Ok, since we've got so many people with so many different backgrounds here maybe we've got someone who knows about electronics
other than computers?
I've got a rather, uh, 'inexpensive' shelf stereo that's got a problem and I am wondering if it is something inherently wrong with the device or perhaps an outside influence. Every so often when I am listening to the radio function, and never at very high volume, it will give off a huge POP noise and stop producing any sound. Flipping around on the radio tuner I find that it simply doesn't turn out any sound. But the stations are still being received because I can see the 'stereo' light going on when it hits a strong station frequency. Turning it OFF and then ON again will restore it. Until it goes POP again... Flipping through the 'function' options, from radio to tape, AUX, CD player, and back to radio will 'sort of' restore it but then the volume is whacked out. It plays very fuzzy and loud as if the volume control is disconnected. Only turning it OFF and then ON again will really restore it. Yet, this doesn't seme to affect the other options. The CD player and AUX work fine even after the POP has discombobulated the radio function.
There is NO predictable pattern to this. It doesn't happen at regular intervals, it doesn't happen at a certain time (right after turning it on, only after running it for X hours) it just happens at random. Sometimes I can listen to it all day without this happening once. I've not (yet) identified any other events that seem to coincide with this, like the starting and stopping of major appliances, but it sure looks like an external event of some sort. Maybe my neighbor has a really noisy microwave oven?
Could this be a malfunction in the radio? If so, are these things ever fixable anymore? Or
worth fixing in a ~$150 consumer electronics bauble? Just curious if anyone recognizes this behavior as a clear sign of some identifiable problem.
[ June 23, 2004, 18:33: Message edited by: Baron Munchausen ]
OT: Tempermental electronics
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