DIYHiFi.org

In most stuff the quality is disappearing and even if you want to buy some quality stuff, it is unobtanium.
I remember when computers were well built and last for a lifetime (China was still far from building them), built by only a dozen companies, american, european and japanese. Expensive, though.
These days you can't even find a good screwdriver locally, as you did before. It's all crap.
My father had a handfull of Facom tools and good soldering stations, isolation transformers... He once showed me how a small Facom plier cuts your nails very well. (!!!)
We had an official Facom store here in Lisbon. It closed long ago because there's China crap everywhere and cheap, which is what people want.
I went there once to buy some small diameter torx bits for my Compaq screwdriver (!) because the china stuff I was buying kept breaking. Yes, I still have it. Was not cheap, but it lasts for a lifetime.
If you buy anything chinese for cheap and it works only once before it breaks, then it WAS very expensive and a very bad deal!!!

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Carlos Filipe

"Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius - and a lot of courage - to move in the opposite direction." Albert Einstein

I make toast in an iron pan.

Sometimes I wonder if people actually want stuff that breaks so that they can go shopping again, the shopping itself being "the thing". An eternal loop of consumerism.

I remember when the first el-cheapo power tools from China showed up, I was one of the first to buy into the "bargaining". Nowadays I try to buy pro tools whenever I can afford them (like Makita power tools, Weller soldering stations and so on), but of course the expense makes the purchases less frequent; it's definitely worth the wait.

I think you may have hit upon something.

Of course people want quality for their money. When they're asking if they're getting a good deal it's more just an admission they have no idea what the hell they're buying, and it's a nicer way of saying "am I getting ripped off, am I getting my money's worth here".

People buying budget computers from budget stores are reduced to that, because the marketing doesn't tell them the truth or make any more an attempt at educating them on matters than they do themselves, and "saleskids" are complicite in that as well, where their only real job is to get the boxes off the shelf.

You'll find they're also at least aware that it's not top notch product they're getting, and that as long as it works alright they don't care because for that price, they can afford to get a replacement in a year or two, as they probably need to anyway.

It's just a farce to think the Chinese are unable to produce higher quality products when it's our manufacturers, corporations and experts over there training them. Why dont' they then? Because quality costs, and if they made the attempt at it then we wouldn't be able to afford it. It's sufficient we're simply given the illusion of quality, or safety, as they sell us what we can afford to buy.

Buying power has been doing nothing but plummeting as long as I've been alive. There's a reason why we shop at places like Walmart and Dollar stores and it's because we can't afford not to.

When it comes to audio you can take DVD players as a fine example, what did the first ones cost? Probably way too much I think it's safe to say, as nobody I knew had one until Walmart came to the rescue with $98 DVD players. Overnight everyone and their grandmothers had two of them. So what if they had to be exchanged several times over before finally getting one that mostly worked with just a few hard smacks, it was the only way they could afford it, and lets not bullshit ourselves, it's really all they are actually worth.

Lets get real. Human lives are often bought and sold far cheaper than what stereophile labels "Class A". Nobody can afford that crap, so if that's what's considered "good", then I guess I'm not an audiophile.

People are wising up to the system that designs obsoleteness into products, sells you non standardized standards, half of which are redundant and the other half rendered inoperable by license agreements or the lack of them.

You'd have to be completely stupid to want to go out and spend a litteral small fortune on some piece of shit that's going to need replacing in six months to a year's time regardless of how good it is or most likely isn't. Laser Discs didn't play DVD, DVD didn't play HD DVD, HD DVD didn't play BLUE Ray.. well some did but you had to pay more for it and then it stands to reason it probably didn't excel at either.

Back in the day the Japanese perfected process optimization and consequently the days of things being built to last a lifetime ended. We become accustomed to things hopefully lasting the limited lifetime of warranty and all too often very little more, what was termed jap scrap.

Now we consider ourselves lucky to have that much quality, not so much because it doesn't exist but because it doesn't exist at a price most can afford or justify paying. As we now have to compete with "ourselves" overseas, our own garbage has gotten cheaper as well, but it's mostly all assembled there anyway.

We've even completely undermined our own education system, because it's cheaper to import those we've trained overseas and pay them the peanuts we can't afford to work for here, because the jobs aren't here anyway, and nobody here likes to hear "it's only $10 an hour, but you can work alllll the hours you want". From a company that throws your resume in the trash if it doesn't include a technologist diploma, and designed the robotic assembly lines for most major car manufactures that existed at that time.

At least once a year during non recession times you get to hear about a great shortage of high skilled laborers, where by that they mean engineers and scientists. What you don't hear is how they'll rectify that by working to improve our education system or access to it, but instead pat themselves on the back for having the vision to grant a few extra thousand temporary work Visas, to fill the gap.

