Mitsubishi Drops Bulky DLP TVs: End of an Era

An anonymous reader writes "Mitsubishi was the last hold-out in the big-screen rear-projection display business after Samsung left the category in 2009. Now Mitsubishi has dropped the dinosaur. Every big-brand CE manufacturer got their start in the big-TV business via rear projection sets from CRT to DLP to LCoS, eventually replacing them with modern-day flat screens. Mitsubishi did develop LCD flat-screens for a time, but dropped out of that market to focus on rear DLPs after Samsung gave it a monopoly. The author, a CE editor, takes a nostalgic and amusing look at her 15 years with three Mitsu rear pros, the only big-screen TV she's known."

Re:DLP

[kelemvor4]

Seriously? I didn't realize DLP's were still manufactured/sold. Go Mitsubishi!

I've got one, unless you're in a location without sufficient space or money is no object they're great. 1080p, 3d support, great appearance, 65". Couldn't come close to that with any other product out there for the $800 it cost brand new.

Re:DLP

[vux984]

Yeah, as long as you can sit directly in front, they do work pretty great. Had one for years. Too big to haul away, so I sold it with the house when I moved.

Too big to haul away? My 60" DLP was 90 lbs and and about 15" deep at the deepest point. One guy could lift it by himself, although it was a lot less awkward with two.

The average dining room table, love seat, recliner, dresser... is far more difficult to move.

As for viewing angles? They were fine; you could sit anywhere in the room and see it just fine. The only bad viewing angle was if you were too high looking at a substantial downward angle which would only be a problem if you sat on a baby's high-chair 2 feet away from it.

But its nice to actually be able to see what you are eating and drinking in a Sports Pub these days without them having to dim the lights just so that people can see the rear projections screens mounted like a sword of Damocles over the bar.

For sure, the thin/flat superbright plasmas and LCD/LED screens are far better suited to that mounting arrangement.

But unless there's an actual game on I just wish they'd turn the fuckers off. They are annoying distractions. If they were just in dedicated sports pubs it wouldn't be a problem, but they seem to be everywhere these days. Family restaurants, fast food restaurants, and so on, the volume is turned off, the content is just mindless drivel -- bowling and tennis highlights, commercials for gum... Nobody wants to watch this crap, but its bright and shiny and it moves so your eyes are drawn to them.

Re:crap televisions, anyhow

[tftp]

Now find the balance between cost of production, and people returning products - there is a point where cheap parts (with a predicatable failure process/rate) end up making a better profit.

There are many reasons why that would be the case. For example:

• One person buys, another person witnesses the failure. Common with gifts and products installed by others.
• Warranty documents are lost. Who saves a store receipt for three years?
• The extended warranty scam. The customer finances the manufacturer for the failure of an item. Failures follow the bathtub curve: high in the beginning, low in the middle, high in the end. Extended warranty sells you the warranty for the middle of the curve, where the device is least likely to fail. But if it fails early the manufacturer gets paid.
• "I must have been holding it wrong, it's all my fault!"
• Customers who are too busy or too disorganized to timely file a warranty claim.
• High shipping costs make warranty claims on sub-$100 items unprofitable. Cheaper to scrap the device and buy a new one.
• The fault attributed to, or hidden by the natural wear and tear. Crack the plastic case, get no warranty even if the failure is unrelated. Other reasons to not honor the warranty.
• Poor handling of warranty repairs. Microsoft was famous for receiving an Xbox with RROD and shipping it, without looking, as a replacement unit to another customer. Eventually some of them got thrown out of a window - sale!1!
• Accounting tricks that use returned products to justify better tax rates.
• Management who is only concerned with Christmas sales, no matter what happens in January.
• Cheap parts and cheap processes that save more money that is lost on warranty claims.
• Fly by night manufacturers who cannot be found for warranty claims.

That's just the most obvious scenarios. One could, of course, wonder why manufacturers don't want to maintain their good name. But that's because who makes TVs - LG, Sony, Samsung and a handful of other players. You are stuck with them no matter what, and they all cheat this way. You may get angry at Viewsonic and buy LG, but another customer is angry with LG and buys Viewsonic. It's like airlines - there are too few of them and they are all bad. Smaller Chinese companies simply don't care, there are enough customers for them in the world. They can also sell under any trade name you want, even if the device is made at the same factory.