In general, if I have problems with a product's reliability or have it die prematurely, that's going to make me a lot less likely to patronize the manufacturer again. However, I'm wondering if this might be an exception and just a case of the manufacturer getting shafted by the capacitor manufacturer.
I bought two flat screen monitors about a year and a half ago. They were a really good deal and have great picture, so I was very happy would them and would have recommended them to anyone or repatronized the manufacture, Sceptre.
However, about two weeks ago one of them started acting up, shutting off when it shouldn't and not always powering back on right away. After a few days it stopped working completely. Then, within a couple of days the second monitor, the exact same type started showing the same symptoms.
So after a talk with tech support they told me it sounded like a bad power supply and unfortunately it was just past the warranted. Thus I figured I had nothing to lose and opened it up. What I found was two 25 volt 470 uF caps were bulging and when I tested them with a meter it seemed they were leaking severely. I took them out and soldered in a couple of new capacitors of the same rating. Problem solved: The monitor was as good as new, except for the skuffs where I pried apart the housing (it's snap-together plastic, basically impossible to open without scuffing).
I would have written this off to being shotty manufacturing on the part of Sceptre and figured that I'd no longer recommend the brand, except for one thing: All other aspects of the construction seemed susprisingly good. I was actually impressed to see that the circuit board was reasonably thick and solid. All the traces for the power supply were also nice and thick, not skimping on copper and the major components were all connected with through-board holes and soldered in solidly.
You don't see that as much these days. It seems like most manufacturers prefer the surface-mount option, which is fine for small components but for things like big capacitors and inductors, it can easily fail. They often have larger, heavier components held on by a tiny amount of solder. (I've seen caps come off of a video card just because they're barely secured to it).
Beyond that, the components all looked pretty solid. They had a big bridge rectifier, instead of trying to get away with the smallest, cheapest one that would do, and it had an ample heat sync.
In light of this, I'm inclined to think that the manufacturer might not be cutting corners but may have just got hosed from their parts supplier on the capacitors.
Is this a valid conclusion?
I bought two flat screen monitors about a year and a half ago. They were a really good deal and have great picture, so I was very happy would them and would have recommended them to anyone or repatronized the manufacture, Sceptre.
However, about two weeks ago one of them started acting up, shutting off when it shouldn't and not always powering back on right away. After a few days it stopped working completely. Then, within a couple of days the second monitor, the exact same type started showing the same symptoms.
So after a talk with tech support they told me it sounded like a bad power supply and unfortunately it was just past the warranted. Thus I figured I had nothing to lose and opened it up. What I found was two 25 volt 470 uF caps were bulging and when I tested them with a meter it seemed they were leaking severely. I took them out and soldered in a couple of new capacitors of the same rating. Problem solved: The monitor was as good as new, except for the skuffs where I pried apart the housing (it's snap-together plastic, basically impossible to open without scuffing).
I would have written this off to being shotty manufacturing on the part of Sceptre and figured that I'd no longer recommend the brand, except for one thing: All other aspects of the construction seemed susprisingly good. I was actually impressed to see that the circuit board was reasonably thick and solid. All the traces for the power supply were also nice and thick, not skimping on copper and the major components were all connected with through-board holes and soldered in solidly.
You don't see that as much these days. It seems like most manufacturers prefer the surface-mount option, which is fine for small components but for things like big capacitors and inductors, it can easily fail. They often have larger, heavier components held on by a tiny amount of solder. (I've seen caps come off of a video card just because they're barely secured to it).
Beyond that, the components all looked pretty solid. They had a big bridge rectifier, instead of trying to get away with the smallest, cheapest one that would do, and it had an ample heat sync.
In light of this, I'm inclined to think that the manufacturer might not be cutting corners but may have just got hosed from their parts supplier on the capacitors.
Is this a valid conclusion?
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