Don's Exit on the Information Highway

Consumer Experiences & Comments

Compact Fluorescent Lamps--buyer beware. (7/30/07)

My efforts to "go green" and save on both energy and light-bulb costs have hit a snag. Compact Fluorescent Lamps (CFLs) seem to have a reliability problem. At this point, after buying and installing about 30 or 40 CFLs about four months ago, I have had about a 10% failure rate, across several brands. I bought mostly floods for recessed lighting, and these have been the ones that failed. Many of them have been of the dimmable variety, and it has been mostly, if not entirely, those that have failed. If the failure rate remains at about 10%, the CFLs will still work out to be economical and good for the environment, as long as one disposes of the mercury-laden waste properly; if many more fail in the first year, however, their usefulness will be dubious at best.

High-definition DVDs (observation, 1/6/09)

Some reviewers of entertainment gear believe that Blu-ray DVDs will fail--a casualty of the format war, high prices, copy-protection restrictions, and the availability of high-def alternatives. For example, take the link to these comments. Luckily, the format war ended in early 2008, and the author of those comments has yet to be proved correct. One way that he will always remain wrong is in the idea that regular DVDs are just about as good as high-definition DVDs--not if you have a large-screen TV they're not! I have just about arrived at the point that I will not watch a movie on a regular DVD on my 60-in. HDTV. The 1080i picture from cable, even though the compression creates motion artifacts and is still not as good as 1080p, is waaay better than standard DVD. Yes, my receiver and/or my TV are doing all their upscaling properly, but there is no way that they can supply the detail that is missing in a standard (480p) DVD--I mean, for goodness' sake, we're talking about 2 megapixels for 1080i versus 0.36 megapixels for 480p (over 5 times the sharpness!). I mean, even cell-phone cameras have higher resolution than standard DVDs, although I suppose one could cite several reasons why that's not a fair comparison--(1) the fact that poor lenses in cell phones keep those 1.3 megapixels from realizing their full potential, and (2) the fact that x number of pixels delivered 30 or 60 times a second in motion video are worth considerably more than x number of pixels in a still photo format. But my point is, if you have a large-screen HDTV with 1080i or 1080p capability, you'll be no more be satisfied with a regular DVD than a digital photographer would be satisfied with a 1-megapixel camera.

Still, even though hi-def TV and Blu-ray are visually stunning realities, the future of hi-def DVDs is still in doubt because of prices that are still too high and because of some really dumb design. I now own a "fourth-generation" Blu-ray player. Almost three years into Blu-ray's life, the kinks should have been worked out; but they are not. Click on "Panasonic Blu-ray" to read about the bad news, along with the good.

Grocery-store produce

Fresh vegetables found in grocery stores are generally not-too-bad. One can almost always find good-enough corn, cauliflower, broccoli, and asparagus--thank goodness for asparagus, good all year 'round! But why do people buy the junky fruit found in supermarkets? On a typical day, even at upscale stores like Whole Foods, I daresay that the majority of mangos, bananas, kiwi fruit, melons, strawberries, peaches, and papayas are close to inedible. Strawberries are a particularly sad case because, even though they are often gorgeous and perfectly edible as generic fruit, they have not had the distinctive strawberry flavor for years. I suspect that a whole generation doesn't even know what a fresh strawberry tastes like. They can get a clue from jams and jellies because these are still made from fruit that has not been compromised to be bullet-proof and look like a million dollars on the shelf while having no taste; but it's only a clue because the canning process alters the flavor. But if strawberry purchases can be excused by sheer ignorance of what the real thing tastes like, what about peaches hard as baseballs? Does anybody buy a second batch after finding the first batch almost inedible? How are stores able to survive if there is no repeat business? It completely baffles me. I can only guess that supermarkets have made a calculation that the appearance of an opulent supply of produce draws people to the store even if they have learned to pass by the produce itself.

I can offer a few tips in one's self-defense, however:

	Strawberries. Don't buy them, ever, in a grocery store, unless by chance your grocery has a special local supplier. Farmers' market strawberries can be good, but many of those farmers have also switched to the modern tasteless varieties.
	Peaches. Take a chance if they are not hard as rocks. If they actually have some sweet scent around them, and perhaps a few flies to confirm their consumability, they will even taste good! (Softness alone is no guarantee of flavor.) You'll have a better shot at flavor in farmers' markets.
	Bananas. The sweetest bananas are red bananas; they're almost like candy--if ripe. Red bananas are very deceptive, however: one simply cannot gauge ripeness by color; sometimes a greenish or yellowish red banana will be tastier than a bright red one. Luckily, a light squeeze is pretty much all one needs to test a banana. With experience you can learn just how soft they have to feel to be good; they have to have more "give" than, say, a kiwi. Don't worry too much about the black blemishes on the peels; red bananas have thick peels that thoroughly protect the delicious insides.
	Kiwi fruit. If they feel like rocks, don't buy them. This is the case with about 50% of the kiwis I find in the supermarket.
	Melons: smell the stem-end. If it smells sweet, buy it; if not, move on.
	Grapes. Thank goodness, it's hard to go wrong here.
	Apples. Another bright spot, although they'll vary from batch to batch, season to season. Braeburns are my favorite.
	Blueberries. Good in season, from June to September. You will know when they're off season because they are only available in half pints then. Avoid the rest of the year unless you have a particular dietary need for them. The winter supply is edible, just tasteless and expensive.