Nowaday names don't mean much

[Pete Deksnis]

Originally Posted by peverett

One that is still around that is a bit surprising is the Hoffman TV people(Easy Vision).

I checked the Hoffman website and came away with a chuckle. Check their timeline feature.

[Carmine]

Originally Posted by peverett

I sometimes think that our memories about quality are a bit selective. I have a four year old Toshiba color tv that has given me no trouble. I had a Mitsibishi for 14 years prior to that that worked fine until a lightning bolt got it. My mother had a Korean(Goldstar, I think) made color TV that lasted 12 years without trouble. How many of the 1960s tvs, especially color TVs, could boast this kind of service? The cabinets are not as nice as back then, but the electronics are far better. How many of us like the crappy wafer tuners from the 1960s which never worked correctly after a year or two. These were even used by Zenith in some sets.

I enjoy restoring the old TVs and radios to working condition, but am the first to admit modern electronics is far better.

Rather an unfair comparison don't you think? I should hope that reliability would improve as electronics moved to low-heat solid-state, ICs, and so forth. Actually, when you consider that the last of the "true" Zenith sets (Chromacolor/System 3) are in some cases over 30 y/o and still produce a sharp, clear picture that rivals or exceeds many new CRT sets, I would say the bar hasn't been moved very far.

If those same engineers were designing sets today, thirty-years later, we would already have compatible HDTV and for all I can guess, smell-o-vision!

Instead we have commodity-type sets that work pretty decent, but don't excel in quality, or advancing the state of the art.

[Chad Hauris]

The state of the art has been advanced though with flat panel type sets, DLP, hard disk video recorders etc. 25 years ago these kind of sets were still just science fiction...even with their shortcomings there has been a lot of advances in TV technology and I do think they are continuing to improve them.

The thing about most modern electronics is that most of it does work very well and often for a long time before needing major repairs, however it is difficult/expensive to repair them due to cheaper construction, specialized custom-made parts, etc.

[tgunner]

What would you rather have? A 60's style $400 new set that needs $50-100 repairs every 5 years to keep going, or a $250 modern set that goes 10-15 years without issues? I personally take the $250 one, even if it must be sent to the re-cycler after those 10-15 years.

[Richard D]

A $250.00 modern TV that works for 10 to 15 years without issues? Maybe because I live in the lightning capitol of the US or Florida Power & Light is just sending spikey voltage jumps, but even with a $90.00 UPS to protect them I find most of the Recylcer / Throw away TV's I have tried in my and my family's homes do not work without issues for 5 years. I know we have to move foward, however it seems that it is harder and harder to buy real quality electronics any more. Large screen LCD's have pixel failures, DLP and others need $240.00 lamp replacements, and plasma had or has burn in issues. Bah Humbug.

[bigolds98]

My friends and I talk about this all the time. There is nothing classic or good anymore. I remember when people bought RCA, Curtis Mathis, and Radio Flier wagons. The list is now endless, because they were American Icons and were known as a quality product. I saw a show on Wal-mart and how they have been the biggest destructor of the Made In America name. Anyway on that show they showed this TV company in China I think it was the Chin-Chin-Wang-chung TV company cranking out TV's the only difference was the stenciled on RCA, Sharp, Magnavox, and Colby names. The TV's were all the same. The bummer thing is I will pay more money for a quality item. I hate that the choices have been made for me buying cheap junk. Plus it angers me to no end seeing once great American company names. Ones associated with a quality product being reduced to a spray painted on decal. I hate those companies that sold out there heritage just to give the CEO a huge bonus. Leaving us consumers with cheap crap. That's why when I find old stuff in good condition I buy it up just to hold on to what was once good. Sorry for the venting.

[andy]

---

[peverett]

Corporations are not generally good at adapting to the future. How many companies can you name that have been around for 75+ years? The only ones that come to mind in the electronics field are IBM, GE, Motorola, and possibly Hewlett Packard. What has happened in electronics is as the old corporations have died, new ones (TI-1947, Intel-1970, Apple-1977, AMD-1970s) develop to take their place. The complete list of recent corporations would be quite long. All of the above mentioned recently formed companies did develop new technology in the US. Some continue to do so. In fact, Motorola(an old line company) essentially developed the entire cellphone industry. The fact that the latest TV displays were not developed in the US does not indicate that innovation is dead here. In fact, I would propose that most of the HDTV specification and algorithms are from US sources.

Also remember that foreign corporations also stumble-look at how Sony is doing these days.

If you think that this lack of forsight is only in electronics, just remember Studebaker, American Motors, Packard, De Soto, Hudson, etc.

[andy]

---

[ChrisW6ATV]

Unless we in the USA want protectionist laws, the changes in industries are almost always going to be due to consumer choices. How many of us really still buy most of our hardware, paint, and tools, for example, at a local hardware store rather than at Home Depot or Lowe's? The word most there was important, because if we make our big shopping trips to the "big-box" stores and just get the occasional screwdriver or couple of bolts at the neighborhood store, it is "our own fault" when the little store closes.

