I've got an Alba portable TV that I've had for 14 years. It was the first colour telly I had as a teenager, it travelled to Uni and back several times for four years and has now been in the spare room in my own home for the last 4 years, and is still used when I'm in there working. I swear it's bulletproof.
Also got a Sanyo VCR that was bought for me in 1994 that is still going strong. It needed one repair under warranty 9 years ago but then has never given me any problems.
Don't know how long it'll last, but I recently bought the £39.99 DVD player from Asda for my bedroom. I plays far more formats than the £350 Sony set up I have and was multi region out of the box. The only shortfall is that it doesn't remember the last play position on the DVD when you put it in standby. But as I got more than I expected for £40 (it's £35 now) it doesn't bother me
My bloody Thomson TV packed up in after just three years.
I remember a few years ago I had a "Ferguson - Thomson Technology" branded TV that went back to the manufacturer a few times. It never worked properly so I eventually junked it.
I hope Pacific TVs aren't notorious for failure, I'm hoping the PAcific W/S I have will last longer than the Thomson did.
I have seen a Pacific 21" Pureflat TV in ASDA for only for only £114 and I'm very tempted. Can anyone give opinions, reviews, etc.?
......... This time the Thomson answer was that the VCR was working correctly but the BBC's implementation of PDC didn't meet European standards.
It's a cool looking VCR, "designed" by Phillipe Starck no less, but basically a heap of junk. Still works - just - so long as you don't try to rewind in play mode, as it will simply chew the tape up and switch itself off in disgust. The TV, on the other hand, still works perfectly.
In all fairness, many other brands of video also had many problems with the BBC's PDC signal. Apparently the BBC had 'their' version of PDC which was different to the accepted standard. PDC later becam an option with timer recordings whereas initially PDC was automatically selected when you did a timer record.
I used to sell a fair amount of Thomson equipment and most was fairly good, but certainly not as reliable as Panasonic... however I'm not in the trade anymore so can't comment on more recent Thomson's....Some of their 'Stark' designed TV's and videos were quite interesting...
Some of their 'Stark' designed TV's and videos were quite interesting...
Yes, the "Starck" video was a very exciting piece of design. It had a translucent hinged front panel with little springy buttons on it which pushed the "real" buttons on the "real" fascia behind it. You could just see the LED display through the smoked glass style panel and it gave the video a classy look. And to programme it you have to connect to a TV via SCART so that the onscreen menu is superimposed on the live TV picture, and you use a trackball-type remote control to input the timer settings. Brilliant design, but in practice...
The smoky front panel broke off, leaving the less attractive "normal" fascia exposed, but the LEDs - which have an automatic dimmer so you can barely see them if the VCR is in standby - have now dimmed themselves so much you can't read them even without the panel in the way. The transport is dodgy, it chews tapes and then switches the VCR off if it gets in trouble. And this week it somehow managed to make my TV display a blank screen on all channels, even cable, just by switching the VCR on!
Orion-based VCRs are the pits as well (some Alba/Bush/Goodmans, Matsui, JMB, Orion etc etc). They develop problems with the MF switch and all start chewing tapes after 2-3 years, and replacing the defective part doesn't seem to help. Cheap garbage IMHO.
I've found Matsui VCRs to have great reliablity - they have out likved VCRs in our family made by JVC, Sony and a 1980s Fergosen, but still havn't had the chance (they are too new) to out live the "made in West Germany" Logik VCR that was still going stong until a power surge killed it in 1995..... (we could have repaired it, but we wanted facilites like timer recording, remote control etc)....
In all fairness, many other brands of video also had many problems with the BBC's PDC signal. Apparently the BBC had 'their' version of PDC which was different to the accepted standard. PDC later becam an option with timer recordings whereas initially PDC was automatically selected when you did a timer record.
