5 Jun
2000
5 Jun
'00
8:45 p.m.
I don't dispute that there are modern plastics
that are very stable and
have a long life. But I doubt that they're used in consumer-grade CD-ROM
drives or VCRs.
They are, simply because the formulations have changed across the board.
You can't getthe bad plastics anymore, they just are long since out of
production.
Some are. Some aren't. In my experience, the ones
used in consumer-grade
stuff are not the latest plastics. They are neither stable nor
long-life. Period.
Well, I made my point, and am not going to continue beating a dead horse.
Well, it was a consumer-grade unit.
And how much did it cost? Probably a good week's pay...
Plastic gears cracking and falling off. You think this
is a non-problem,
I've seen it happen far too often to trust it won't. Other plastic parts
will fail due to stress. Adjustments (turntable height -> focus) will be
lost.
No comment anymore.
Chips failing due to :
Thermal stresses cracking bondout wires (this happens in powered-down
equipment)
Contamination getting into the device/dopant migration (not common, but
certainly possible after 50 years)
Bit Rot. The microcontrollers may well use OTP EPROM or E2PROM program
memeory. We worry about bit-rot in our classic computers. It's a
problem in other devices as well
Uhhh...integrated circuit technology has progressed as well, and we are
not talking about cutting-edge fineline traces on the dies.
Electrolytic capacitors, particularly SMD ones
failing. This is a major
problem in modern-ish camcorders, BTW. The problem is not replacing the
capacitors (which are easy to get, well-understood, and thus could be
made in 50 years time). It's that they leak a corrosive electrolyte which
will make a right mess of the multi-layer PCB. Seen it happen. Seen it
happen in modern devices.
And capacitor technology...
No, not every device will fail, sure. But I think
rather more will fail
than you might think. And they will not be easily repairable.
I've made my point a few times over now, and this will be my last word on
the matter - and I don't want this to sound like a flame, but man, you
have to get a little faith in what mankind can actually accomplish. That
"world of tomorrow" and "technology marches on" stuff may actually
mean
something...
William Donzelli
aw288(a)osfn.org