Are you talking to me? Are you talking to me?
Taxi Driver was on TV last night.

No, I don't think you are addressing post #138.
Happy Sunday, tracecom...and everybody else.

No one in particular. Sometimes I just talk to hear my head roar.

 

No one in particular. Sometimes I just talk to hear my head roar.

I usually don't talk. It interferes with the music that is playing in my head.

 

I have had an HP2000 colorjet printer.
That has inkcartridges that would not work after the expiring date.
The printer is blocked until you have installed a new cartridge.
I phoned HP and asked why this was done.
They told me that it was to protect the printing heads from old ink.

Bertus

Old ink ... I wonder how that got into the script.

Every year we get a new group of engineers. They plan for the obsolescence and hope to bring things to market quickly. Without nothing new, those engineers would be under and unemployed.

#12, worthless hobby is only worthless when one views the cash flow ... more exits the pocket than enters, especially if one becomes attached to the items they repair.

 

Had the same problem Joe, with a HP1050 printer. Didn't bother to get new cartriges just diched it & bought a Canon MG2560 printer, just refilled the cartridges & its away again.

 

no one would ever find out and make the information generally known since doing so would instantly put the company out of business.

Somehow, all of the consumer electronics companies are choosing to bump sales 20% by using a technique that will cause them to lose all their customers when revealed.

Common sense can be your friend.

the "clients" have now been trained that nothing lasts anymore. I go to repair something for a friend that blew up after 4 months and it's going to be an annoying SMD repair etc, and they say; "Don't bother, I'll just buy another one, nothing lasts these days anyway".

Whether they buy that brand or a different brand deosn't matter, the industry gets repeat sales as a whole and consumers are stupid and buy based on colour or how pretty the display is or what the salesman pushed that month. They are not very brand focused especially these days where there is a lot of Asian rebadging going on and consumers don't really know who made something anyway.

We (or the great unwashed, if you don't want to include yourself in "we") are boiled frogs. This issue of decreased life span of goods, whether you want to call it:
A: "planned obsolescence" = purposefully designed to fail exactly after the warranty expiration, or
B: "cut-corners crappy design" = minimally designed to last only to the end of the warranty, and any days after the expiration is a fluke bonus for the buyer
(In practice, I don't realize much distinction between the two; designed-to-fail or not-designed-not-to-fail, both still fail at the appropriate time)
...is no big secret that if it were to get out, would sing a corporate ship. We've been letting things get steadily worse over the years. People no longer expect their devices to last much longer than the short period of warranty, so when the devices fail just past the warranty expiration (at the designed-to-fail or not-designed-not-to-fail point) they don't question it. That's just the way things are; we accept it.

We silently condone the designed-to-fail or not-designed-not-to-fail practice, and we've painted ourselves into a corner now where in many categories we don't have a higher quality option. When every washing machine on the market has zero life expectancy after 5 years, all the manufacturers win. If your Fisher/Paykel fails after 5 years, you go online and write a scathing review of it and then buy an LG or Kenmore, and repeat the process in 5 more years. It's one more example of a trend that I'm calling "collusion masquerading as competition." Manufacturers these days (as I perceive it) are more than ever working together instead of against each other; maybe not outright - there may be no recognized agreement (whether formal or informal) and there may not even be any words exchanged on the topic. They probably just individually look to the left and to the right and see what the "other guys" are doing, and they get on the same page, and the end result is one market that functions as one company. A functional monopoly. Of course this does not apply to all categories of goods. I'm sure anybody could provide an example of an industry where competition still exists; I could provide several myself. But in an alarming number of industries, you can't.

We need some brave entrepreneurs to blaze a trail back to the land of consumer goods built to last. Some strong willed people who will not falter under the inevitable assault from the megagiant industry practicing Collusion Masquerading as Competition and products designed-to-fail or not-designed-not-to-fail. Inject some competition back into the game and pull us out of this crappy place we've wandered into. If that designed-to-last mentality could get a foot-hold in the consumer goods industry, I think it would force the megagiant, eventually, to step up it's game. Or I could just be naive.

