[GibbyTheMole]

If you liked the K-7, I'd just look for another used one. They go for around $250. A lot cheaper than $740 for a repair, which is a total ripoff IMO. This is a big reason unless I hit the winning powerball, I'm gonna stick to used DSLRs. Hurts less to be out $200 on a used K-x than a grand on a K-3.

[ElJamoquio]

Yeah, the days of component level repair are gone. Robots build the boards now - little human involvement. You or I could replace the chip easily, I'm sure - the trick is getting hold of the replacement part in single quantity.

The trick is finding the bad chip, a lot of the time. Sometimes the missing smoke isn't as easy to detect as others.

[grhazelton]

I saw the comment about surface mounted components. I can only imagine trying to change one.... Back in the day I built 2 HeathKit color TVs. The first had a 21 inch CRT, some 21 tubes, and one transistor! The builder stuffed as I recall 3 PC boards mounted the boards, interconnected them with wiring and cables, and installed the CRT. Scary job that! Worked right off the bat! I did have to adjust convergence, no fun. I was able, with the aid of the manual and a VOM, to do all servicing needed, not much BTW. Of course this was when most TV shops had a mutual conductance tube checker, and were willing to test tubes against a sale. Eventually the picture tube died, one gun failed, and replacement was cost prohibitive.

The next HeathKit was a 23 inch based on a Zenith design, I think. Heath had been bought by Zenith. One tube, the CRT, all the rest were transistors. One little board to load, the others were pre-built, aligned, whatever. Assembly was limited to mechanical stuff, mounting the boards, interconnecting them with cables, etc, and mounting the CRT. IIRC it had no convergence yoke, whatever convergence was really easy. Self service was limited to pulling the offending board and sending it to Heath. Fortunately that wasn't needed.

Good picture! My then wife felt that we needed a bigger screen, so in came a 32 inch Sony, the Heath BTW had a far better tuner. Such is life. It seems that increasing complexity tends to remove the user from the repair picture. You or I might attempt to clean a Compur Rapid shutter or a K1000 shutter, but not much internal on today's "marvels." Same with cars.

[nomadkng]

the other problem is potential cascade failure. when one chip/circuit goes, often it takes others with them. I see this all the time in my line of work, what seems like a simple component replacement ends up being an elaborate repair process. it's probably why they wanted to replace the whole board. it can get VERY expensive chasing failed chips/circuits. With the cost of labor close to 100/hour, a repair company can't afford to make time costly mistakes.

as it's been said about consumer electronics, by the time the warranty has expired, it tends to cost more to repair it than replace it. it's another reason why individual quantities of components aren't stocked. there's really not a lot of market for repairs. take the case of my K5iis. with it going for a bargain basement price of 700, based on your quote, I'd be better off buying a new one for the same price. Even with the base price of a board at 400, I'd have to think very hard if I wanted to spend 400 to repair or 700 to replace

[tim60]

the other problem is potential cascade failure. when one chip/circuit goes, often it takes others with them. I see this all the time in my line of work, what seems like a simple component replacement ends up being an elaborate repair process. it's probably why they wanted to replace the whole board. it can get VERY expensive chasing failed chips/circuits. With the cost of labor close to 100/hour, a repair company can't afford to make time costly mistakes.

as it's been said about consumer electronics, by the time the warranty has expired, it tends to cost more to repair it than replace it. it's another reason why individual quantities of components aren't stocked. there's really not a lot of market for repairs. take the case of my K5iis. with it going for a bargain basement price of 700, based on your quote, I'd be better off buying a new one for the same price. Even with the base price of a board at 400, I'd have to think very hard if I wanted to spend 400 to repair or 700 to replace

Long ago I expressed your idea as "Even after I spend all that on repairs I still end up with an old one."


I was actually talking about the problem of major repairs on an aging car.


In electronics a root cause these days for not stocking parts is that the parts fit one model, because all the parts are special purpose, whereas back in the Heathkit days the parts were piece parts that could be applied to a list of purposes and probably common across many products. And there were books of equivalents so replacements were not uncommonly done with the nearest available equivalent, not the original device.


We have also seen the effect in the decline of jobs in the highly skilled technical areas.

[Racer X 69]

The trick is finding the bad chip, a lot of the time. Sometimes the missing smoke isn't as easy to detect as others.

And once the Magic Smoke has been found, getting it back in is usually very difficult, if not impossible.