Actually, the BBC use the "full spec" where as Channel 4 (who were the first to introduce PDC in this country) only required, and therefore used, a smaller subset of the capabilites of PDC. This meant a number of VCRs were designed to work with the Channel 4 implementation (a perfectly valid one) but when the BBC started and used a much greater range of the facilites (as they have to with the smaller gaps between programmes and regional variations) some of the early VCR's were badly programmed enough to say "bah we don't like this" and go wrong on the BBC....
Ah, well I know the BBC introduction of PDC caused much havoc for us Vcr salespeople..... and naturally the vcr makers blamed the BBC for their PDC version.
Just another great idea that was too clever for it's own use. We'd get so many complaints about it.....
Schieder TV's
Low end Sony VCR's (they're just a generic machine that loads of manufacturers use)
Aiwa since they got taken over by Sony (I've got an Aiwa hifi I got before they were bought out and its been going for just over 5 years now)
Sharp MiniDisc players
Gigabyte Mobo's
Philips DVD players (the TV's are good tho)
Alesis ADAT machines
BT.
Intel Chipset Modems
Brother laptops (very poorly built, mine broke)
Nokia mobiles (fall apart)
Panasonic-bought a VCR at Christmas 1990,it broke down in November 91. After two months and a failed repair attempt,I got my money refunded and bought a newer Panasonic model which lasted eleven years with regular use.
Phillips-my father bought me a Phillips portable cassette recorder/player one Christmas which had broken down by 10.30am on Christmas morning!
Sharp-bought a minidisc recorder four years ago,never had a days trouble with it. Ditto my Sony portable radio in the kitchen which I bought at roughly the same time.
Matsui VCR's are just great! I have one from 1992, and the only niggle is that the remote broke back in 98 - universal remotes do the trick though!
It has outlived several Sony VCRs, to put it that way.
Phillips TV's are really good as well. I have one also from 1992, it has 2 SCARTS, NICAM stereo (big beefy speakers, unlike the tinny ones you get in most low to mid range equipment now-a-days), a 16:9 letterbox mode, and RGB.
I swear the Sky RGB picture on it is better than most peoples new expensive TV's around these days.
Alba is definitely very hit and miss, my Dad had an amp/tuner and it worked well for many years. I had a cheap Alba radio from Argos and it would not hold the station at all.
I try to stay with Sony and haven't had any problems at all, it's not too overpriced. Well unless you buy their computers !
I must be abusing my Matsui VCRs then I must say lol. But then my experiences with electricals have always been a bit "different"...
Remember Akura from the early-mid-90s? They were huge for about a year and a half until they developed a "junk" reputation and were forced off the shelves. But for a while they were everywhere, and really cheap too (20" TVs for £160 when even Alba were charging £220 and that sort of thing).
Well I bought two Akura VCRs, a stereo and a TV. All still going in various places......
If you want a quality TV that will last you years, buy a Sony. I've had a 14 incher since I was about 14/15 - and I'm now just the wrong side of 30. Is that some kind of record? Like the oldest goldfish...
However, the Sony laptops are overpriced and, in my experience, not that great, especially when it comes to picture quality.
For VCRs I would recommend Sanyo. Again, had mine for yonks - a four-header - and it's fantastic. Interestingly, a panasonic bought back in the early 90s expired after a couple of years (like another poster on here). Must have been a dodgy design.
As for Playstations, again I would recommend the Sony. Fan's a bit noise, but still the best on the market.
The Sony TV at work has been absolutely hammered its whole life, and the admin manager reckons they bought it in 1978. So it's doing pretty well hehe.
My elderly neighbours have a very early colour TV (branded "Ultra" although it looks like a Thorn-Ferguson to me) from around 1969-70, and the picture would put many a new TV to shame. Likewise a friend of mine has a Sanyo from the early 70s that's still going strong.
If you want a quality TV that will last you years, buy a Sony. I've had a 14 incher since I was about 14/15 - and I'm now just the wrong side of 30. Is that some kind of record? Like the oldest goldfish...
