CD player not to buy

[Mike Arman]

In response to the lister who inquired about what brand of CD player to
look at:

I have a Blaupunkt AM-FM-CD player with removable faceplate, model ACD
2900, and it is in an 86 5Ks.

It is about a year and a half old, and for the past nine months has
exhibited a strange quirk - it won't turn off! From time to time, even
after turning off the ignition and removing the faceplate, the device keeps
playing merrily on, and eventually, this kills the battery in the car
(which can be annoying, to say the least!).

I've discovered that hitting the "reset" button (under the faceplate, use a
paper-clip end), shuts it off, but of course that loses ALL the radio
presets, tone, balance and loudness control settings, etc., and there are a
LOT of them!

I spoke to Blaupunkt about this shortly after it started happening, and was
informed that "The unit is out of warranty, and is essentially
unrepairable. You'll need to buy a new unit, preferably a more expensive
Blaupunkt. After all, the one you bought is just an entry level unit, so
what do you expect?"


Well what I *expect* is for the unit to work properly, and not crap out 15
seconds after the warranty expires (let alone evidencing the problem before
the warranty is up!)

I *bought* the damn thing, I didn't "rent" it!

What I also expect is to indeed buy another, more expensive unit, but you
can bet whatever portion of your anatomy you want that there is no way in
hell it will ever be another Blaupunkt!

Here is a perfect example of a big company trading on a reputation of "fine
German engineering", and then when it comes apart anyway, totally evading
all responsibility - sorry, your warranty expired ten minutes ago. Too bad.
Buy another.

No thanks. No more Blaupunkt for me. I won't buy from companies that don't
stand behind their products.

And YES, goddamn it, rant mode is ON! and will probably stay that way for a
while . . .

Best Regards,

Mike Arman