I read in sci.electronics.design that Bill Turner
wrote (in ) about 'Tantalum
caps.', on Thu, 22 Jan 2004:
Consumer electronics are costed down to the lowest possible level. If
they can use something cheaper, they WILL use something cheaper. A TV
set or VCR has had people go over the design hundreds of times with
BOMs and catalogs, checking to see if they can shave a penny here or a
penny there.

_________________________________________________ ________

Well, maybe. Any manufacturer who has been nailed with thousands of
dollars in warranty costs caused by saving a penny might disagree with
your statement. I've seen it happen.

Epidemic faults were, in my experience, rarely caused by cost-reduction
but either by component manufacturing faults (noisy tantalum caps and
unreliable fuses, for example) or by unrecognized 'gotchas' in the
original circuits (high-Q series resonance in a loudspeaker crossover
filter).
--
Regards, John Woodgate, OOO - Own Opinions Only.
The good news is that nothing is compulsory.
The bad news is that everything is prohibited.
http://www.jmwa.demon.co.uk Also see http://www.isce.org.uk