Did you know you can still buy gym shoes (or "sneakers"/"tennis shoes" depending on where you are) that are Made in USA? They are in many stores, too-they are New Balance brand. Now for the kicker: They cost about $100-$120 a pair for the US-made ones. New Balance also has its $30-$60/pair shoes, and they are made in China like all of Nike's shoes, and other brands. So, in a few cases at least, we still have the choice to "Buy American", but we have to be willing to pay for it.

Also, I do not understand the singling out of Wal-Mart for driving manufacturing out of the USA. Wal-Mart, as far as I know, has only truly been a huge force in U.S. retailing for maybe the past 15 or maybe 20 years (since it expanded from only rural areas into the cities and suburbs), but the shrinking of U.S. manufaturing has been constant and continuous for 40 years. (Remember Mattel "Hot Wheels" cars? They came out in 1967, and they were made in Hong Kong.) You can buy things like Sterilite plastic bins at Wal-Mart, and they are as American-made as a Hollywood movie.

[bgadow]

As the thread proves, there are many sides to the story. Chris makes the good point about where you do most of your shopping. 20 years ago in our small town, most people, as they had for years, bought their groceries, their medicine, their hardware, cars & trucks, and yes, tv sets, here in town. The big-boxes were not yet convenient and so there was little reason to go to another town to go shopping since you could get everything here. One by one the small mom & pops closed because it was too easy to shop elsewhere. For one thing, hardly anybody works here anymore. It is now a bedroom community. It was heartbreaking to watch the local grocery store go out of business. Years ago you would go in there and they would have 2 or 3 checkout lanes open, 3 or 4 people deep, with carts loaded. In later years, after big new supermarkets had opened 10 minutes away in all directions, you would go in there and find one register open, and nobody ever had a cart full. This pushed them into a downward spiral as they could not afford to keep the shelves full, which turned away shoppers who couldn't find what they needed. I went in there the day they closed and tried to fill a basket with stuff just to help them out. There wasn't enough left to do it.

Well, I guess I'm straying too much here...Americans have never been good at buying American when American stuff cost more. (not in modern times, anyway) We gripe about plants closing but I would say a very tiny percentage of people pay attention to where something is made. Sometimes it takes quite a lot of effort to buy American...you may have to stop in every store in town. I have done such searches in the past for things like an electric can opener, a waffle iron, a telephone, a camera. The telephone was frustrating as the website said they were made in Mississippi but the one I got came from China. The camera? That was in the mid-90s and I must have looked at 100 cheap cameras to find that Keystone, on the shelf at a small Woolworths.

The consumer electronics industry has been through many cycles over the years. There was the telephone, the phonograph, the radio...in each case there were a few pioneers, then hundreds or thousands of companies popped up. The market culled out those with an inferior product, or poor business plans. Starting with radio, as time went on the market got saturated. After a time everyone had at least one radio so to stay in business you either had to convince them to buy something better as a replacement or sell them a second set. By the 40s the radio business might have collapsed down to only 3 or 4 makers but then along came television. A television was like a high-end radio and was an excellent profit maker. And they sold like hotcakes. TV was a shot in the arm for most radio makers, and many new companies jumped on the bandwagon. But by the mid/late 50s everyone who was going to have a TV had one. Again, the makers had to either offer up something new (bigger screens, modern styling, portables) or go out of business. The TV business started to suffer. Color TV would be the savior, but it would take some time to come. Many companies left the business. When color did become serious in the mid 60s it was, again, a shot in the arm for those who had managed to hang on. Eventually, though, the market was again saturated-there was almost nobody else left to sell a first color tv to. So, what was new and exciting? Solid state? Yeah, that brought a few sales. Modular chassis were not enough by themselves. Modern remote control sold some sets. But mostly the market needed to find "the next big thing". RCA thought it would be the CED. Zenith put a lot of effort into early HDTV, as I recall, but it ran out of steam. I think if HDTV had come along in the 80s it would have helped RCA/Zenith/GE/NAP continue to be real players for another decade. Instead they were just in the business of selling a commodity, something no more exciting or "new" than a can opener or a waffle iron or a cheap camera. By the time the technology was ready the American consumer electronics giants were all washed up. I remember that back in the 80s the owner of the local TV shop said that someday we would have flat tv sets that hung on the wall and sattelite dishes the size of serving plates. Well, he was exactly right. It just took too long to happen to save his business or the industry.

[Carmine]

A couple points:

It appears to me that Zenith was probably one of the last holdouts still building a good, durable set, in the US at least into the late 70s. But by that time, TVs had begun the slide into commodity and consumer's weren't willing to pay the premium.

There of course was the famous (infamous) TV dumping case against the Japanese that was dragged out so long in court (in exchange for Japanese support of US policy) that every US-made TV company except Zenith and RCA was gone by the time it was ruled the Japanese were dumping.

