wrote in message
ups.com...

4-There never has been a warranty law in the US.

Some States, like MA have laws of this sort, but only a handfull.

I have yet to find any manufacture that will not sell
at reasonable cost to a qualified servicer the service information,
some even provide them for free, Hitachi for one.

Then you have not tried to service many of the newer products. Infocus,
BenQ, Viewsonic, Dell, and many more of the vendors currently selling
consumer products will not sell you parts nor manuals. Hitachi is a very
atypical vendor, providing excellent service support for free to any
qualified (actually, any shop that is a legitimate business, not necesarily
qualified to do very much) servicer. Most other vendors do not supply
training materials beyond their ASCs and many manuals are not reasonably
priced at all. It very much depends on the vendor.

Even many of the traditional TV makers are providing very limited support
for field service on boards that are easily serviced. Sharp and Panasonic,
for instance provide NO SCHEMATIC in the service manual and no parts list
for some power supplies that are easily repaired.

Until servicers and consumers pressure manufacturers, the trend will likely
continue. Gateway, for instance, would not sell part for their PDPs until
just recently. They have changed their tune after many customer complaints
and lawsuits. Even so, their service support is virtually useless, other
than guessing at what board to change.

When the auto service industry began to limit support to independent
servicers, the ASC negotiated with them to solve the problem, avoiding
action in Congress. They took a proactive stance insupport of servicers and
consumers. Too bad NESDA in the USA has amounted to nothing more than a
group of "good ole boys" who get together for a party once a year.

Leonard




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