Products with built in faults

[Brian Gaff]

You know, I often wonder these days whether product development is now so
fast that nasty long term failures never get found. Its left to the poor old
consumer either to throw away items that repeatedly fail in the same manner
or keep shelling out to get them fixed outside the warranty period.

So it seems to be, for example, with the Pure Sonus1 XP DAB radio.
These were very popular and a lot were sold to folk as you could just
touch the handle and a sexy voice told you the time, she also told stations
and all the settings etc.
Apart from the snag where the stations soon changed their names and made
the name part a bit silly the rest of the radio was very good..... for a
while.
It appears from talking to people with these, that a while after the
warranty expires, they tend to go unreliable. Doing things like random
resets and losing all settings, to speaking letters and words randomly, or
just locking up.

Eventually these problems make the radio unusable and the final death
occurs so that the display is blank and nothing will work at all.
I had one go this way, and sent it back for repair, It then worked fine for
another couple of years and now the same problem is starting all over again.
My guess is that the software is getting scrambled and rebooting itself and
eventually it gets scrambled in such a way that the reboot no longer works
and the set is then dead. This sort of problem tends to occur, I think due
to either poor interference rejection in the set, or some kind of internal
noise on the supply. Not really worth shelling out another fifty quid for a
new module a second time.
However, talking to people it seems this experience is not uncommon these
days. One of the most often quoted pieces of gear to suffer from continual
similar failures seem to be DVD recorders, closely followed by the displays
in LCD tvs.

All a bit worrying I feel.

Brian

[Mark]

On Sun, 14 Nov 2010 09:49:48 -0000, "Brian Gaff"

Post by Brian Gaff
You know, I often wonder these days whether product development is now so
fast that nasty long term failures never get found. Its left to the poor old
consumer either to throw away items that repeatedly fail in the same manner
or keep shelling out to get them fixed outside the warranty period.

[snip]

I'm positive that consumer products, particularly electronics, are far
less reliable that they used to me. I put it down to a combination of
short product development timescales, the desire to make items as
cheaply as possible and the increasing complexity of said items.
There's a computer is almost everything nowadays.

It is possible to get things repaired for nothing outside the warranty
period because we actually have quite good consumer protection in this
country. It's not easy and most companies pretend they don't know the
law. The Sale of Goods Act allows consumers to get protection for a
maximum of 6 years (although it is usually shorter than the full 6
years).

[john brook]

Post by Mark
On Sun, 14 Nov 2010 09:49:48 -0000, "Brian Gaff"

Post by Brian Gaff
You know, I often wonder these days whether product development is now so
fast that nasty long term failures never get found. Its left to the poor old
consumer either to throw away items that repeatedly fail in the same manner
or keep shelling out to get them fixed outside the warranty period.

[snip]
I'm positive that consumer products, particularly electronics, are far
less reliable that they used to me. I put it down to a combination of
short product development timescales, the desire to make items as
cheaply as possible and the increasing complexity of said items.
There's a computer is almost everything nowadays.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

some years ago a member of our family who is an electronics engineer in
japan told us that many companys were actively researching how to 'inbuild'
failure after a certain time.

ring any bells out there ?

[Richard Head]

Post by Brian Gaff
You know, I often wonder these days whether product development is now so
fast that nasty long term failures never get found. Its left to the poor
old consumer either to throw away items that repeatedly fail in the same
manner or keep shelling out to get them fixed outside the warranty period.
So it seems to be, for example, with the Pure Sonus1 XP DAB radio.
These were very popular and a lot were sold to folk as you could just
touch the handle and a sexy voice told you the time, she also told
stations and all the settings etc.
Apart from the snag where the stations soon changed their names and made
the name part a bit silly the rest of the radio was very good..... for a
while.
It appears from talking to people with these, that a while after the
warranty expires, they tend to go unreliable. Doing things like random
resets and losing all settings, to speaking letters and words randomly,
or just locking up.
Eventually these problems make the radio unusable and the final death
occurs so that the display is blank and nothing will work at all.
I had one go this way, and sent it back for repair, It then worked fine
for another couple of years and now the same problem is starting all over
again.
My guess is that the software is getting scrambled and rebooting itself
and eventually it gets scrambled in such a way that the reboot no longer
works and the set is then dead. This sort of problem tends to occur, I
think due to either poor interference rejection in the set, or some kind
of internal noise on the supply. Not really worth shelling out another
fifty quid for a new module a second time.
However, talking to people it seems this experience is not uncommon these
days. One of the most often quoted pieces of gear to suffer from continual
similar failures seem to be DVD recorders, closely followed by the
displays in LCD tvs.
All a bit worrying I feel.
Brian
--
Note:- In order to reduce spam, any email without 'Brian Gaff'
in the display name may be lost.
Blind user, so no pictures please!