 

I have decided that, for double the price, I can get a laundromat quality clothes washer. I expect it would last longer than I will at this stage of the game. If my Kenmore is dead in 5 years or less, that is my answer. Some things, you can still buy better quality. Most things, you can't.

ps, My sister bought a used laundromat washer with everything wrong but the timer and the drive motor. I won't make that mistake. It took months to find all the bad parts and get new parts from Europe! Besides that, it was designed to dump straight into a sewer pipe underneath it and the used appliance store had attached a 1.5 GPM pump on the bottom drain. I had to get a different pump so it would be empty before the timer started the spin cycle. That experience was every bit as bad as the Kenmore I bought a year ago.

 

the place I work for got some lasers, for measureing. somebody messed up, they have a 1 year warreenty, and only last 6 months. so far we have only paid for the origional ones and keep sending them in every 6 months.

 

I used to know a guy that did that for a hobby. He had the early curly fluorescent bulbs and mailed in the burnt out bulbs every 6 or 8 months for years.

 

We (or the great unwashed, if you don't want to include yourself in "we") are boiled frogs. This issue of decreased life span of goods, whether you want to call it:
A: "planned obsolescence" = purposefully designed to fail exactly after the warranty expiration, or
B: "cut-corners crappy design" = minimally designed to last only to the end of the warranty, and any days after the expiration is a fluke bonus for the buyer
(In practice, I don't realize much distinction between the two; designed-to-fail or not-designed-not-to-fail, both still fail at the appropriate time)...
...

I don't see ANY distinction between the two. In both cases it is "deliberately designed to fail".

To be "deliberate" doesn't require failure as the only motive, it just requires that they knew of the consequences and still did it anyway.

If I steered my car to a direction where I KNEW it would run over a cat, and did it anyway, then I "deliberately run over the cat". It doesn't matter what my motive was, maybe my motive was just to get to work a bit quicker. But I still deliberately run over the cat.

Same with consumer goods manufacturers. If they choose design decision A where they KNOW the product will fail in about 1 year, instead of design decision B where they know the product will last for 2 years, then they "deliberately designed it to fail in 1 year".

To be deliberate requires deliberation, ie understanding the consequences and still doing it anyway.

Like deliberately making appliances that will fail in a very short time. And re the title of this thread , you can call that "planned" instead of "deliberate". A court would not see any difference in you "planning" to run over the cat or you "deliberately" running over the cat. Same action, same crime.

 

RB, what do you have against cats?

 

RB, what do you have against cats

They are obsolescent.

 

They are obsolescent.

You seem to prefer "obsolescent" to "obsolete." Is that a personal preference or a UK thing? And do you agree with the following?

The adjective obsolescent refers to the process of passing out of use or usefulness--becoming obsolete. The adjective obsolete means no longer in use--outmoded in design, style, or construction.

 

You seem to prefer "obsolescent" to "obsolete." Is that a personal preference or a UK thing? And do you agree with the following?

Personally I have no preference, but the noun is in the title.
I think the Queen's English is the same as North American usage

Obsolescence = The noble art of becoming obsolete.

Norman Rockwell said it all in my post 100

 

RB, what do you have against cats?

Just the opposite. I really like cats. Actually I like all animals.

Humans are the species I like the least.

 

I wonder what a forum of cats would look like. Probably a desolate place, where the cats rarely log in, and when they do, they don't read any of the other cats' posts; they just post a quick one-liner about themselves, fishing for compliments or affection, and re-read their own posts from earlier and get pissed off that nobody replied to them. A lot like facebook.

 

 

I wonder what a forum of cats would look like. Probably a desolate place, where the cats rarely log in, and when they do, they don't read any of the other cats' posts; they just post a quick one-liner about themselves, fishing for compliments or affection, and re-read their own posts from earlier and get pissed off that nobody replied to them. A lot like facebook.

That's funny.

My wife and I have a cat. Because we have been traveling, the cat has been taken care of by a friend for almost two weeks and we haven't seen him (the cat) for that long. My wife is going to get him today, and I told her not to be disappointed when Jack (the cat) totally ignores her. That's the way cats are: self-centered.

 

The Story of Electronics

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sW_7i6T_H78

 

Mostly (90%?) on topic here...

How about "planned inferiority?" At least that's what I'd call it. It seems almost the same thing as "planned obsolescence" except it's "obsolete" (in comparison to its higher $$ higher model# clones) before it ever leaves the factory - "crippled" is the best word...

http://hackaday.com/2013/11/04/manu...l-camera-hacked-to-perform-as-high-end-model/

 

...and Rigol did the same thing on their scopes apparently. You pay double for the letter "D"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LnhXfVYWYXE