It sounds like in 15 years Funai has not improved on their quality much. I used to work in an Audio/Video shop and they used to sell Funai TV/VCRs. More came back to our shop as defective than actually stayed out.

I am glad that this turned out well for the OP.
I would personally stay away from Sony however, I have NEVER had success with any Sony products that I have purchased. Pioneer, Panasonic, Samsung & Vizio would be my choices for a television.

I'm not blaming the OP or anything but you really get what you pay for. We have a little 20 inch Trutech LCD and the color and contrast on it look absolutely terrible in comparison to our Sony Bravia and Samsung DLP.

And even though customer service is pretty bad in general, you probably get better tech support and customer service with a name brand product as well.

I've learned my lesson and I'm not buying generic brand TVs anymore. Better just to go without for the time being and just save up for a reputable brand.

@Rachacha: Sony had some major quality control issues for years. Recently though, their Bravia TVs have been amazing, and are highly rated for a reason.

That said, our two year old Samsung just died. It apparently had been having problems with its power supply for most of its life, and the damn thing finally died. Our Panasonic is going great, though.

@Adhominem: The customer actually bought a Sylvania TV. Back in the 1970s and 1980s, it was a very respectable brand name which was apparently sold to a 3rd tier manufacturer. Unfortunatly, many of the Big names from 10-20 years ago have gotten out of the business, so consumers can not purchase by brand name alone. We have to do research before purchasing.

@Rachacha: @Rachacha: You must be joking; the differences between a Vizio and a (high end) Sony Bravia are huge. Vizio is a value brand and Sony is a premium brand. You can't say that a $2600 TV is comparable to a $900 one.

That being said, I've had my Sony Bravia TV for about a year and it has been perfect in every way and the picture is incredible. My PS3 works just as well too, as well as the two ten year old CRT TV's that are Sony's.

@Rachacha: That's very true Rachacha, I stand rebuked.

Why should they get a refund for?
Funai was gonna repair it, but they didn't even let them try to. So why should they be entitled to a refund.
All warranties says that if it can't be repaired, they will refund you the purchase price, or replace it.
but they didn't even let them try to repair it.

it's a crappy product.

@Jack O'Neill: Given the information in the link to the original article, why would you want it repaired?

@sqlrob: Really. I thought they were generous in including "new Funai TV" as an acceptable solution, since they now know that the warranty is meaningless. That would probably be enough for me to stick with a refund request.

@Adhominem: But the customer paid for a functioning television. She didn't get what she paid for.

There are levels of customer service? How many nazi zombies do you have to kill to get there?

@ducttape38: I never tried to compare Vizio to Sony. Personally, I have never had much luck with Sony products, and have therefore made the decision to avoid Sony products whenever possible.

I suggested Vizio as a possible option to the OP as they were clearly shopping by price when they purchased a Sylvania/Funai TV, Vizio has demonstrated that they can produce a good quality picture and reliability for a very reasonable price.

The OP purchased a 43 inch TV for $400, they are now considering replacing it with a Sony TV (for probably +$2500), perhaps something in the middle like a $1000 Vizio might be better suited for them.

@Rachacha: I would personally stay away from Samsung. I had one Samsung which died under warranty, had a long draw-out battle with Samsung customer service, got another replacement TV and that one broke too (Samsung also fixed that one too).

I won't buy Sony anything because of their constant use of proprietary formats and overzealous use of all forms of DRM (to the detriment of performance).

Panasonic has always served me well though.

@OMG! Conies!:

Yes there really are different levels of customer service.

I once reached (jokingly) what I refer to as Tier 37 of customer service at Microsoft. It was a 3 man office (actually 2 men and 1 woman) based in a well known, not exactly teckie, mid-sized US city. End of the line. Nobody else higher. They had no "quotas" or "performance goals". They choose the problems they wished to address and work on the problem until it is resolved. The resolution? An update was required by both the antivirus company providing antivirus support on the server's email system as well as the antivirus software on my computer. The probelm never a MS problem, yet Tier 37 worked with other MS techs to provid the support to both antivirus companies to resolve the issue and prevent it from happening to other duelling antivirus companies.

A word of advice to the OP--Sony hasn't made anything good since about 1995. Anyone who thinks Sony is still a "premium" brand, well, they must either work in Sony management or have gotten VERY lucky in the last 15 years.

Sony seems to have almost no quality control anymore, which is a bummer because their consumer electronics* are made in the same lowest-bidder Chinese factories as the cheapest no-name brands (Hey! Brands like Funai!). This is why they have a very high failure rate.

For a good TV, the only brands I would consider today are Sharp, Panasonic, and Toshiba. I bought a Toshiba and love it, and we have purchased several Sharps at my work which have performed flawlessly, being left on 24 hours a day for the past 2 years or so.

*Note I said consumer. For completely pro stuff, I've heard plenty of people who know what they're talking about say that they still actually make that stuff correctly. Probably you can tell if you're dealing with real pro stuff because it will be made in Japan instead of China, Korea, or Mexico.

@sqlrob: Original article has the request as a 'refund or replace with new'. There are only a few companies that might even do this, but still a very rare occurrence.

You get what you pay for.

@Rachacha:
I personally own 3 Vizio TV's, a 26", a 37", and a 48". All work perfectly and have only had an issue with one with a stuck pixel, but that eventually went away. I would highly recommend getting a Vizio.

Best bet for choosing a replacement? Only choose one of Consumer Report's recommended TVs & check out their review of any set you're considering.

@☠Grяrяrяrяrя sings the doom song now!: I have had a Samsung Plasma for about 5 years now and it works great (knock on wood). I would have loved the Pioneer Plasma (top of the line at the time), but I could not justify the extra $7000 that it would have cost.

I have an Olivia Budget LCD that we bought about 4 years ago that the kids watch in the play room (connected to the Wii and DVD/VCR player). The picture is not the greatest, but it works well for the price that we paid.

YMMV.

@sven.kirk: As was pointed out, the problem is that the OP didn't get what he paid for.

I think you may be trying to say that unless you pay over a certain amount, you can't be guaranteed a product that works as advertised. The thing is, reliability statistics simply don't bear that out; in fact, Sylvania is one of the more reliable brands for flat-screen TVs.

@Rachacha: I have three Sony tv's (and some audio equipment as well). One of the tv's is over ten years old and still functions perfectly so...I guess it depends on whether you got a Monday set or a Wednesday set.

@Rachacha: That seems to be it...YMMV. I've had friends who had terrible luck with "Brand X" and yet mine's always been fine, and vice versa.

There's no final QC these days in electronics, so you get the luck of the draw. Manufacturers ship out 1000 TV's at a time without inspecting them and it's cheaper just to deal with the warranty returns/repairs than it is to actually verify every unit is working before leaving the factory.

@OMG! Conies!: Thread over, godwin's law invoked