All I know is that all the must-have gadgets that we in the West see as
indispensible are produced in the far East by poorly-paid and poorly-treated
workers as cheaply as possible so that the rest of the people in the supply
chain between the Chinese factory and the UK retailer all get a good cut.
For example, an iPod that retails in the UK for around £160 probably costs
about £15 to make and is sold by the factory for about £30. So, it is little
wonder that the life expectancy of many electronic items is short when they
cost so little to manufacture.

[Brian Gaff]

Well, yes I agree, indeed the radio does say its made in China, though
designed in the UK. I wonder what stuff would cost if it was made here
though, presumably you could offset the transport and extra hands grabbing
a cut against the higher cost of making it.


Well to some extent.

When I bought my first hi fi, it was made here, but the percentage of my
income for it was far greater than a similar device today would be. We saved
up for it, and were not very impressed if it went wrong a lot. I wonder who
was the first company to shut up shop here and make stuff in a cheap place.
At the moment we will soon run out of cheap places I fear, as even China is
showing signs of costing more now. Where is left, Africa maybe?

Brian
--
Brian Gaff - ***@blueyonder.co.uk
Note:- In order to reduce spam, any email without 'Brian Gaff'
in the display name may be lost.
Blind user, so no pictures please!

Post by Richard Head

Post by Brian Gaff
You know, I often wonder these days whether product development is now so
fast that nasty long term failures never get found. Its left to the poor
old consumer either to throw away items that repeatedly fail in the same
manner or keep shelling out to get them fixed outside the warranty period.
So it seems to be, for example, with the Pure Sonus1 XP DAB radio.
These were very popular and a lot were sold to folk as you could just
touch the handle and a sexy voice told you the time, she also told
stations and all the settings etc.
Apart from the snag where the stations soon changed their names and made
the name part a bit silly the rest of the radio was very good..... for a
while.
It appears from talking to people with these, that a while after the
warranty expires, they tend to go unreliable. Doing things like random
resets and losing all settings, to speaking letters and words randomly,
or just locking up.
Eventually these problems make the radio unusable and the final death
occurs so that the display is blank and nothing will work at all.
I had one go this way, and sent it back for repair, It then worked fine
for another couple of years and now the same problem is starting all over
again.
My guess is that the software is getting scrambled and rebooting itself
and eventually it gets scrambled in such a way that the reboot no longer
works and the set is then dead. This sort of problem tends to occur, I
think due to either poor interference rejection in the set, or some kind
of internal noise on the supply. Not really worth shelling out another
fifty quid for a new module a second time.
However, talking to people it seems this experience is not uncommon these
days. One of the most often quoted pieces of gear to suffer from
continual similar failures seem to be DVD recorders, closely followed by
the displays in LCD tvs.
All a bit worrying I feel.
Brian
--
Note:- In order to reduce spam, any email without 'Brian Gaff'
in the display name may be lost.
Blind user, so no pictures please!

All I know is that all the must-have gadgets that we in the West see as
indispensible are produced in the far East by poorly-paid and
poorly-treated workers as cheaply as possible so that the rest of the
people in the supply chain between the Chinese factory and the UK retailer
all get a good cut. For example, an iPod that retails in the UK for around
£160 probably costs about £15 to make and is sold by the factory for about
£30. So, it is little wonder that the life expectancy of many electronic
items is short when they cost so little to manufacture.

[Mark]

On Tue, 16 Nov 2010 09:19:31 -0000, "Brian Gaff"

Post by Brian Gaff
Well, yes I agree, indeed the radio does say its made in China, though
designed in the UK. I wonder what stuff would cost if it was made here
though, presumably you could offset the transport and extra hands grabbing
a cut against the higher cost of making it.

Production costs are so cheap in China and so it is cheaper to make
stuff there despite the extra transport costs (otherwise they would
not do it)

Post by Brian Gaff
Well to some extent.
When I bought my first hi fi, it was made here, but the percentage of my
income for it was far greater than a similar device today would be. We saved
up for it, and were not very impressed if it went wrong a lot. I wonder who
was the first company to shut up shop here and make stuff in a cheap place.
At the moment we will soon run out of cheap places I fear, as even China is
showing signs of costing more now. Where is left, Africa maybe?

