clare at snyder.on.ca wrote
Rod Speed wrote
terry wrote
Ecnerwal wrote:

The new ones are, for the most part, designed NOT to be repairable,
and/or parts prices/availability are manipulated to render them
effectively non-economic to repair. "This part will (by design) break
about 1 year after the warranty runs out - let's put in in a monolithic
module containing all the most expensive parts of the machine."

Maybe that's stating it rather strongly?

Although recent discussion/discovery that IPods will
exhaust their batteries in approximately one to two
years do clearly raise the question? "Designed to fail?".

Doesnt explain stuff like cordless phones that use standard batterys.

Except you can buy much better batteries than the crap
that comes with the chinese built phone from the factory.

Not true of the chinese built Panasonics I bought.

I deliberately chose cordless phones that take standard AA NiMH batterys.

Likely cost as much as the phone,

No they dont with standard AA or AAA batterys.

but often worth it.

I doubt it. It may be truer with digital cameras tho.

But it's the same reason that I continue to accept
and use old appliances that I can repair myself.

I repair all my own stuff too, but accept
that sometimes I need to buy parts.

That can mean that you have to do without
some of the most elegantly usable appliances tho.

For example I refuse to buy a stove that incorporates
a digital timer/clock; they are virtually unrepairable!

If a digital timer makes it through the first 90 days,
and then through warranty, it may very well outlive
YOU. Infant mortality is the biggest issue with electronis.

And is really just a nuisance given that its covered by the warranty.

Mechanical timers simply wear out or burn out, and although
SOMETIMES repairable, they ARE more likely to fail after the
first year or so than electronics. Particularly as the mechanics
were cheapened and electronics become more integrated and solid.

Yeah, in spades with mics where the antique phone mics were
steaming turds reliability wise before all phones became electronic.

Mindlessly silly. My microwave is still going fine 30 years later.

Eventually can see myself, however, ending up with one
of those and deliberately disconnecting the digital timer
clock or modifying the stove to use one my older (saved)
clock/timers or just dong away with the timer altogether.

Or get a clue and only bother with that if it actually does fail.
And get the benefit of a decent modern design when it doesnt.

I've never actually had a single digital clock in any system
ever fail and I've got heaps of them, plenty 30+ years old.

My experience as well. Electromechanical timers have failed on
just about everything I've ever owned with them except for the old
Frigidaire range (50 years old and still working fine when the oven
element let go and "plasma cut" a big hole in the bottom of the oven)
Several wires had burned off 30 years ago - I repaired them 26 or 27
years ago - otherwise it worked fine. Not so the timer on the water
softener that pumped several hundred gallons of water and350 lbs of
salt all over the basement floor when the timer died--------.

The main thing I detest with modern products is keyboards. I used
to be able to buy proper double injection moulded keyboards in the
pre PC days but they arent even buyable now even with the branded
produces like Microsoft and Logitech and the stupid cheap stuck on
lettering never lasts very long at all.

But I wouldnt go back to corded mice and keyboards again.
In spades with non optical mice either.