11 Jun
2006
11 Jun
'06
1:02 a.m.
Tony Duell wrote:
[equipment manuals]
Yes, though this is frustrating. It helps if you have some
spare/disposable units that can give their lives for the cause! :>
But, even then, it can be difficult...
I have to sacrifice a couple of telephone sets in order to
figure out what's inside them so I can modify them for
"(doorway) entry phones". But, I susct I will encounter
a fair number of oddball/proprietary components in the process
(PBX's are usually poorly documented)
Exactly!
And I still fail to see how supplying information means I'll do a worse
repair. Darn it, I am going to have a go at fixing this <foo> no matter
what. If I can get a service manual I'll read it first, if not, I'll have
to work it out as I go along...
Manuals don't exist anymore because:
- they are expensive to produce
- few people are CAPABLE of using them
- litigation ("Didn't you INVITE my client to stick his
hands inside that 20KW pulse amplifier, Sir?")
- product lifecycles are really short
- vendors are under the (mistaken?) belief that they have
a monopoly on some "great idea"/implementation
If you think about each of these, I think you'll have
to agree...
So, why should a vendor undertake such a task?
--don
service manual
for a simple thing like a mouse ;o)
Actaully, I don't have a mouse on this PC (probably the only PC in the
world not to have one, but...). But for things like mice it's often
quicker just to trace out the scheamtic than to do battle trying to get a
schemaitc from the manufactuer. I know I included schematics of the
appropriate mice when I traced out diagrams for the PERQ AGW3300 and the
HP IPC> I have never (well, not in the last 20 years, anyhow)
'mucked up a PCB'
trying to repair it. Yes, you can generally tell where I've been (hand
soldering does look different from wave soldering), but I do not lift
traces, rip out vias, and all the other things that certain people manage
to do.
And if I muck that, (expletive deleted) them, because it is mine,
bought
with my (expletive deleted) money!!! What do they have to do with that? :oP