The beer is cold, the pizza is steaming, the remote control in hand… Argh, the set doesn't turn on.
To avoid this catastrophic scenario at the kick-off of the Euro on Friday, many French people have taken the lead and bought themselves great new generation LCD screens.
What if we change jobs too often?
This is the question posed by the association Halte à obsolescence programmed (HOP) that we reveal: the average lifespan of this equipment is seven and a half years today, while the old cathode ray tube stations of the 1960s lasted fifteen years.
At the same time, it calls on the ten largest manufacturers (Samsung, Panasonic, Sony, etc.) to prevent this giant waste.
Across France, keeping your television set for nine years instead of eight would save more than 1.7 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent, or the city of Lyon's annual emissions!
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“TVs could and should last longer, especially if the brands' commercial strategies did not push us to always want more, always bigger,” points out Laetitia Vasseur, president of the NGO.
The first reason for changing jobs is, according to the study, "the desire for a better image and a different decoration" for nearly a third (32%) of respondents.
“Even though I challenge you to see the difference between a high definition image and an ultra high definition,” sighs the one who has been working on our household appliances for years.
Less than three out of ten broken TVs are repaired
Another argument put forward for scrapping your old television, software problems (for 30%)!
We speak of “obesware” when the software update is, for example, too heavy to be supported and causes the device to malfunction.
The study reports in particular the cases of French people who changed their TV following the installation of Disney + which, all of a sudden, had caused a black screen and general failure on a device purchased only four years previously.
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Some (13%) were, they believed, forced to change television sets by regulation. For example, when, in 2016, we went from DTT to high definition DTT. "And yet, the vast majority of them could have kept it (86%), either by simply updating it, or by using adapters", underlines Laetitia Vasseur. The problem is likely to rest soon, as the transition to ultra high definition is slated for 2024.
What if the screen breaks.
"Change the slab?
Ooh!
It is the most expensive operation!
Overall and depending on the size of the screen, the labor time required, the repair costs about half the price of the TV.
In general, customers prefer to upgrade, ”says Jérémy, an artisan repairer in Paris, who has been in business for years.
According to the Environment and Energy Management Agency (Ademe), less than three out of ten TVs broken down between 2017 and 2019 have been repaired.
Parts of questionable quality
Blame it on the consumer, who uses the slightest sign of weakness as a pretext to indulge himself? Not only. The HOP association notes a certain number of failures "which should not take place", due to the poor quality, or even to the poor sizing of the LED diodes which are used to generate the light so that the image produced by the panel is visible. However, repairs are difficult and expensive. It is often necessary to change an entire strip when one or a few diodes malfunction, and changing all the strips instead of one so as not to have a brighter strip is classic.
Several experts also denounce the quality of capacitors, often placed as close as possible to a heat source, even though they fear it. “The temptation to save money on this coin can be strong, knowing that the finding of weakness will only be years later. It is an obsolescence, at least indirectly programmed, most often the consequence of financial choices, ”estimates Laetitia Vasseur. His association voted for the repairability index, a score of 1 to 10, like at school, mandatory on teloches since January. But only 65% of brands had provided their ratings.
In the meantime, what are we doing to extend the life of the star of our salons? Jérémy, the television repairman, has a few tips: "Do not leave your television near a radiator or in direct sunlight, use special products to clean the screen and, when you vacuum, remember to direct the nozzle. towards the ventilation grille. "