England. As we run out of cheap countries to exploit and Britain goes
into a deeper recession then eventually we will be the lowest paid
workers in the world and production will be all moved here. Might not
take too long either if the current government keep up their cutbacks.

[Brian Gaff]

Yes, well, the problem with being in charge of the UK just now is that
whichever way you go, its not obvious how its going to work. If you print
money, then the cost of the items you have to buy goes up. If you cut back
you have loats of people out of work, and cannot see them starve. It needs
some natural disaster or war to kick start things. Maybe it would be
cheapest to get the Argentines to invade the Falklands again.

Brian
--
Brian Gaff - ***@blueyonder.co.uk
Note:- In order to reduce spam, any email without 'Brian Gaff'
in the display name may be lost.
Blind user, so no pictures please!

Post by Mark
On Tue, 16 Nov 2010 09:19:31 -0000, "Brian Gaff"

Post by Brian Gaff
Well, yes I agree, indeed the radio does say its made in China, though
designed in the UK. I wonder what stuff would cost if it was made here
though, presumably you could offset the transport and extra hands grabbing
a cut against the higher cost of making it.

Production costs are so cheap in China and so it is cheaper to make
stuff there despite the extra transport costs (otherwise they would
not do it)

Post by Brian Gaff
Well to some extent.
When I bought my first hi fi, it was made here, but the percentage of my
income for it was far greater than a similar device today would be. We saved
up for it, and were not very impressed if it went wrong a lot. I wonder who
was the first company to shut up shop here and make stuff in a cheap place.
At the moment we will soon run out of cheap places I fear, as even China is
showing signs of costing more now. Where is left, Africa maybe?

England. As we run out of cheap countries to exploit and Britain goes
into a deeper recession then eventually we will be the lowest paid
workers in the world and production will be all moved here. Might not
take too long either if the current government keep up their cutbacks.
--
(\__/) M.
(='.'=) Due to the amount of spam posted via googlegroups and
(")_(") their inaction to the problem. I am blocking some articles
posted from there. If you wish your postings to be seen by
everyone you will need use a different method of posting.

[Mark]

On Wed, 17 Nov 2010 09:03:30 -0000, "Brian Gaff"

Post by Brian Gaff
Yes, well, the problem with being in charge of the UK just now is that
whichever way you go, its not obvious how its going to work. If you print
money, then the cost of the items you have to buy goes up. If you cut back
you have loats of people out of work, and cannot see them starve. It needs
some natural disaster or war to kick start things. Maybe it would be
cheapest to get the Argentines to invade the Falklands again.

They probably will -- we are getting rid of many navy ships early.

But it's a lie that money cannot be found. Billions have been spent
on the banks and on wars in recent years. It's the will not the means
that is lacking now.

[Brian Gaff]

I disagree, the problem is that when the economy picks up we will hit an
interim period where the repayments on all the money the country is
borrowing will be unsustainable and although the recession will be over any
country in this mess will dive back into it again.

As I said, you can only print money if you have something to judge its value
against. At the moment so many countries do not have anything to make value
with. Lots of people, certainly, but nothing to make them do to get things
to sell and probably nothing another country would want to buy.

Brian
--
Brian Gaff - ***@blueyonder.co.uk
Note:- In order to reduce spam, any email without 'Brian Gaff'
in the display name may be lost.
Blind user, so no pictures please!

Post by Mark
On Wed, 17 Nov 2010 09:03:30 -0000, "Brian Gaff"

Post by Brian Gaff
Yes, well, the problem with being in charge of the UK just now is that
whichever way you go, its not obvious how its going to work. If you print
money, then the cost of the items you have to buy goes up. If you cut back
you have loats of people out of work, and cannot see them starve. It needs
some natural disaster or war to kick start things. Maybe it would be
cheapest to get the Argentines to invade the Falklands again.

They probably will -- we are getting rid of many navy ships early.
But it's a lie that money cannot be found. Billions have been spent
on the banks and on wars in recent years. It's the will not the means
that is lacking now.
--
(\__/) M.
(='.'=) Due to the amount of spam posted via googlegroups and
(")_(") their inaction to the problem. I am blocking some articles
posted from there. If you wish your postings to be seen by
everyone you will need use a different method of posting.