I've got an old 14 inch BAIRD branded portable, white case with a black facia, 8 push buttons and a great big loudspeaker., it's quite old, not sure how old although I've had it since I was 14, when I used to use it as a monitor on my sinclair speccy128. It's now connected to a pace on-digital box (rf out).
I've got a Matsui VCR from 1996, although the design is a bit stupid because there are only play, record and stop/eject buttons on the front of the VCR so god help you if you are watching something you recorded off ITV, have a broken remote control and want to skip through the adverts. I didn't choose it however - my mum did and it was the only thing that we could afford at the time, as VCR's were pretty pricey back in those days!
Still going strong although it chewed up some tapes ages ago and had to have some of the innards replaced whilst under warranty. Although it is getting 'on' a bit because there is this awful hissing on the soundtrack which becomes apparent when fed through a computer. I'm looking to replace it soon so I can take advantage of Nicam - this one is mono.
Also we still have a really old Panasonic TV from godknowswhen as it has a wooden finish cabinet, no scart, has buttons for "BBC1", "BBC2, "ITV1" and "ITV2" which I assume was Channel 4 and says "made in UK" on the sticker on the back - something I've not seen in ages - the picture is good but like the Matsui VCR, it is getting on a bit - if you touch the buttons on the panel to change then it sometimes can't stay on the channel you selected, the sliders on the front to control the sound/contrast/colour are dodgy and the slightest touch can cause them to go from one extreme to another.
As has been said, Mitsubishi pulled out of the UK electronics market some time ago and the "Mitsubishi" stuff you get now is not the real thing.
So who exactly makes which brand that we see today?
I think that Sony, Goodmans and AIWA are poor brands.
Bush are quite good actually, and I've always thought highly of Thomson, Beko and LG.
Sharp are good but quite 'boring' and 'behind the times' if you know what I mean.
Alba are very bad but the Ministry Of Sound stuff has good aesthetics to it and works solidly.
The person moaning about their old matsui vcr should be grateful they've got an eject button on it, I had a vcr that didn't have one, the eject button was on the remote. I am forever losing my remotes so as you can imagine, I was not at all impressed!
I think that Sony, Goodmans and AIWA are poor brands.
Bush are quite good actually, and I've always thought highly of Thomson, Beko and LG.
Sharp are good but quite 'boring' and 'behind the times' if you know what I mean.
Alba are very bad but the Ministry Of Sound stuff has good aesthetics to it and works solidly.
Sony aren't as great as they once were, I confess. But to lump AIWA and Sony in with Goodmans is pretty harsh.
The person moaning about their old matsui vcr should be grateful they've got an eject button on it, I had a vcr that didn't have one, the eject button was on the remote. I am forever losing my remotes so as you can imagine, I was not at all impressed!
Same here! I'm always losing my remote controls too!
Your VCR that doesn't have an eject button ... it isn't a Matsui is it?
The person moaning about their old matsui vcr should be grateful they've got an eject button on it, I had a vcr that didn't have one, the eject button was on the remote. I am forever losing my remotes so as you can imagine, I was not at all impressed!
I hate dual function buttons - like one of the old VCRs we had having to press and hold power to eject the tape (also turning the VCR off) :rolleyes:
I've got a Matsui VCR from 1996, although the design is a bit stupid because there are only play, record and stop/eject buttons on the front of the VCR so god help you if you are watching something you recorded off ITV, have a broken remote control and want to skip through the adverts. I didn't choose it however - my mum did and it was the only thing that we could afford at the time, as VCR's were pretty pricey back in those days!
Rofl, I think we had exactly the same VCR! It ended up thrown out of a third story window, smashing to pieces on the concrete below when a rather pissed off yours-truly found it had just chewed up a favorite video! Lol.
Stupid designed machine, but we were in same boat, couldn't afford a decent one!
Comments
Also got a Sanyo VCR that was bought for me in 1994 that is still going strong. It needed one repair under warranty 9 years ago but then has never given me any problems.