So the Chinese are evil for bullshitting us about quality that's not there, but we taught them that game too, and continue to bullshit ourselves. Once again, who's the real ennemy.

Apart from that I can't honestly tell you the last time I've seen a made in canada or usa sticker on anything that wasn't mostly for cosmetic or comedic value. I bought a coat the othe week that was designed in Canada, made in China. Other stickers say "imported by".. "oh look, canada". Looks like we play a roll in there someplace.

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'I am... everything is... changed... they're calling... your face... interwoven... who is...

PS:

A few months ago I saw a local classified ad for a used 90 year old mistress going cheap.

Directly under that someone was looking for electrolytic caps, apparently any would do.

It turns out, the guy got a great deal at walmart on laptops, so he got enough for the whole family. But tsk, wouldn't you know it? "Bad caps"..and he could tell just by the brand. "Will the plague ever end?? LOLZ".

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Ever notice how just about every failed electrolytic now is a "Bad Cap"?

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'I am... everything is... changed... they're calling... your face... interwoven... who is...

I work as a peon for Rockwell Automation (gotta pay for my equipment and college somehow...) and a lot of our components come from China. Through the time I've been there, there must have been numerous times where plastics were cheapened (thinner, more brittle), standards were minimized (hi-pot specs), or lines were moved for not being efficient enough. Seems to be the norm now to cut as many corners before a customer complains. There is some nice stuff they make though, admittedly.

Engineering there is terrible though. It's just embarrassing to see them stumble around trivial problems for days. Most don't even know the functions of simple switches, let alone Ohm's Law. Thousands of dollars in scrapped material that wasn't bad at all (crud on the contacts and such that simple cleaning would've fixed). It's just plain dumb. It's how these companies seem to operate though. Tack on a prefix to "engineer" for anyone who has a degree and they can fix any problem apparently. Control engineer. Process engineer. Material engineer. Senior engineer. Quality engineer. LEAN engineer. All equally useless. A capable high school student is bound to do better than any of these guys. So good news for people who barely made it through college to get a degree. Grades and work quality be damned. Seems like anyone can BS there way up now.

The only thing funny in this is watching them scramble for an explanation or solution, all the while using technobabble.

It's been an eye opening experience though. Patience gained, mostly. Money too, of course. Ultimately, an exercise in my tolerance of menial, insultingly easy tasks at the hands of incapable "professionals".

It's a good thing I have music, books, my dog and forums.

~Thomas

Thomas,

At the instituation I attended those who barely scrapped by were mostly those with their nose in the books that worked their asses off.

Those with the good marks did very little more than kiss all the ass they could and cheat like crazy.

One small team of 15 of their very "best", couldn't interface a microcontroller they were all intimiately familiar with, of the teacher's own design, assembled in a paint by numbers fashion by his $70 coloring book, that he made no money on at all.

They had all semester to complete that one task and couldn't manage it without letting the smoke out. They had however managed a coat of paint and some sparkling trim. The teacher was going to dedicate his night to it to get it working for them as they had to present it before the media the following day.

That was the day I never went back, and these days they no longer have a robotics program, nor electronics or mechanical.

The "student" mantra btw was "who cares, they'll just train us anyway".

In other news:

A mechanic friend was telling me a few years ago, while bragging about his used truck, that he was glad to find one a year or so older or of a certain version because they'd just started implementing things like wimpy ball joints and tie rods that year. He said 1/3 the size of previous ones, and that they needed changing all the time because they simply didn't last.

Guess that was GM trying to turn a profit..

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'I am... everything is... changed... they're calling... your face... interwoven... who is...

And those came down to 25 Euros some years later.

The serious problem is not that they build cheap and crappy stuff.
The chinese SELL cheap stuff because they don't pay for the licenses of the technology involved.

Before they could build DVD players for cheap, they have "invented" the SVCD format, which is nothing more than Philips' VCD, with more resolution.

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Carlos Filipe

"Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius - and a lot of courage - to move in the opposite direction." Albert Einstein

Nope, our local Walmart isn't in Euros... yet.

Not licensing the technology has to be irrelevant in the great scheme of things. The cost of something like that might increase the sticker price by, just as a wild guess, somewhere in the parts per million?

Such fees only hold back the little guys but they're a pittance to a corporation, and it's our own companies bringing us these cheap goods anyway. They just haven't got that kind of initiative, they're simply "taking orders" .

Let's say you found some such infraction in these $98 players and hey maybe that's why the menu didn't work or the disc didn't eject or the unit didn't power up at all. Fast forward to the class action lawsuit, do you sue "the Chinese" or ...

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'I am... everything is... changed... they're calling... your face... interwoven... who is...

