I purchased a "new" Portable DVD Player, Model E1022PD made by Element Electronics from now defunct Circuit City in Madison, TN (suburb of Nashville, TN) in the Spring of 2008. I hadn't had the thing more than a few weeks when the wife and me to our Currie Electronics Electric bikes for a ride around the neighborhood, stopping to rest at the little Gazebo in the center of our tiny little town of Old Hickory, TN. We brought our new DVD player along WITH us, intending to plug it in to the electric receptacle at the Gazebo while we watched an interesting video together as the evening was close at hand.
After plugging it in, I kept noticing I was getting a mild electric shock touching something on the unit but I was so paranoid of getting electrocuted that I didn't try investigating closer to see "where" the current was leaking and just kept my hands and body away from the thing while we watched the DVD.
Anyway, in about 1/2 hour we packed the thing back in its' new Targa case that I had bought for it and headed back home.
Well, it's now May 3, 2009, and I hadn't taken the thing out to use it more than a couple of times since then and only for a few minutes at that so didn't notice any problems then.
WELL, TODAY, nearly a year since I purchased the thing, I pulled it out of its' Targa case and stuck a DVD that I wanted to watch into it. Of course, I didn't think the battery would have ANY charge now since it has been over 6 months since charging it and I thought it would surely be discharged, but to my surprise, it was as hot as EVER ---- AND, GET THIS!!
Well, as I began running my thumb against one of the little decorative metal "clips" on the back side of the swivel screen, I began feeling a very "strong" stinging, burning sensation on the inside of my thumb and then the distinct "smell" of burning flesh!
When I looked down AT my thumb as I was rubbing it alongside this little decorative metal clip, I could SEE the very SHARP - BRIGHT orangish-red glow of current LEAPING from the metal clip to my thumb -- just like an electric cautery that a doctor uses. (If you've ever had one of THOSE things used on your person to burn off a wart or skin lesion, etc., (maybe they don't use these for warts or other external medical reasons anymore), then you can DISTINCTLY understand exactly WHAT I was feeling on the side of my thumb!
And to TOP IT OFF! The thing was NOT EVEN PLUGGED IN! I was burning the skin on the side of my thumb quite well -- smoke rising and the distinctive ugly smell of burning flesh could be detected. I stood there looking at what was happening in sheer amazement!
HOW could this thing be putting out THAT kind of voltage and amperage coming from just the current being supplied by a rechargeable 9 or 12v battery on this little DVD player? I could'nt believe what I was seeing and experiencing. It was too much. And I'm a compuer electronics major having studied electric current and all it's ramifications from Ohm's law through reactive inductance, but through my years of college and all the electrical things I'd had my hands into, I'd NEVER experienced something like what I did TODAY!
Anyway, the 12V battery DOESN'T have enough current to do anything to hurt you like this BY ITSELF -- it HAS to be a short-circuit (of course) stemming from electric current that's been SERIOUSLY pumped UP -- STEPPED UP, I believe, to a DANGEROUS level that "IF" I had been touching something to GROUND when touching this clip, I would have sustained a SERIOUS electrical shock! Judging by what I was seeing and feeling, it is MY estimation that this current has to be in the "house-current" range -- 110V -- with SERIOUS amperage, which may be due to an "inverter" circuit INSIDE THE THING -- in other words, could this current be a "square-waved" INVERTER electrical output? Like the same amount of current you get when you plug a DC to AC Inverter unit into your cirgarette lighter which hypes up the voltage AND amperage to 110-120V "square-wave" AC (they cannot produce a true "sine-wave" form since it's not being produced in the same way as what comes out of the powerhouse from the generators at the dam.
Anyway, SOMEBODY's got to LOOK at this thing and FIX IT! I HAVE NOT DONE A THING to this unit, never dropped it, spilt anything ON it or INTO it - it was defective from almost the first day I GOT it, so it's been this way since the first day I brought it home. I think someone told me that Element once was owned or WAS Polaroid Company (the same people that made the famous Poloroid Land Camera of the 50's and 60's. I don't know if this is true, just what I heard.
So, I was wondering "IF" anybody else ever had the same issue/problem with THEIR unit as I'm having with MINE now? I'll tell you, the charge arcing off that little clip is SERIOUSLY HIGH voltage and enough amperage to start burning DEEP into your skin, and still serious enough also to give you a real whammy PUNCH if you're grounded at the same time!
PLEASE fix this thing for me, ha? I could have SUED SOMEONE from being electrocuted by this defective thing, but luckily, no one's been seriously hurt -- I just got kicked pretty hard the FIRST time I used it at the Gazebo, shortly after buying it, because I was grounded somehow, someway. And TODAYT, I was lucky again -- First, it wasn't even plugged IN, and it was still producing this high electric current from what little juice the battery still had remaining from a charge I put on it MONTHS ago; Second, I wasn't grounded "yet" - had I been standing anywhere else in the house or even outside WITHOUT protection, I could have been SERIOUSLY SHOCKED! And my heart is bad now too, and this could have been TRAGIC!!
SO, can someone tell me what they suspect might be going on here, and if anyone else has had similar problems? I've NEVER disassembled or had the thing apart - EVER! It's only been used about a couple of hours since purchasing it, so I DON'T know where this problem is coming from or HOW it even could be occurring. It seems so ILLOGICAL to my thinking, that something like this could even be HAPPENING! It's CRAZY, in ALL my hears, and I've been shocked by touching electric appliances that were already in use, YEARS ago, and since the advent of DIGITAL electronics and tigher and smoother electrical designes, designers, and components, etc., etc., "HOW", pray tell me, just HOW could something like this have EVER occurred?
Will be waiting to hear something from somebody, AND, I hope, a WAY to RMA this thing BACK to the Factory in hopes they would SWAP me out on a NEW model that plays Blu Ray Discs too? Seeing WHAT this thing has already done to me and the POTENTIAL for serious harm here, I really feel like I'm deserving of SOME "GIFTED" item for all the PAIN this thing has caused me.
The BALL if in YOUR park now!
William
wmdsull@gmail.com
(213) 926-9696
(909) 522-4450
P.O. Box 11982
San Bernardino, CA 92423
/wds