Don't know how long it'll last, but I recently bought the £39.99 DVD player from Asda for my bedroom. I plays far more formats than the £350 Sony set up I have and was multi region out of the box. The only shortfall is that it doesn't remember the last play position on the DVD when you put it in standby. But as I got more than I expected for £40 (it's £35 now) it doesn't bother me
I remember a few years ago I had a "Ferguson - Thomson Technology" branded TV that went back to the manufacturer a few times. It never worked properly so I eventually junked it.
I hope Pacific TVs aren't notorious for failure, I'm hoping the PAcific W/S I have will last longer than the Thomson did.
I have seen a Pacific 21" Pureflat TV in ASDA for only for only £114 and I'm very tempted. Can anyone give opinions, reviews, etc.?
Thanks
In all fairness, many other brands of video also had many problems with the BBC's PDC signal. Apparently the BBC had 'their' version of PDC which was different to the accepted standard. PDC later becam an option with timer recordings whereas initially PDC was automatically selected when you did a timer record.
I used to sell a fair amount of Thomson equipment and most was fairly good, but certainly not as reliable as Panasonic... however I'm not in the trade anymore so can't comment on more recent Thomson's....Some of their 'Stark' designed TV's and videos were quite interesting...
Yes, the "Starck" video was a very exciting piece of design. It had a translucent hinged front panel with little springy buttons on it which pushed the "real" buttons on the "real" fascia behind it. You could just see the LED display through the smoked glass style panel and it gave the video a classy look. And to programme it you have to connect to a TV via SCART so that the onscreen menu is superimposed on the live TV picture, and you use a trackball-type remote control to input the timer settings. Brilliant design, but in practice...
The smoky front panel broke off, leaving the less attractive "normal" fascia exposed, but the LEDs - which have an automatic dimmer so you can barely see them if the VCR is in standby - have now dimmed themselves so much you can't read them even without the panel in the way. The transport is dodgy, it chews tapes and then switches the VCR off if it gets in trouble. And this week it somehow managed to make my TV display a blank screen on all channels, even cable, just by switching the VCR on!
Actually, the BBC use the "full spec" where as Channel 4 (who were the first to introduce PDC in this country) only required, and therefore used, a smaller subset of the capabilites of PDC. This meant a number of VCRs were designed to work with the Channel 4 implementation (a perfectly valid one) but when the BBC started and used a much greater range of the facilites (as they have to with the smaller gaps between programmes and regional variations) some of the early VCR's were badly programmed enough to say "bah we don't like this" and go wrong on the BBC....
Just another great idea that was too clever for it's own use. We'd get so many complaints about it.....
Low end Sony VCR's (they're just a generic machine that loads of manufacturers use)
Aiwa since they got taken over by Sony (I've got an Aiwa hifi I got before they were bought out and its been going for just over 5 years now)
Sharp MiniDisc players
Gigabyte Mobo's
Philips DVD players (the TV's are good tho)
Alesis ADAT machines
BT.
Intel Chipset Modems
Brother laptops (very poorly built, mine broke)
Nokia mobiles (fall apart)
P.S. Theres nothing wrong with Panasonic.
Panasonic-bought a VCR at Christmas 1990,it broke down in November 91. After two months and a failed repair attempt,I got my money refunded and bought a newer Panasonic model which lasted eleven years with regular use.
Phillips-my father bought me a Phillips portable cassette recorder/player one Christmas which had broken down by 10.30am on Christmas morning!
Sharp-bought a minidisc recorder four years ago,never had a days trouble with it. Ditto my Sony portable radio in the kitchen which I bought at roughly the same time.
It has outlived several Sony VCRs, to put it that way.
Phillips TV's are really good as well. I have one also from 1992, it has 2 SCARTS, NICAM stereo (big beefy speakers, unlike the tinny ones you get in most low to mid range equipment now-a-days), a 16:9 letterbox mode, and RGB.
