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There are many others, as well. Atmel, LSI Logic, National Semiconductor, Medtronic, etc. But, chips have become dominated by computer design and automated fabrication. And 12" wafers. All this makes for a poor employment environment. And people, other than engineers (which we do a poor job of turning out - no one wants to work that hard today) don't need all that much education to do the routine tasks now required in semiconductor manufacturing, where I worked as an engineer until 2000. With the new paradigm, it is very difficult to compete with the Chinese.
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#32
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You are correct in that most of the work is done (in both design and manufacturing) by computers. I do the design work day in and day out It is all done with computers.
I am not sure that most electronic manufacturing jobs ever required great skill. Wiring up TV or radio chassis does not seem to me to require any more skill than working in a modern chip fabrication line. The skill was always in the design(of the part and the manufacturing process) , testing, and servicing. Mostly because of so much integration and cost reduction in modern electronics, the service side is now almost completely dead for consumer items You are very correct in saying that it is very hard to compete with the Chinese. Another reason that we do not turn out any more engineers than we do is that bright students see engineers being laid off at 50. They then turn to being doctors and lawyers so they will not have to put up with that crap. (I want to strangle all of the CEOs who come out complaining that we do not graduate enough engineers-most of them are part of the problem). AMD also has manufacturing in the US. |
#33
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IMO, I think Zenith as we used to know it actually disappeared years before they sold out to Gold Star, given the fact that much of Zenith's audio gear was made offshore by the '80s (my 1980 Zenith R-70 AM/FM radio was made in Korea, also, to the standards of Zenith in Chicago, and my H-480 AM/FM stereo Zenith clock radio [also 1980 vintage] was built in Taiwan) and their televisions were being made offshore by then as well (yes, even their fabulous System 3 color consoles, but the ones built in the '70s must have still been made half decently; I have a friend whose parents owned a System 3 console set with remote and had it 15 years before it finally conked out--they replaced it with a 25" RCA "Guide Plus" set that went all of two years before the CRT blew, but that's another story). Every new Zenith TV I've owned since the late '70s was actually built either in Mexico or offshore. The only American-made Zenith radios I own anymore, however, are my H511Y (1951) and my Royal 1000-1 TO (Zenith's first transistorized T/O; mine was probably one of the first, built by the original Zenith Radio Corporation in Chicago), not to mention a wood-cased K-731 AM/FM set from 1963. You can be sure I'll hold on to these three radios, as they are pieces of Zenith history the likes of which we will never see again. I like the design, sound and the superb build quality of the R-70 as well, so that one will be a "keeper" also. Had the dickens of a time finding a replacement for a missing battery box for my T/O (finally found one a couple months ago at John Kendall's Vintage Electronics of suburban Baltimore, on his website), but it was worth it for a radio so well built and which sounds every bit as good as a good table set.
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Jeff, WB8NHV Collecting, restoring and enjoying vintage Zenith radios since 2002 Zenith. Gone, but not forgotten. |
#34
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I was the project manager for the multi-million upgrade of AMD Fabs 10, 14 & 15 in Austin back in 1989. At that time AMD was the largest maker of the 286 (more than Intel, who had moved on to the 386). Ratty old Fab 10 had much better yields than Fabs 14 & 15. Because they had the skilled techs running the processes. My, how time flies. |
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Time does fly-I am still in Austin, working for Freescale (spun off from Motrola). Our newest fab was built in the mid 1990s. It seems that AMDs new fabs are built in Germany these days.
The newest fab in Austin now was built by Samsung of Korea. It is my understanding that TI, Intel, and IBM are all building new fabs in the US, so some activity is underway. Of course, this does not have anything to do with the demise of Zenith. Back on this subject, I did see a PBS special quite a few years ago that claimed that the beginning if the demise of US TV/radio manufacturers was when Sears imported Japanese sets at below manufacturing cost in the early 1970s. The US manufacturers sued the Japanese for dumping and won, but by then it was too late. At present time, even Japan is to expensive for TV/radio manufacturing, so it has also bypassed them. I have a working 12" Sears color tv from 1971 and it was made in Japan. I have have also discovered that Curthis Mathis was importing Japanese electronics for their comsumer items at this time also. |
Audiokarma |
#36
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Last edited by andy; 12-07-2021 at 04:17 PM. |
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(I want to strangle all of the CEOs who come out complaining that we do not graduate enough engineers-most of them are part of the problem
you are so very correct. Lets get rid of all those idiots in Washington at the same time. Seems that the whole world and a lot of our own elected are trying to make us go broke . Self interest seems to be the problem. As for me, I am proud of what americans have done in the past. In lew of self. For example , how about Armstrong? He was a smart cookie and he gave up all his patents in WW II for the sake of the USA/. In the end, RCA screwed him. Its a darn shame. All cause of greed. I am not rich but I am content! |
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'Can't make it here any more Last edited by sydsfloyd67; 01-26-2006 at 10:36 AM. |
#39
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Sanyo is still manufacturing t.v.'s and other electronics in the U.S. They have a plant in Forrest City, AR. which is about 16 miles from my home.
