In 2007 we purchased a Memorex DVD player to replace our Sanyo unit which had just died. The Memorex was cheap, $40 USD, but seemed to work ok. 4 months ago it stopped working properly. It would randomly shut off or sometimes not even turn on. I went through and resoldered all joints including some small surface mount components. I did this because modern wave soldering and reflow soldering frequently has lots of imperfections and over time they can become an issue. Well, sure enough it worked fine after the repair. However, over the weekend it let out it’s magic smoke and I cannot put it back in. We have replaced it with a Sony unit for $36 USD that appears to be at least twice the quality our Memorex was for about the same price.
So, modern technology seems to be a bit of a catch 22. It can cheapen our electronics to the point of planned obsolescence, but at the same time it can also bring down new technology prices quite rapidly giving us higher end gear for a reasonable price tag in just a few years time.