I swear the Sky RGB picture on it is better than most peoples new expensive TV's around these days.
I try to stay with Sony and haven't had any problems at all, it's not too overpriced. Well unless you buy their computers !
Remember Akura from the early-mid-90s? They were huge for about a year and a half until they developed a "junk" reputation and were forced off the shelves. But for a while they were everywhere, and really cheap too (20" TVs for £160 when even Alba were charging £220 and that sort of thing).
Well I bought two Akura VCRs, a stereo and a TV. All still going in various places......
However, the Sony laptops are overpriced and, in my experience, not that great, especially when it comes to picture quality.
For VCRs I would recommend Sanyo. Again, had mine for yonks - a four-header - and it's fantastic. Interestingly, a panasonic bought back in the early 90s expired after a couple of years (like another poster on here). Must have been a dodgy design.
As for Playstations, again I would recommend the Sony. Fan's a bit noise, but still the best on the market.
My elderly neighbours have a very early colour TV (branded "Ultra" although it looks like a Thorn-Ferguson to me) from around 1969-70, and the picture would put many a new TV to shame. Likewise a friend of mine has a Sanyo from the early 70s that's still going strong.
I've got an old 14 inch BAIRD branded portable, white case with a black facia, 8 push buttons and a great big loudspeaker., it's quite old, not sure how old although I've had it since I was 14, when I used to use it as a monitor on my sinclair speccy128. It's now connected to a pace on-digital box (rf out).
I've got a Matsui VCR from 1996, although the design is a bit stupid because there are only play, record and stop/eject buttons on the front of the VCR so god help you if you are watching something you recorded off ITV, have a broken remote control and want to skip through the adverts. I didn't choose it however - my mum did and it was the only thing that we could afford at the time, as VCR's were pretty pricey back in those days!
Still going strong although it chewed up some tapes ages ago and had to have some of the innards replaced whilst under warranty. Although it is getting 'on' a bit because there is this awful hissing on the soundtrack which becomes apparent when fed through a computer. I'm looking to replace it soon so I can take advantage of Nicam - this one is mono.
Also we still have a really old Panasonic TV from godknowswhen as it has a wooden finish cabinet, no scart, has buttons for "BBC1", "BBC2, "ITV1" and "ITV2" which I assume was Channel 4 and says "made in UK" on the sticker on the back - something I've not seen in ages - the picture is good but like the Matsui VCR, it is getting on a bit - if you touch the buttons on the panel to change then it sometimes can't stay on the channel you selected, the sliders on the front to control the sound/contrast/colour are dodgy and the slightest touch can cause them to go from one extreme to another.
So who exactly makes which brand that we see today?
I'm confused with all this!
Mitsubishi still sell their good quality stuff in Japan and the US, and still have a good name there.
Mitsubishi cars are obviously still Mitsubishi.
Oh I see.
But why then is it still sold here under the Mitsubishi name even though what's being made doesn't come out of a Mitsubishi factory.
Bush are quite good actually, and I've always thought highly of Thomson, Beko and LG.
Sharp are good but quite 'boring' and 'behind the times' if you know what I mean.
Alba are very bad but the Ministry Of Sound stuff has good aesthetics to it and works solidly.
Sony aren't as great as they once were, I confess. But to lump AIWA and Sony in with Goodmans is pretty harsh.
My dad's Panasonic Hi-Fi lasted 27 yrs before it died.
My JVC Hi-Fi lasted 22 yrs. before it packed up.
Alex
Same here! I'm always losing my remote controls too!
Your VCR that doesn't have an eject button ... it isn't a Matsui is it?
Rofl, I think we had exactly the same VCR! It ended up thrown out of a third story window, smashing to pieces on the concrete below when a rather pissed off yours-truly found it had just chewed up a favorite video! Lol.
Stupid designed machine, but we were in same boat, couldn't afford a decent one!