Dumont- First with the finest in television. |
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From their website: Quote:
Last edited by Keefla; 02-09-2006 at 01:02 AM. |
Audiokarma |
#41
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Sony Trinitron Fan |
#42
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Your Zenith was manufactured several years before the company left Chicago and went to Korea, which explains why it's still giving you good service after 25+ years. I have a 19" Sentry II Zenith of 1995 vintage that still works well and still has its original CRT. This amazes me, since 1995 is right in the middle of the time frame during which Zenith was having so much trouble with the CRTs in their sets. I shudder to think what the reliability record of LG's flat-panel HD sets must be. I do know, however, that I would never buy a new TV with the lightning-bolt "Z" on it nowadays. That symbol is just a marketing icon; it means absolutely nothing. LG is simply using it on their televisions to protect their intellectual property rights to the symbol. The guts are still the same low-quality garbage found in LG and many other TVs made offshore today. (I hear even some Sonys are made offshore by another Korean electronics firm.) Unfortunately, however, this is nothing new. I bought an off-brand 12-inch portable TV when I graduated high school 30.5 years ago (1975). The set lasted all of three years before giving up the ghost (I turned it on one afternoon and saw a plume of smoke rising from the circuit board; something had shorted in there). I pitched the off-brand set and bought a Zenith solid-state B&W portable the next day; the new Zenith lasted 22 years without giving me one bit of trouble--nice sharp bright picture, good sound, and good reception with a monopole antenna in the near-fringe area where I lived at the time. I got rid of it in 2000 only because of space limitations when I moved. I also had two Zenith 13" color portables, one 1979 vintage, one 1982, that also gave me excellent service. Again, the only reason I gave them up when I moved was the space problem, which I have described in other posts. I can only hope those sets went to good homes and didn't wind up in the landfill (I wasn't even living at my former residence in late 1999; my dad's widow cleaned out the house and later sold it after I left, so I have no way of knowing what happened to those TVs), as they were still working very well, with the 1979 set (Zenith L1310C) having only tuner issues (the detents were shot on both the VHF and UHF tuners). These sets made excellent pictures, however, and were built very solidly...well, at least the 1982 set that replaced the L1310C was; I wouldn't say the '1310 was made all that solidly if the detents on both tuners quit after only a few years. The reason for the 1310's successor's long life (at least 20 years) with no tuner drive train problems was probably that the set had one-knob electronic tuning; once the UHF stations were set up and the channel number tabs installed, the UHF tuning was ordinarily forgotten as was the VHF fine tuning (this set had switchable AFC, but the instruction manual suggested switching the AFC on and leaving it on after properly fine-tuning all stations in the user's area). I know nothing lasts forever, but anything one pays a good deal of money for should last at least a few years. Time was when you could buy a TV set, for example, and it would last 15-20 years or more. Today's sets, by contrast, even the flat-panel HD sets, are throwaways and generally do not last longer than a couple years, often giving up the ship immediately after or shortly after the warranty expires. I'm not making this up; I have read right here in these AK forums of new TVs made by such formerly respected companies as RCA, Zenith, Magnavox, et al. which come in for repair service, only to have the technician find that the set has developed some very costly repair problem. In many cases the warranty may have just expired or else, if it is still in force, does not cover the problem being repaired. Another common situation is the TV with some years (5, 10 or more) on it that comes into the shop with a very severe problem such as a burned-out CRT, flyback, etc. that will cost more than the set is worth (or what the owner paid for it when it was new) to be repaired. These sets are generally pitched immediately, or at least as soon as the owner gets the repair estimate, as it is not cost-effective for the customer to have it repaired; for what the customer would pay to have the old one repaired, he or she could buy a brand-new set. With the change to digital TV coming in about three years, many people are getting rid of their perfectly good analog CRT sets (I see them all the time on ebay, at dirt-cheap BIN prices and very low starting bids--some as low as one penny) and replacing them with flat-panel plasma/LCD HD sets. It just makes sense, especially since, even though analog CRT TVs will work with digital signals using a converter box between the cable and the set, they will not produce a HD picture. However, as I said, at this stage of their development, HD flat-panel sets are still prone to repair problems that often show up just after the warranty expires. Heaven forbid an owner of a HDTV flat-panel set would have trouble with the video driver ICs in his/her new set. The ICs are actually molded into the ribbon cable going between the panel and the chassis, so if the chips go West for any reason, the entire panel must be replaced. This is probably why so many relatively new FP sets are winding up being sold as-is on ebay or being thrown out with the trash these days. I saw one on the bay just recently that had a cracked screen; these show up very often, being advertised as "parts sets" or something similar. Many FP sets are severely damaged by soda cans or other heavy objects being hurled at the screens by irate viewers or children; many times the sets are not worth repairing, especially if they have a few years on them. All of the foregoing is too bad, but, as former CBS-TV anchorman Walter Cronkite used to close the "CBS Evening News", that's the way it is in this age of outsourcing and companies leaving the United States for offshore destinations. It would be nice if things weren't like this, but they are, so the best any of us can do is to accept it, and, if we can, to make the best of a bad situation.
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Jeff, WB8NHV Collecting, restoring and enjoying vintage Zenith radios since 2002 Zenith. Gone, but not forgotten. |
#43
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And, as you state, even the Japanese companies can no longer afford to make their own TV (and other gear) at home, except for the highest-end stuff. Yamaha no longer makes a CDP. All are rebadged from Philips or Samsung, etc. Oh, well, we get what we vote for in a democracy. |
#44
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Sony Trinitron Fan |
#45
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Sony Trinitron Fan |
Audiokarma |
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