My Excellent Home Electronics Adventure
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About 16 months ago I bought a new RCA home theater system. Surround sound, Internet content, the works. Brought it home and hooked it up to my antiquated (22 year-old) RCA TV by way of its RCA cables and was thoroughly enjoying it. About 30 minutes after the warranty expired it began giving me problems. Eventually it quit working altogether. My son Googled the symptoms and found a lot of people were having the same problem and that RCA wasn't especially concerned about it. This past weekend I headed off to Walmart to purchase a new system. I absolutely was not going to buy another RCA unit and finally settled on a nice Phillips system for $179 out the door. I spent the next hour unplugging all the speakers and related misc from the RCA and then wired up the Phillips. That's when reality set in. My old RCA TV didn't have an HDMI connection and the Philips system didn't have RCA jacks. Carelessness on my part. I couldn't really afford a new TV, so it was off to Gold Mine Pawn and Gun to see what kind of deals they had on a decent-sized flat screen TV. Came home with a 32" Samsung with all the toys for $120, and stopped back at Walmart to grab an HDMI cable. Now we're ready to roll, right? The Phillips was defective out of the box. It'd power up, but never finish booting itself or whatever Blue Ray systems do. It was essentially a brick. By now I was frustrated enough to eat scrap metal and spit nails. Back to Walmart I go to exchange the Phillips - after taking it all apart and boxing it up. Walmart is decent about exchanges and refunds so I quickly had my money back. I almost went back to get another Phillips, but instead bolted out the door and returned to the pawn shop. The nice young lady remembered me from earlier and asked if the TV had malfunctioned. I explained my situation and she guided me to a brand-new, never opened Samsung system. Seems that the original owner had purchased it a week or so back, and his car engine went down literally on his way home with it. The retailer (not from Walmart) wouldn't take it back so the poor guy pawned it to have money to fix his car. It retailed for $249. I got it for $175... four bucks cheaper than the Phillips. Hooked it all up and it worked great. A better system feature-wise than either the Phillips or the RCA. Later that day however I was running an errand and suddenly steam was billowing from beneath the hood of my trusty old '89 Jeep Cherokee. Ended up having to replace the plastic coolant reservoir which had cracked. This caused me to wonder if
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About 16 months ago I bought a new RCA home theater system. Surround sound, Internet content, the works. Brought it home and hooked it up to my antiquated (22 year-old) RCA TV by way of its RCA cables and was thoroughly enjoying it. About 30 minutes after the warranty expired it began giving me problems. Eventually it quit working altogether. My son Googled the symptoms and found a lot of people were having the same problem and that RCA wasn't especially concerned about it. This past weekend I headed off to Walmart to purchase a new system. I absolutely was not going to buy another RCA unit and finally settled on a nice Phillips system for $179 out the door. I spent the next hour unplugging all the speakers and related misc from the RCA and then wired up the Phillips. That's when reality set in. My old RCA TV didn't have an HDMI connection and the Philips system didn't have RCA jacks. Carelessness on my part. I couldn't really afford a new TV, so it was off to Gold Mine Pawn and Gun to see what kind of deals they had on a decent-sized flat screen TV. Came home with a 32" Samsung with all the toys for $120, and stopped back at Walmart to grab an HDMI cable. Now we're ready to roll, right? The Phillips was defective out of the box. It'd power up, but never finish booting itself or whatever Blue Ray systems do. It was essentially a brick. By now I was frustrated enough to eat scrap metal and spit nails. Back to Walmart I go to exchange the Phillips - after taking it all apart and boxing it up. Walmart is decent about exchanges and refunds so I quickly had my money back. I almost went back to get another Phillips, but instead bolted out the door and returned to the pawn shop. The nice young lady remembered me from earlier and asked if the TV had malfunctioned. I explained my situation and she guided me to a brand-new, never opened Samsung system. Seems that the original owner had purchased it a week or so back, and his car engine went down literally on his way home with it. The retailer (not from Walmart) wouldn't take it back so the poor guy pawned it to have money to fix his car. It retailed for $249. I got it for $175... four bucks cheaper than the Phillips. Hooked it all up and it worked great. A better system feature-wise than either the Phillips or the RCA. Later that day however I was running an errand and suddenly steam was billowing from beneath the hood of my trusty old '89 Jeep Cherokee. Ended up having to replace the plastic coolant reservoir which had cracked. This caused me to wonder if
Alan Burkhart wrote:
Came home with a 32" Samsung with all the toys for $120
That's a cheapo :doh: Germany -> 379€ (reduced) / 559€ (regular) Prices in $ 465$ / 686$ How the hell do such prices work :wtf: ?
if(this.signature != "") { MessageBox.Show("This is my signature: " + Environment.NewLine + signature); } else { MessageBox.Show("404-Signature not found"); }
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Alan Burkhart wrote:
Came home with a 32" Samsung with all the toys for $120
That's a cheapo :doh: Germany -> 379€ (reduced) / 559€ (regular) Prices in $ 465$ / 686$ How the hell do such prices work :wtf: ?
if(this.signature != "") { MessageBox.Show("This is my signature: " + Environment.NewLine + signature); } else { MessageBox.Show("404-Signature not found"); }
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Alan Burkhart wrote:
Came home with a 32" Samsung with all the toys for $120
That's a cheapo :doh: Germany -> 379€ (reduced) / 559€ (regular) Prices in $ 465$ / 686$ How the hell do such prices work :wtf: ?
if(this.signature != "") { MessageBox.Show("This is my signature: " + Environment.NewLine + signature); } else { MessageBox.Show("404-Signature not found"); }
"Second hand" or "Preowned" goods are always cheaper than new. Except on FleaBay, where the idiots will bid more than the value because...because...um...nope, dunno why.
