Pananonic Player Quality & Lifespan (1 Viewer)

My Panasonic A-110 finally died. It appears that the optical pickup has failed completely. It will still read a CD but doesn't recoginze any DVDs. I've only had it about 3 years with moderate usage, but I can't say I'm surprised because of all the problems I've seen reported here about the A-110 and A-310.

At the age of 2.75 years is it even worth complaining to Panasonic that the machine they sold was defective? I just don't think less than 3 years is an adequate lifespan for a DVD player. Particularly since it is a name-brand player. I've had CD players for 6-8 years without problems and friends of mine have had LD players longer than that. I know a DVD player is much more complicated, but is 3 years all I can expect to get out of my DVD players?

Based on this bad experience, my initial reaction is to avoid Panasonic on all future purchases. Is there anyone out there that would tell me they have improved their quality control? If not, what brands and players would you recommend with progressive scan without spending too much? Thanks for the help.

Tim,

It is not just Panasonic thats putting out substandard players. I had a Sony 360 that died after a year and a half. Like the A110 and A310, the problem in this model was evident in most the ones sold.

I agree these things should last for at least 3000 hours of in use time. When my Sony died it only had about 400 hours of use.

Hi Tim, My first player was one of the 310 models that had the defect. Panasonic replaced it with the RV-65 model a couple years ago and it's worked flawlessly. I'm still using it to this day. I think panasonic learned their lesson about quality control so I can say that I'd recommend them again.

Jeff