I don't think you can blame Fluke for making products/pricing that milks money from those accounts.
Nope, but normally manufacturers who do that are ridiculed.
I don't think you can blame Fluke for making products/pricing that milks money from those accounts.
Nope, but normally manufacturers who do that are ridiculed.*cough* Apple *cough*
Fungus, can you please just let it go? Is it really necessary for you to derail yet another thread with your anti-Fluke crusade? You don’t like it? Don’t buy one.
No, no... you've got it all wrong. I'm not Anti-Fluke. Fluke make some fine meters, I even own a few, including a 50,000 count, dual display Fluke 87-IV.
What I don't get is the deification of a meter that's obviously very overpriced and whose only design criteria is to milk money from corporate/government accounts and is holding back Fluke from producing anything better.
It just doesn't seem that special.
I dunno, my wife just got a new M1 MacBook Air that cost less and performs better than the Dell laptops her employer is buying for people who prefer Windows machines.
It's not deification.
But here's the thing, Fungus: You're (apparently) an engineer. Wouldn't you LOVE to be able to design a product like the 87, one that sells like hotcakes even though it is "expensive" and as such makes boatloads of money for your employer?
Fungus, can you please just let it go? Is it really necessary for you to derail yet another thread with your anti-Fluke crusade? You don’t like it? Don’t buy one.
No, no... you've got it all wrong. I'm not Anti-Fluke. Fluke make some fine meters, I even own a few, including a 50,000 count, dual display Fluke 87-IV.
What I don't get is the deification of a meter that's obviously very overpriced and whose only design criteria is to milk money from corporate/government accounts and is holding back Fluke from producing anything better.
It just doesn't seem that special.
It's not deification. (disclosure: I have owned a Fluke 179 for 20 years. It still works like a champ, no complaints.) It's just recognition that the Fluke 87 is one of those "golden egg" products that every company wishes they could have in their line. Yes, indeed, it's a license to print money.
Question: If you were looking for a "better" meter than the Fluke 87V then what meter would you get?
(nb. A meter that you would actually want to own. The Fluke 289 doesn't count - who wants to own a complex meter that takes ages to "boot up"?)
Fungus, can you please just let it go? Is it really necessary for you to derail yet another thread with your anti-Fluke crusade? You don’t like it? Don’t buy one.
No, no... you've got it all wrong. I'm not Anti-Fluke. Fluke make some fine meters, I even own a few, including a 50,000 count, dual display Fluke 87-IV.
What I don't get is the deification of a meter that's obviously very overpriced and whose only design criteria is to milk money from corporate/government accounts and is holding back Fluke from producing anything better.
It just doesn't seem that special.
I don't think you can blame Fluke for making products/pricing that milks money from those accounts.
Nope, but normally manufacturers who do that are ridiculed.*cough* Apple *cough*
A lot of people probably would want the 189 back
Suppose I want a 10 year minimum warranty?
I take issue with you jumping on a soapbox about this issue at every opportunity, derailing discussions about other topics to express your opinion about Fluke. It’s not the “what” that bothers me, it’s the “when” and “where”. It doesn’t need to be everywhere, all the time.
Anyhow, people ridicule Apple for having “high” prices and “style over substance”. What they ignore is that while Apple mostly chooses to not participate in the low end market at all, their prices in the midrange and high end markets are generally competitive. They absolutely have style, but they do have the substance to back it up.
I dunno, my wife just got a new M1 MacBook Air that cost less and performs better than the Dell laptops her employer is buying for people who prefer Windows machines.
Sure, you can pay a fortune for windows machines if you want to. The entry level is much lower though.
It's not deification.
It sort of is.
Question: If you were looking for a "better" meter than the Fluke 87V then what meter would you get?
(nb. A meter that you would actually want to own. The Fluke 289 doesn't count - who wants to own a complex meter that takes ages to "boot up"?)
But here's the thing, Fungus: You're (apparently) an engineer. Wouldn't you LOVE to be able to design a product like the 87, one that sells like hotcakes even though it is "expensive" and as such makes boatloads of money for your employer?
If I had shares in the company, then sure. In practice: Did the designers even get a raise? Pride alone won't get me a new car.