Bad command or file name. Bad, bad command! Sit! Stay! Staaaay...
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"Second hand" or "Preowned" goods are always cheaper than new. Except on FleaBay, where the idiots will bid more than the value because...because...um...nope, dunno why.
Bad command or file name. Bad, bad command! Sit! Stay! Staaaay...
eBay used to be a great place to sell stuff until they figured out they could take whatever the idiots bidding on things paid over the odds for themselves. Listing fee, final value fee (30% for electronic stuff the last time I sold a laptop), then fees to PayPal.. you can lose up to a third of your sales price these days :mad:
How do you know so much about swallows? Well, you have to know these things when you're a king, you know.
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"Second hand" or "Preowned" goods are always cheaper than new. Except on FleaBay, where the idiots will bid more than the value because...because...um...nope, dunno why.
Bad command or file name. Bad, bad command! Sit! Stay! Staaaay...
Well okay, second hand stuff is usually cheaper thats right ^^ I didn't get that one.
if(this.signature != "") { MessageBox.Show("This is my signature: " + Environment.NewLine + signature); } else { MessageBox.Show("404-Signature not found"); }
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About 16 months ago I bought a new RCA home theater system. Surround sound, Internet content, the works. Brought it home and hooked it up to my antiquated (22 year-old) RCA TV by way of its RCA cables and was thoroughly enjoying it. About 30 minutes after the warranty expired it began giving me problems. Eventually it quit working altogether. My son Googled the symptoms and found a lot of people were having the same problem and that RCA wasn't especially concerned about it. This past weekend I headed off to Walmart to purchase a new system. I absolutely was not going to buy another RCA unit and finally settled on a nice Phillips system for $179 out the door. I spent the next hour unplugging all the speakers and related misc from the RCA and then wired up the Phillips. That's when reality set in. My old RCA TV didn't have an HDMI connection and the Philips system didn't have RCA jacks. Carelessness on my part. I couldn't really afford a new TV, so it was off to Gold Mine Pawn and Gun to see what kind of deals they had on a decent-sized flat screen TV. Came home with a 32" Samsung with all the toys for $120, and stopped back at Walmart to grab an HDMI cable. Now we're ready to roll, right? The Phillips was defective out of the box. It'd power up, but never finish booting itself or whatever Blue Ray systems do. It was essentially a brick. By now I was frustrated enough to eat scrap metal and spit nails. Back to Walmart I go to exchange the Phillips - after taking it all apart and boxing it up. Walmart is decent about exchanges and refunds so I quickly had my money back. I almost went back to get another Phillips, but instead bolted out the door and returned to the pawn shop. The nice young lady remembered me from earlier and asked if the TV had malfunctioned. I explained my situation and she guided me to a brand-new, never opened Samsung system. Seems that the original owner had purchased it a week or so back, and his car engine went down literally on his way home with it. The retailer (not from Walmart) wouldn't take it back so the poor guy pawned it to have money to fix his car. It retailed for $249. I got it for $175... four bucks cheaper than the Phillips. Hooked it all up and it worked great. A better system feature-wise than either the Phillips or the RCA. Later that day however I was running an errand and suddenly steam was billowing from beneath the hood of my trusty old '89 Jeep Cherokee. Ended up having to replace the plastic coolant reservoir which had cracked. This caused me to wonder if
What an adventure! :) What dedication for home entertainment. :laugh: Maybe it is cursed. Hope the setup works out for you.
"Age wrinkles the body. Quitting wrinkles the soul." -Douglas MacArthur
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:-D :thumbsup:
Sometimes the true reward for completing a task is not the money, but instead the satisfaction of a job well done. But it's usually the money.
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"Second hand" or "Preowned" goods are always cheaper than new. Except on FleaBay, where the idiots will bid more than the value because...because...um...nope, dunno why.
Bad command or file name. Bad, bad command! Sit! Stay! Staaaay...
One of my ex-wives became partially disabled awhile back and started an Ebay store. She's beginning to turn a profit and plans to support herself with it. She raids local garage sales and then resells people's junk. Amazing.
Sometimes the true reward for completing a task is not the money, but instead the satisfaction of a job well done. But it's usually the money.
