I didn't mean those, I meant the later ones with the kamikazi power supply using I think the 2SC4834s.

If I am not mistaken, those 2SG613s mostly blew because of a drive fault. Lose the negative pulse to the gate and it stays on too long and boom.

In the earlier ones, I think the SRC (sine resonance choke) saved alot of flybacks from overload. The SRC was there to increase the efficiency of the HV rectifiers.

Talk of these Sonys brings back a memory. I was working on a stock 26" console. (you know a toilet seart manufacturer made those cabinets, the only one could meet the specs, and like three guys could sit on top of one and you can still roll it across a thickly carpeted floor) I was pulling the control unit from the front and somehow caught the CRT board and broke the neck.

I thought ih ****, there goes a couple hundred bucks, but that ain't how it is. Under warranty all you sent back was the neck of the CRT. They said to write it up as "unable to get good convergence". I almost had to laugh, with the neck broken like that, damn right I can't get good convergence. They even paid me to change it ! Well after all Sony paid them.

Really, it was dishonest but things like that happened VERY rarely.

And now I work for factory service for RSQ, which is a marketer of Karaoke machines. They are cheap Chinese or Korean built, but what isn't anymore ? They are actually modified DVD players. In the same building is a retail outlet for them and a few other things. It's like I got two jobs in one. But anyway, they do not record the serial numbers or anything. If I fix something and it breaks again nobody has any way of knowing. Also, as I pointed out to them, the customers could rob us blind if they knew.

Good old American business, but the money spends just fine.