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An expensive TV is a poor investment, and people spend FAR too much on them

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MK14:

--- Quote from: eti on February 01, 2022, 08:27:13 pm ---As title says, I think an expensive TV is a VERY VERY poor  investment

--- End quote ---

My answer might be very, very difficult, for some to understand.
But it is actually the ('Buy cheap, buy/pay Twice!') cheap stuff, which (can be, but not always) is the poor investment, in the longer term.
For Example:
You save a huge amount of money, by buying a $0.49 screwdriver. It looks kind of good, until you use it, the screw head gets chewed to pieces and damages the item you were trying to open. The cheap screwdrivers shaft soon bends out of shape, and it needs to be tossed in the waste. You then buy a second one, for $9.99, a quality make. It works really well, never or almost never chews up the slot in screws, and lasts a lifetime.
My understanding is that many of the cheap TVs, are cheap because they have too few backlight LEDs, those LEDs are poorly/inadequately cooled, and fail prematurely. Somewhat pushing the owner to pay again and again for new TVs, every couple of years, or whatever the repeat period is.
tl;dr
It is cheaper to pay more, for something that will last a long time. Than to pay less, but it doesn't last very long at all, is somewhat useless, and you end up buying the higher priced item, as well, anyway.
So the more expensive one, is cheaper in the long term. If you buy a sensible long lasting TV. Even expensive ones, especially if poorly researched beforehand, can last for short periods of time.
EDITED: Big size reduction, too long.
EDIT2: As regards the TVs. I sometimes hear contradictory reports/stories/opinions on the internet. Many seem to be saying, if you buy the right/correct lower cost TVs. They can be good buys, even for the long term. So maybe the TV answer is not absolutely black and white (clear cut). As there are many claims, that some of the cheaper ones, are both reasonably good and reasonably long lasting.
So maybe the answer is (as already mentioned in this thread), do the research and get a good, long lasting one. Rather than ones that don't last very long.

Circlotron:

--- Quote from: MK14 on February 03, 2022, 11:41:09 pm ---My understanding is that many of the cheap TVs, are cheap because they have too few backlight LEDs, those LEDs are poorly/inadequately cooled, and fail prematurely. Somewhat pushing the owner to pay again and again for new TVs, every couple of years, or whatever the repeat period is.

--- End quote ---
Backlight LEDs are the new vacuum tubes.

That said, what was the economic life of a vacuum tube TV back in the day? Not how long it could be made to last but how long it was worth the average person getting it fixed every now and then. And the relative purchase cost compared to a normal TV nowadays? Mum and dad's first TV in 1957 seemed to last forever, a lifetime in fact. And when I was 12 it did.

MK14:

--- Quote from: Circlotron on February 04, 2022, 12:10:05 am ---Backlight LEDs are the new vacuum tubes.

That said, what was the economic life of a vacuum tube TV back in the day? Not how long it could be made to last but how long it was worth the average person getting it fixed ever now and then. And the relative cost purchase compared to a normal TV nowadays? Mum and ydad's first TV in 1957 seemed to last forever, a lifetime in fact. And when I was 12 it did.

--- End quote ---

I agree with that, a good analogy.
Valve/vacuum tube TVs, tended to break every 3 months to 5 years (year of manufacture plus age/luck dependent). Later Transistor/IC TVs, could last 10, 15 or even 20+ years, with no servicing. Especially Japanese ones.

In the days of Valve/Tube TVs and early transistor/IC ones, people in the UK, tended to rent them. Because they were very expensive (relatively speaking, compared to today), potentially extremely unreliable. I'm convinced they could easily need repairing, a number of times each year.
There were certain eras, when TV rental was a big proportion of the population. Off-hand, I'm not sure of the exact years of when rentals were very common. Probably (maybe earlier), 1960s, 1970s and the early part of the 1980s I suppose.

As you say. If you own it, and it costs more to repair, than it was worth, the new TVs are better. It perhaps wasn't worth getting it repaired. Also, new TVs were better, at certain points in history, such as bigger black and white screens, faster switch on (warm up times), colour TV, more tunable stations, bigger screens, stereo sound. Remote control. As TVs became better and better, over the years.

tom66:

--- Quote from: VK3DRB on February 03, 2022, 10:40:37 pm ---
--- Quote from: tom66 on February 02, 2022, 03:09:33 pm ---I like good visual quality, so I own a Panasonic 42" plasma TV from 2012...


--- End quote ---

And you don't mind high electricity bills, running a power guzzling TV like a plasma.

--- End quote ---

120W when running on a normal programme, about twice that of an LED-backlit panel.

The Kuro was 360W!  And it could peak up to 600W on the right scenes (>50% pixels white).

Still, at the current rates I'm paying the TV costs about 2 pence per hour to run.  Otherwise known as negligible.

Zero999:
CRTs often degrade slowly, rather than suddenly. A supermarket down the road from my parent's house has a CRT TV, used as a CCTV monitor. The shop opened in the mid 90s and I'm pretty sure has not changed the TV, since then. It's open on average of 12 hours per day, 7 days per week, except for say Easter, New Years and Christmas day. I don't remember exactly what year it opened, but I'll guess 1995, so the TV has been on at least 12 hours per day (it's probably also on a bit when the store is closed, whist the staff are there) for 26 years, minus three days a year, giving about 113k hours of run time. It still works, but the picture quality is poor. It's dimmed and distorted. Degaussing may partly restore it, but the electron guns and phosphor have deteriorated. One day it will just fail and they'll get a new one.

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