This is just a thought provoking post. We in Chennai are experiencing one of the most excruciating periods - SUMMER.

Recently we heard many people tell us that they have purchased an air conditioner but it fails to work because of too low a voltage at their home. A gentleman remarked today that off the three phases at his home, one phase was delivering only 80V. Yes, it was delivering 1/3 of the requirement for most appliances. In these extreme conditions no voltage stabilizer can start the power guzzling air conditioners.

Worse than this is that there have been reports of power being turned off during peak hours when almost all homes with AC turn them on and create a massive overload on the system. Small UPS and inverters cannot certainly power the air conditioners. What one really needs is a full blown generator running on diesel or kerosene to power these machines.

We had spoken about inverter technology based air conditioners. But mass adoption is a key to this. Most homes still have conventional air conditioners and this causes voltage drop issues.

How are you tackling a similar situation in your town/locality? Please leave your comments behind.

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We are not sure if you have noticed that an increasing number of airconditioners in the market are now labelled as “Inverter Air Conditioners”. We decided to write something on this to demystify the title.

In a conventional airconditioner, a reverse-cycle is used where a heat pump (compressor) is working either at full speed or switched off. So when it is switched off, you can notice that your AC doesnt make much sound (probably only noticed in window AC and not in a split AC , as the compressor for the later is mounted outside the home).

This limitation is imposed because the compressor’s speed cannot be varied. So how do these ACs regulate temperature? They use ambiant temperature sensors like thermistors to detect the room temperature and when it is near the setting, the compressor is switched off while the fan still is operational.

In an inverter AC, the incoming AC signal is first rectified into DC and then switched back to AC with varibale frequency control. (Remember regular AC power is 50 Hertz only). The resultant AC which has variable frequency is used to control a special motor such as a brushless AC motor or an induction motor whose speed is directly proportional to the frequency of the powering signal.

So now it is possible to run the compressor at variable speeds and achieve optimum cooling of the room. A microcontroller is used to sample the ambiant temperature and control the speed of the compressor.

By minimizing the start stop cycles like it is done in conventional AC units, the inverter AC maximized efficiency of operation, increases the life of components used on board and eliminate sharp fluctuations in the load the air-conditioner places on the power supply.

The last example is very apparent when you realize your lights dim momentarily when the AC is switching on its compressor!

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More brands, more products. Here’s Part III of our coverage of the Electronics Show from Chennai.

Whirlpool

This is yet another giant in the consumer electronics segment in India. Featured products included Microwave Owens, Refrigerators, Washing Machines, Air Conditioners and Water Purifiers.

Some Pictures from the stall:

The ‘Energy star’ and the ‘Stabiliser free operation’:

Some details about Whirlpool Products:

Refrigerators:

In the refrigerators line-up, they have Direct cool (Under which we have Genius and Genius XL), Frost Control (Fusion),Frost Free (Master Mind, Iceberg and Professional). Storage space starts from 180 litres and comes in 200 , 220, 230 , 250, 260 , 280,  310, 340, 405, 445 litres. They are also available in  variety of colors including white, blue, red, grey, steel, silver and gold.

Washing Machines:

Under Washing Machines, they have Front Loading models, Fully Automatic Models and Semi Automatic models. 5 , 6 , 6.5, 7kg. They even had a Dryer.

Sansui:

Sansui is a Japanese brand that mainly deals with Televisions and Audio equipment in India. They had a generously spaced stall, but had only televisions (CRT and LCD) and music systems on display. Their LCD TV range goes by the name Kyuten.

Also on display was a DVD Recorder. Now this is worth mentioning because none of the other giants sported this in their stalls even if they do manufacture it. You can record onto DVD’s directly from your TV.  

DVR 515 R - Rs. 9,490/- (Offer price was Rs.7,490/-)

Sansui actually has a good range of products. To know more, you can visit their Indian website.

Onida:

Onida’s stall was pretty crowded at-least in perspective of the size of their stall. Featured products included LCD TV’s, Microwave Ovens, CRT televisions, Air-Conditioners, Washing Machines, Speaker Systems.

Onida’s LCD TV range goes by the name Xaria. Candy range of DVD players was on display too.

Some pictures of their TV’s , Washing Machines, Air Conditioners and Ovens:

You may also visit Onida’s website.

Godrej:

A player in the Indian consumer market for a long long time, Godrej is still keeping up with growing foreign presence. Featured products included Ovens, Washing Machines, Refrigerators, Air-Conditioners and even Safe’s.

Pictures from the stall:

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This post is subsequent to posts Retail Plus AV Electronic Show-2008 - Coverage and ‘Retail Plus AV Electronic Show-2008-Coverage-Part I ‘.

Here we talk about the big brands and the products they had on display.