We don't have Walmart here but we have similar and the price is in Euros.
Now you have DVD players for well under your $98 from the major brands (Philips, Sony, etc.)... made in China.
But these have a warranty and a name/reputation to maintain, and you know that the brand doesn't disappear suddently from the market the next day.

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Carlos Filipe

"Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius - and a lot of courage - to move in the opposite direction." Albert Einstein

We'll just have to agree to disagree.

It's not just that they don't pay for licenses. They also pretty much copy a lot of designs, saving a tremendous amount of development money and time to market.

(Just to perk Jocko up - how different is this from a lot of "group buys"??)

It is not just limited to the Chinese or even Asia, either, although they certainly have the most market visibility.

I was reading something from a guy who is living in one of the eastern Asian countries. He went to buy a game for his Play Station, I think it was. The shop keeper just looked at him funny, explaining that NOBODY there buys games - they just download them. Different thinking.

But hey, this a lot of our own fault. If we weren't so anxious for something just a little cheaper RIGHT NOW, and we didn't demand a little more profit RIGHT NOW, there wouldn't be the same market for this. The unfortunate part is that this really affects people and communities locally over the long term. But who cares about that?

They're also obsolete. However I just checked namebrand blue ray players and they seem to be going for around 200 to 350, might actually sell them at that price, no doubt they're made in China too.

I looked up the Sony of the group and you get the basic comments you'd expect from cheap gear, some were ecstatic, others mentioned how the unit has basic functionality (eject) that's no longer offered on the cut corner remote, others said "built like a toy", while others complained of more serious issues that may or may not have been user error, something about calibration.

Generally though it seems to be what you'd expect for the price. Here's probably the worst of the examples:

http://www.amazon.com/review/R3INKFKKJ6 ... hisHelpful

1 year warranty and doens't seem to handle standard DVDs so well?

Moving on I thought hey know what'd be funny? So I searched along the lines of "blue ray stereophile"... enters Marantz BD7003 - ZXY9000.00 = 560 to 800 smackers as their budget model.

Scroll down to read the comments:
http://www.engadgethd.com/2008/09/24/ma ... ay-player/

"This type of shit is gonna kill blu-ray. Who would buy this? How is this better than a Sony or Panasonic standalone? Oh wait, it isn't."

"Audiophiles and Videophiles will always pay way more for no gain. They love to waste their money on snake oil"

"What a joke. Is there really a large enough market out there for Stupid people throwing money away at this overpriced garbage? Oh and it is ugly as hell, and their $2000 player is also only profile 1.1. How dumb can you be buying this junk? Even if I was a Multi-billionaire, I wouldn't pay half the price for either of them. Their name doesn't impress me"

"Why $799.99? How about QUALITY? Just because it is Profile 1.1 does NOT mean a player is bad. News flash guys, most high end manufacturers don't care at all about chat during a movie, or playing a lame java game. They are concerned with picture and sound quality and reliability! Just so you know, Marantz has a 2 year warranty on ALL of their players, where most manufacturer's are giving you 90 days to 1 year.

You should also consider just WHAT $800 means in todays economy. This is NOT expensive for a quality piece of gear that you will own for 5+ years. If you are looking for a decent player at a cheap price, get the Samsungs that are on sale for $200 at Radio Shack. Just do not expect the same reliability and performance that $800 will buy you!..." bla bla bla... but you know what? It _is_ expensive and most people wont' go for it.

Endgadget's own comments:

" Oh sure, it's got HDMI 1.3a, 1080p upscaling for standard DVDs and support for Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio, but we're still unclear on what makes this thing worth nearly eight bills. If you've got it all figured out, however, you can dive right in this November."

Here's another Marantz multi format player.

http://www.engadgethd.com/2009/06/15/ma ... and-dated/

Only five thousand dollars but it doesn't handle DVD audio.

Read those (few) comments:

"mitchelljd @ Jun 16th 2009 12:27PM
interesting take on the BD player with great audio. but...

Why so expensive, a list price of $1500 is the max i could go for this.
also...
Why no HDCD compatibility?
Why no DVD Audio compatibility?

if Marantz could bring the price down and have it be a truly multi-format player. I would definitely buy it. but with it only supporting SACD, im a little un-impressed. it would be alot better to also support HDCD."

"Oppo BDP-83, anyone? $499 for reference-quality video & sound, AND dvd-audio included, thankyouverymuch. Sheesh.

Anyone who buys this is a chump."

Pros Vs cons of the Oppo:

http://www.productwiki.com/oppo-bdp-83/

Read that and ask if people want quality if it's offered at a reasonable cost and they get their money's worth for it.

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'I am... everything is... changed... they're calling... your face... interwoven... who is...

I can understand why.

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'I am... everything is... changed... they're calling... your face... interwoven... who is...