That does not mean that ALL Japanese companies were dumping... There is a small article in a 1977 issue of Consumer Reports called "Why nobody's mad at Sony" Pretty much says that Sony was selling sets on quality, not price, so they weren't part of the dumping case. Naturally, CR takes the opinion that dumping is a "good" thing, because it means lower prices for consumers. (scumbags)

So they outsourced. First to Mexico, then to Asian countries. Quality went in the dumper, and the reputation began to slide. The tried to diversify into computers, but that went nowhere. Enter Gold Star to buy a good chunk of the company.

They pinned their hopes on a compatible HDTV system, as was required by the US government at that time. In the early 90s, under intense lobbying from foreign companies, the FCC's compatible requirement was dropped. Practically overnight, Zenith stock became worthless because nobody needed the patents on a compatible HDTV system.

Gold Star steps in and buys the remains. Their name in the US is junk, so they re-badge it under the Zenith brand. This buys them some time in the US market, and they re-enter as "LG". The LG products are better than the Gold Star, and the Zenith name is phased out.

Right? Wrong?

I also believe that Zenith was an early pioneer of flat-tubes, at least having them as early as '88, and those WERE good tubes, not the junk that came after '93. They did continue with a "rounder" 23" tube in the entry model sets. I remember seeing a lot of those in bars.

[oldtvman]

Originally Posted by peverett

One that is still around that is a bit supprising is the Hoffman TV people(Easy Vision).

http://www.hoffmanvideo.com/aboutus.asp

Of course, they do not manufacture TVs anymore.

One of my radio friends said this about Philco:
"The quality fell out before the name went on" Fitting for the 1960s GE tvs also.

I sometimes think that our memories about quality are a bit selective. I have a four year old Toshiba color tv that has given me no trouble. I had a Mitsibishi for 14 years prior to that that worked fine until a lightning bolt got it. My mother had a Korean(Goldstar, I think) made color TV that lasted 12 years without trouble. How many of the 1960s tvs, especially color TVs, could boast this kind of service? The cabinets are not as nice as back then, but the electronics are far better. How many of us like the crappy wafer tuners from the 1960s which never worked correctly after a year or two. These were even used by Zenith in some sets.

I enjoy restoring the old TVs and radios to working condition, but am the first to admit modern electronics is far better.

One final comment is that a modern piece of consumer electonics equipment is just ike the cars mentioned by doctorbongo. The components come from all over, including the US, no matter where the company headquarters are.

I have never questioned the reliability issue, but rather the difference between different manufacturers of color sets back in the 50's and 60's, of course any solid state device would run cooler than it's tube based counter-parts, but beyond that once you got past the RCA and Zenith brands back then both picture quality and set design were sometimes questionable.

Back then you could cover up everything but the picture and the color and tint controls and for the most part I could tell by the performance what kind of design it was ie: Zenith, Rca based technology or Magnavox and so on.

[RVonse]

Originally Posted by Carmine

A couple points:


There of course was the famous (infamous) TV dumping case against the Japanese that was dragged out so long in court (in exchange for Japanese support of US policy) that every US-made TV company except Zenith and RCA was gone by the time it was ruled the Japanese were dumping.

For whatever reason since WWII, the Japanese seem to be far more sucessful at business than the American counterparts. First they successfully took over television electronics and now they have taken over the huge automobile industry that used to be the mainstay of America. All accomplished by a small nation with little or no natural resources to themselves.

A lot has happened since WWII and it hasn't been so good for the U.S I'm afraid. The U.S. should have made Japan the 51th state while we still had the chance.

[peverett]

The Japanese success in electronics has been fleeting. The consumer business is moving to other countries, such as China, etc. The Japanese stuff never really caught on in the personal computer world either, .

In addition, in the semiconductor manufacturing world, the Japanese were always also-rans. The large fabs have always been in the US, Europe, and now Taiwan. The Japanese fabs have actually only supplied the internal Japanese markets, never catching the US companies in market share. .

Saying the US companies have not been successful in electronics since world war II is just not correct. Just look at Intel, Hewlett Packard, Dell(until recently), TI, and Apple. There are many others. US companies just have not been successful in consumer entertainment electronics. They have been quite successfull in some consumer electronics. An example is the cell phone-Motorola. In fact, there is not a Japanese name in the top three cellphone suppliers(Nokia, Motorola, and Samsung). In addtion, US companies continue to provide components to Japanese consumer electronics companies to this day. Components made in the US.

As far as cars, it is my belief that the US manufacturers are still reaping what they (both management and labor) sowed in the 1970s. I am old enough to to remember horror stories from all of the big 3(crankshaft on gasoline engine breaking in two at 20,000 miles-GM-only warrantied half the cost, pulley falling off on an almost new Chrysler product, transmission lines crushed by poor assembly-causing out of warranty transmission re-build at 40,000 miles-my 1978 Ford Mustang-I can list many others). People bought far better quality Japanese cars, had good experience, and never looked back. It does not matter at this point if the big 3 automobilie quality is close to or as good as the Japanese-people my age and their children(as recommended by the parents) buy Japanese, they have no reason to go back.

By the way-I have four Fords, including a 2006 model, so I am not biased toward Japanese cars.