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About 16 months ago I bought a new RCA home theater system. Surround sound, Internet content, the works. Brought it home and hooked it up to my antiquated (22 year-old) RCA TV by way of its RCA cables and was thoroughly enjoying it. About 30 minutes after the warranty expired it began giving me problems. Eventually it quit working altogether. My son Googled the symptoms and found a lot of people were having the same problem and that RCA wasn't especially concerned about it. This past weekend I headed off to Walmart to purchase a new system. I absolutely was not going to buy another RCA unit and finally settled on a nice Phillips system for $179 out the door. I spent the next hour unplugging all the speakers and related misc from the RCA and then wired up the Phillips. That's when reality set in. My old RCA TV didn't have an HDMI connection and the Philips system didn't have RCA jacks. Carelessness on my part. I couldn't really afford a new TV, so it was off to Gold Mine Pawn and Gun to see what kind of deals they had on a decent-sized flat screen TV. Came home with a 32" Samsung with all the toys for $120, and stopped back at Walmart to grab an HDMI cable. Now we're ready to roll, right? The Phillips was defective out of the box. It'd power up, but never finish booting itself or whatever Blue Ray systems do. It was essentially a brick. By now I was frustrated enough to eat scrap metal and spit nails. Back to Walmart I go to exchange the Phillips - after taking it all apart and boxing it up. Walmart is decent about exchanges and refunds so I quickly had my money back. I almost went back to get another Phillips, but instead bolted out the door and returned to the pawn shop. The nice young lady remembered me from earlier and asked if the TV had malfunctioned. I explained my situation and she guided me to a brand-new, never opened Samsung system. Seems that the original owner had purchased it a week or so back, and his car engine went down literally on his way home with it. The retailer (not from Walmart) wouldn't take it back so the poor guy pawned it to have money to fix his car. It retailed for $249. I got it for $175... four bucks cheaper than the Phillips. Hooked it all up and it worked great. A better system feature-wise than either the Phillips or the RCA. Later that day however I was running an errand and suddenly steam was billowing from beneath the hood of my trusty old '89 Jeep Cherokee. Ended up having to replace the plastic coolant reservoir which had cracked. This caused me to wonder if
Alan Burkhart wrote:
Walmart is decent about exchanges and refunds so I quickly had my money back
I have no problem recommending Walmart for electronics. Unlike actual electronics stores, Walmart employees "partners" have no interest in trying to find out what's wrong or trying to blame you for anything you might have done wrong. My best example yet of this sort of thing: Computer bought by a friend at Walmart, started freezing on disk I/O after less than a month of usage. SpinRite spent an entire day working through the first few hundred sectors and was simply not progressing (the hard drive manufacturer's own diagnostics tools also reported all sorts of errors, if they ran at all). Got the whole machine exchanged, no questions asked. Based on my experience, all local computer stores would've had me run virus scans, uninstalling anything that hadn't shipped with the machine, roll the OS back to its original state, etc. Sometimes you're better off buying your electronics from places that you know will treat returns like a faulty toaster.
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Alan Burkhart wrote:
Walmart is decent about exchanges and refunds so I quickly had my money back
I have no problem recommending Walmart for electronics. Unlike actual electronics stores, Walmart employees "partners" have no interest in trying to find out what's wrong or trying to blame you for anything you might have done wrong. My best example yet of this sort of thing: Computer bought by a friend at Walmart, started freezing on disk I/O after less than a month of usage. SpinRite spent an entire day working through the first few hundred sectors and was simply not progressing (the hard drive manufacturer's own diagnostics tools also reported all sorts of errors, if they ran at all). Got the whole machine exchanged, no questions asked. Based on my experience, all local computer stores would've had me run virus scans, uninstalling anything that hadn't shipped with the machine, roll the OS back to its original state, etc. Sometimes you're better off buying your electronics from places that you know will treat returns like a faulty toaster.
I buy most electronics at Walmart but not computers. The partners generally lack product knowledge. Otherwise Walmart is my 1st choice. The Best For Less and all that.
Sometimes the true reward for completing a task is not the money, but instead the satisfaction of a job well done. But it's usually the money.
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I buy most electronics at Walmart but not computers. The partners generally lack product knowledge. Otherwise Walmart is my 1st choice. The Best For Less and all that.
Sometimes the true reward for completing a task is not the money, but instead the satisfaction of a job well done. But it's usually the money.
Alan Burkhart wrote:
I buy most electronics at Walmart but not computers. The partners generally lack product knowledge.
When I buy electronics, if I have questions I haven't already managed to get answers to before walking into a store, they're not questions most employees in the store with a "sales" title will be able to answer anyway...which is exactly why sometimes I'd rather buy from a place where the employees will think of a product I'm returning as nothing more than a broken toaster. Ever talked to a Geek Squad member from Best Buy? I'd rather talk to someone who won't pretend to know anything about anything.
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What an adventure! :) What dedication for home entertainment. :laugh: Maybe it is cursed. Hope the setup works out for you.
"Age wrinkles the body. Quitting wrinkles the soul." -Douglas MacArthur
It's working great so far. Never had a TV with all the built-in content before (I know,I'm behind the times) so I had a lot to learn. But it's been fun. Definitely got to get a keyboard for it though. Searching YouTube with the remote is a major pain.
Sometimes the true reward for completing a task is not the money, but instead the satisfaction of a job well done. But it's usually the money.
