an organization called onlycablecan.org, which extolls the virtues of cable against the problems of getting TV reception via satellite; another organization does just the opposite in its commercial, also seen here on cable from time to time, pitting satellite TV against cable.)

However, as I said at the start of this message, I find it almost incredible that your area does not have cable in the 21st century; I always thought cable TV was more or less national in scope, being available virtually anywhere. Are there any plans for the cable systems in either Odessa or Midland to extend their networks to your town? Just curious.

[Jeffhs]

Originally Posted by domfjbrown

Jeff - you've bought hook line and sinker into digital...

Vinyl's still far more musically coherent than any silver beermat. VHS always was and still is crap compared to DVD, but Laserdisc, in many respects, can look better (especially in comparision to early DVDs with poor bitrates/blocking artefacts).

As for LCD/Plasma - I've still not seen one that can do what CRT does (decent dynamic range, colour fidelity); when an LCD 28-inch widescreen costs the same as an equivalent sized Sony Trinitron/Panasonic TAU in the UK *and significantly* outperforms these CRT sets, I might well be interested. My 9-year-old Sony Trinitron can produce a picture every bit as good as (though obviously smaller than) a £6000 Pioneer plasma that one of Exeter's hifi shops has - with NONE of the horrid blocking/banding/smearing artefacts.

Progress isn't always good, and it's forced on us. I for one resent having to rebuy all my music on CD, and when they ditch CD player manufacture (DVD players are crap for playing CDs - really flat and dull sounding) and force a new format on us, I might well say "stuff it" and give up on music altogether! Corporate greed = another word for progress.

I mean, I have a UK copy of "Hunky dory" by David Bowie on 8track that outperforms the 2001 EMI CD reissue. And I'm not joking. Sure there's a bit of hiss and some minor wow, but musically and soniically it's streets ahead. The timpani on the end of "Life on mars?" on the 8track sounds like a timpani; the one on the CD sounds like someone slapping a kipper against a kitchen worktop. Even the original US-pressed 1983 RCA CD copy I have of this pees on the 2001 copy from a great height! Let's not even mention the LP...

You can't claim that 30 years' age on the mastertape is why the CD sounds crap either - this 8track's been to hell and back and is the same age as the master, with much slower tape speed and no environmentally controlled long term storage (I got it from a carboot sale!). I blame digital for most of today's musical ills - it's what made Kylie Minogue sing in key, what made Oasis "talented", and what removed the soul from all bands' albums. Listen to "Elephant" by the White Stripes to hear what an album SHOULD sound like (direct to 8 track open reel - all valve; even on the grossly-inferior CD format, it sounds good; on vinyl.. well...). I tell you one thing - manufactured crap like The Spice Girls would have got nowhere without pro-tools and other digital malarky.

...and here's the killer; my turntable/arm/cart/phono stage cost a quarter of my CD player - and still sounds far better. Figure that one out.

I've heard pre-recorded (as in shop-bought) cassettes that outperform remastered CDs - my original 1982 unbarcoded tape copy of "Love over gold" by Dire Straits is one such example.

As for washing machines that are designed to break after 5 years, and computers that have, what, a six-month lifecycle at best, and other such crimes to our bank balances and the environment, SOMETHING'S got to give...

My audio system is in fact 100-percent digital (all my music is on CDs, much of it ripped into my computer, and I listen mostly to Internet and cable radio/music channels rather than standard local FM which, for the most part, except for the National Public Radio affiliates operating from 88-92 MHz, is garbage in this country); so is my video entertainment center, except for the monitor. I still use an RCA 19" CRT television I bought new some five years ago; it still makes an excellent picture on the cable system in my small town, as well as my other video sources (VHS and DVD). As long as my CRT TV still works, I'll use it with the digital cable box; it's probably just as well, as all U.S. TV stations will convert to all-digital (ceasing all analog telecasting) by the end of 2006 (by the U. S. Federal Communications Commission's decree, not by their own choice) and I want to be ready. I also have a DVD player and a subscription to Netflix.com (a very popular DVD rental service in the U.S.), and believe me, I use the DVD player a lot more these days than I use my Panasonic VCR, even though I have a collection of about 60 VHS tapes of old movies and TV series I taped over the last 20 years or so. Nice to see the old shows I grew up with in the 1970s coming back on DVD.


Kind regards,

[domfjbrown]

Don't worry guys - I have no affection at all for VHS; even as a 7 year old kid in 1983 (when our neighbours got Beta - MY parents didn't get a video until 1988!) I could still see the better quality picture of Beta a mile off! Still poor compared to off-air though

I got my 8track deck/tapes in 1998, so have no idea what the tapes sounded like new. After new pressure pads (read window draught stripping!)/resplicing/refoiling and a head clean, some of the tapes sound crazily good. My Hendrix "Live at the Isle of Wight" gives decent LPs a SERIOUS run for their money - and that surprised me too!

[bgadow]

Jeff, around here all the small towns have cable & you are covered if you live on one of the main roads, but most of the side roads just don't have it available. The houses are too far apart. Thats what started the Rural Electric Administration way back, its just not profitable to run the lines down a road with only a few houses.