1) Sony

Sony is one of the most popular consumer electronics brand both in India and worldwide. Appliances on display included CRT televisions, LCD televisions , Home theatre and stereo systems. They also had laptops, walkmans  and other electronic accessories like cameras and storage devices. We will not delve into that in much detail.

Also featured was Playstation 3for Rs.24,990/- Playstation 2 was also available.

Here are some pictures of the LCD TV’s on display:

(If you look closely, you should be able to see both model numbers and the price of some of the televisions. The same is typed out here for easy reading.)

KLV 40V 300 A             - Rs. 99,990/-  *  (Bravia V Series,40″ LCD screen)

KLV 32D 300A              - Rs. 69,990/-  *  (Bravia D Series,32″ LCD screen)

KLV 32V 300A              - Rs. 54,990/-  * (Bravia V Series,32″ LCD screen) 

KLV 40X 350A              - Rs.1,79,900/-* (Bravia X Series,40″ LCD screen)

KLV 40W 300A             - Rs.1,29,900/-*(Bravia W Series,40″ LCD screen)

KLV 40S 310A              - Rs. 79,990/-   * (Bravia S Series,40″ LCD screen)

Pictures of Home theatres/Stereo systems:

DAV-DZ151K/DAV-DZ150K          -Rs. 12,990/- * (5.1 Channel,850W )

DAV-DZ750K                                    -Rs. 26,990/- * (5.1 Channel,1000W)

Picture of CRT televisions:

2) Samsung

The Samsung stall had most of the home appliance products. Samsung enjoys a big presence in the Indian market. Among the products on display were, Televisions (LCD, Plasma,CRT), Refrigerators, Washing Machines, Air Conditioners, Microwave Owens, Home theatre systems and optical players.

Presented below are some pictures.

Televisions:

In the LCD television segment, Samsung seems to have a wide range. The four ranges on display were  Sonoma Trenz, Bordeaux Art, Mosel Blaque and HD Plasma. (In increasing order of price; Sonoma Trenz being the cheapest.)

Typical Price Range:

Sonoma Trenz - Rs. 52,000/- (32″) , Rs. 85,000/- (40″) , Rs. 1,40,000/- (46″)

Bordeaux Art  - Rs. 21,000/- (19″) , Rs. 35,000/- (26″) , Rs. 57,000/- (32″) , Rs. 75,000/- (37″) , Rs. 95,000/- (40″) 

Mosel Blaque  - Rs. 1,20,000/- (40″) , Rs. 1,70,000/- (46″) , Rs. 3,00,000/- (52″)

Plasma TV      - Rs. 80,000/- (42″) , Rs. 90,000/- (42″) , Rs. 1,70,000/- (50″) , Rs. 4,50,000/- (63″) 

DVD Players/Home Theatres:

Refrigerators:

We found a couple of interesting things on refrigerators. The first of these is the ‘Energy Star’. ( which was covered earlier - Tips for lower emissions from homes - II ) The second of these is the ‘Stabiliser Free Operation’ (also earlier covered -  Appliances with built in voltage stabilizers )

Images of the two are shown below:

Washing Machines:

Featured washing machines included both front loading and top loading models.

Pictures of Air-Conditioners and Microwave Owens:

People interested in knowing model numbers and prices of Samsung products may put up queries on the forum. The number of models is too many to be covered as a part of this particular post.

* -Might have been the offer price. You may want to check the local prices yourself.

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Thought we’ll start out the year with some tips for better home maintenance from the environmental perspective. Given below are the pointers that we came across in the site climatecrisis.org. Clearly it is prepared with the US homes in mind, but some points are quite on target for other countries as well.

1. Cleaning a dirty air filter on your air conditioner can save 350 pounds of carbon dioxide a year.

2. Programmable thermostats will automatically lower the heat or air conditioning at night and raise them again in the morning. They can save you $100 a year on your energy bill.

3. You can save another 550 pounds per year by setting the thermostat no higher than 120 degrees Fahrenheit.

4. You can save 700 pounds of carbon dioxide when you air dry your clothes instead of using a dryer.

5. Even when turned off, things like hairdryers, cell phone chargers and televisions use energy. In fact, the energy used to keep display clocks lit and memory chips working accounts for 5 percent of total domestic energy consumption and spews 18 million tons of carbon into the atmosphere every year!

6. You can save 3,000 pounds of carbon dioxide every year if your new car gets only 3 miles per gallon more than your current one. You can get up to 60 miles per gallon with a hybrid!

7. You can save 100 pounds of carbon dioxide per year if you use your dishwasher only when the load is full.

8. It takes 70 to 90% less energy to make recycled paper and it prevents the loss of forests worldwide. So use recycled paper more.

9. Frozen food uses 10 times more energy to produce. So it is far better to use fresh food than the frozen ones.

10. If just 1% of car owners properly maintain their cars, nearly a billion pounds of carbon dioxide will be kept out of the atmosphere.
    

Psst.. Have a few more pointers with us. But saving that for another day.

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