As an "engineer" I might be annoyed if my boss told me I wasn't allowed to try and improve it for the next generation or even try to design another model that was even better.
Anyhow, people ridicule Apple for having “high” prices and “style over substance”. What they ignore is that while Apple mostly chooses to not participate in the low end market at all, their prices in the midrange and high end markets are generally competitive. They absolutely have style, but they do have the substance to back it up.
That is if they actually offer the feature(s) that one wants. Unfortunately, they have chosen to forgo offering the things I insist on all to comply with their style directives and 'vision'.
My Brymen has a 3 year warranty, I've seen Joe's Brymen-torturing videos. I figure if it my meter goes for three years without any problems then it's going to outlast me.
If it doesn't? A complete kit of replacement parts (including a case, a screen, a PCB and a set of fuses and leads) costs about $165.
They absolutely have style, but they do have the substance to back it up.
As has been said repeatedly, the situation is significantly different in the US for both pricing and warranty.
On what do you insist? Be specific.
What if Fluke has already asked their customers what they like and don't like about the 87 and the consensus was "it's fine as it is?"
What if instead of changing the 87 they put whatever features customers suggested into new products?
needless to say, my laptop is not sleek, light or small--which doesn't bother me in the least given the way that I use it.
*cough* Apple *cough*I dunno, my wife just got a new M1 MacBook Air that cost less and performs better than the Dell laptops her employer is buying for people who prefer Windows machines.
I don't think you can blame Fluke for making products/pricing that milks money from those accounts.Nope, but normally manufacturers who do that are ridiculed.*cough* Apple *cough*Gesundheit! Here’s a tissue.
Anyhow, people ridicule Apple for having “high” prices and “style over substance”. What they ignore is that while Apple mostly chooses to not participate in the low end market at all, their prices in the midrange and high end markets are generally competitive. They absolutely have style, but they do have the substance to back it up.
The M1 is a game changer: it’s their entry level computer CPU and wipes the floor with most midrange computers while only sipping homeopathic amounts of electricity. It’s a tremendous technological tour de force.
(I'll risk a single post on this off-topic subject...)
Apple only works if you fit their customer profile. If you want to run "interesting" software or open it up to add RAM or change the disk then you're SOL.
Fungus, can you please just let it go? Is it really necessary for you to derail yet another thread with your anti-Fluke crusade? You don’t like it? Don’t buy one.
No, no... you've got it all wrong. I'm not Anti-Fluke. Fluke make some fine meters, I even own a few, including a 50,000 count, dual display Fluke 87-IV.
What I don't get is the deification of a meter that's obviously very overpriced and whose only design criteria is to milk money from corporate/government accounts and is holding back Fluke from producing anything better.
It just doesn't seem that special.
The meter itself isn't. The reputation behind it is. And for some people, that matters a lot. For people (like electricians) that need their equipment to work No Matter What and also need them to fail safely, the reputation of the company is of paramount importance, because it instills a confidence in the equipment that can't be had any other way. Now add to that the fact that the model they're looking at (the 87V) has been the same for many years, and thus has by itself built a long and (at least for the most part) exemplary track record, and you end up having to ask why Fluke would want to change it.
Apple only works if you fit their customer profile. If you want to run "interesting" software or open it up to add RAM or change the disk then you're SOL.
Plus: Most of the people who don't need to run any "interesting" software are probably better off with a Chromebook. Chromebooks run ARM processors have very long battery, generally better software than MacOS (all the google stuff for mail/productivity), and are pretty much maintenance and hassle free (it's all web/cloud based).
Exactly. The meter is good, it's not spectacular, it's not the only good meter out there, not by a long shot, but it's good, very good, and it has a reputation proven by time. When you buy one you know exactly what you're going to get. You know it will be good and you know the company that makes it will stand behind it. If it breaks they will service it, often even years later. How many companies can you think of that are interested or even willing to service a product they sold 30 years ago? Not many I bet, and there is value in that. A few hundred bucks is peanuts in the grand scheme of things. The way so many companies constantly update their products and constantly add unnecessary features is exactly the problem with so many of them, everything is a moving target, you never quite know what you're getting. The product they released 5 years ago that was fantastic is forgotten and unsupported. The latest version who knows.