Disposable Electronics?
In the town I grew up in there was a small TV repair shop named “Ron’s TV”. The folks at Ron’s TV repaired televisions and many other electronics. From what I heard, the owner’s name wasn’t Ron, that was just a ruse for sales guys and bill collectors. Apparently they did something right, because many years later they are still in business – amazing given the change in this industry. The great thing about this repair shop is if it was electronic and had a screen or speaker they could repair it.
Today everything is disposable. Most electronics are built in China at factories that would never pass our safety standards. They are made by people making wages we would consider unthinkable. Unfortunately, I think we exported our morals along with our electronic manufacturing. The upside is costs have gone way down. A growing problem is many electronics cannot be serviced. I’ve heard many low-end 40+ inch LCD televisions can’t be repaired anywhere (well except maybe the famous Ron’s TV).
I’ve found the growing trend to combat the lack of repair is a good old American “do it yourself” spirit. Recently I’ve had some Nintendo DS game devices in our house break. The pictured device is a perfectly good machine, but the bottom screen stopped functioning as a “touch screen”. Many people would just buy a new device, but I wondered if there were any tricks to fix it. I went to my friend Google and found several tricks to fix the problem. None of them worked! I knew replacing the component was an option so I dug deeper. Turns out you can not only get the part on eBay for $8 delivered, but find YouTube videos to show you how to put it in! I ordered the touchscreen on eBay and it arrived a week later (it even came with the right screwdriver for this machine). I immediately took it apart and started the repair. My son watched and a few times asked me if I knew what I was doing. I didn’t read any online instructions but it seemed simple enough to me. Find the old part, figure out where it is connected, and replace it with the new one. About 20 minutes later he was up and running.
So if your stuck with a dead device, head onto the internet and find your $8 solution!