if I played guitar, you' be my repair shop 🙂

Exacttly. People enjoy not being screwed around with. Seems like an almost forgotten art these days.

And now that I got to the end, sometimes it's not the simple things lol

What he said...

Harrow!!! We would have frequented the same shops in the 90s😂

Is that type of charger common or standard in the UK? I've never seen that before until this video, so if it's not common or someone new to the UK they most likely genuinely didn't know

We called them Tandy. I remember going into Tandy stores.

Yeah I think it was genuinely ignorance, it's unlikely they work on commission or get a kickback from selling him a new charger. In the US and EU no such extendable ground prong design exists

Very interesting, cheers for sharing your knowledge 👍 👍👍

Here in Australia, it was mandated over a decade ago, that manufacturers and importers are required to pay towards the recycling of electronics that they make / import. Lots of drop-off locations depending on what the item is (Computer, TV, etc...), just requires people to actually go to the effort of taking it to one of those places (Most people live within 10-15min drive of one). One thing I really wish our councils would do, is add 'Electronic Waste pickup' to the list of services they provide once a year. My local council provides twice-yearly greenwaste collection, and once-yearly hardwaste collection.

@@ray73864 Yes well i'm in oz too, but not all of us have or can afford a car.

@@EmeraldHill-vo1cs Especially when you consider how much electronic waste is produced by teens too young to drive. I'm actually working with my city councillor to find a way to get recycling drop-offs in electronics shops.

Agreed.

It's because of cases like this that high street shops are dying.

Better than in the fire.

I mean, I agree, unless the lady was a temp or it was a job to get some vacation money. It depends on the circumstances just how close to the fire she belongs 😂

Cultural enrichment.

Hah, yeah, more "recycling theater". Where I live the government goes through your trash to see if you are recycling enough and scolds you. But then what is the recycling bin? Single stream, and glass gets thrown away. The most useless type of recycling, it just ends up being dumped in some country in SE Asia because it is way too expensive to sort even with cheap labor. Repair and reuse is the best way, most recycling is just an excuse for people to overconsume.

Every phone charger in the UK, apple, samsung being the most common, use these. This feature is a standard trick used to make a more compact charger for compact packaging or travel reasons. Anyone working in a shop that sells phone chargers will have seen loads of these. Anyone using an Apple phone or a Samsung phone or other makes will have gotten these in the box. Anyone working in a tech shop should have the IQ to simply figure it out because it's blatently obvious the earth pin is too low and moves. Having no clue on how a common charger works, in a shop that sells them every day, is like having someone work in a shop selling AA batteries yet having no clue how to put them into a toy and having no ability to figure it out.

As someone who lives in the US and has spent a considerable amount of time in mainland Europe this is the first time I've ever seen a charger with an extendable ground prong, usually there is no ground prong on these at all

Yeah, it's just three normal nicd cells welded together and shrinkwrapped though.

We had loads of those too but as DECT phones moved on they just started using standard cells. I remember seeing the NIMH packs like you describe in non DECT analogue cordless phones, I suspect a few of those old analogue ones might still be in use. They were about 15 -20 years ago or so as I used to pick them up on my scanner and that was quite a while after they stopped generally making them. I used to sell these things in Staples back all those years ago so remember the "transition" they made to DECT everything. These days you find similar packs in RC stuff.

UK plug sockets are designed to be extremely safe. The earth pin must be present otherwise it is physically impossible to plug anything into the socket. The live and neutral pins can not enter without the earth pin inserted as that pin is used to open the shutters. The idea is that the first connection made is to earth. If you look at the live and neutral pins you will see they also have insulation bands. This also means that by the time electrical contact has been made inside the socket there is no chance of any electrical connection to that can be made so something like a knife touching the pins. The earth pin is all metal, the knife can only make electrical connection to earth which is fine. Older plugs or fake ones dont have the insulation bands so will cause a danger of someone killing themselves, unless they happen to touch the earth pin too, which is why that is always all metal (when that pin is needed). In this case the earth pin is plastic as the device does not actually need it. However without it is correctly impossible to make a connection. Unless you have a broken socket that is!

There are petrol stations where you have to pump manually? I thought they were all electric. I've not seen such a thing.

I thought Uniross was gone! And yes, that is their 80s/90s design but I hoped they had brought it back like Cadbury brought Wispa back. They are old cells but if they still hold a charge they should work for years. (Just googles, Uniross is a name still applied to rechargables if you shop online you will see them. But certainly that is a very nicely retro packaging design)

I was hoping that Uniross was back and they had brought out a new line with retro packaging! I was really getting excited lol

Plenty of companies still sell them here in Australia. Officeworks, JBHifi, TheGoodGuys, BigW, Harvey Norman, etc... I got my Panasonic DECT phone set a couple of years ago from Harvey Norman. All you need is an ATA (Such as a Cisco one), or, if you are with an RSP that supplies their own modem/router, they generally have an ATA built-in that you plug a phone into.

@@ray73864 I get that you can buy them. What I said was I hadn't seen one used in years. I just wonder what the use case scenario is for a landline when nobody is ever more than a metre from their mobile at any given time?

The UK uses a VOIP system, the last leg to the houses is either: 1. VOIP provided by the router (an ATA). Your standard analogue phones will plug into the router and instantly become VOIP phones. All your extensions in the house can do so too. Almost any phone that uses tones for dialing is compatible. Pulse dialing phones may not be but they will work for answering. Phones with glorious bells in them may work if not you can get a booster that will get the bell ringing! 2. The last leg is still copper and the ISP/line provider has not enabled your VOIP functions on the router yet and asked you to plug your phone lines into the router. I'm at number 2. My router has RJ11 sockets for analogue phones but I'm not on that yet, at some point Virgin (the ISP) will turn off the dedicated phone link and ask me to plug my phones into the router. But behind the scenes the UK phone network is almost entirely digital. I recently had an issue with my phone line, no calls and a noisy line. Called up Virgin who fixed it using software their end. They just moved me onto another circuit, took all of 5 mins of basic tests. As for the reason I still use a landline? Well its a great way to contact companies or sign up to things! I'm at work out of the house most of each day so as those companies sell my house number they can cold call the answer phone, on which they never leave a message. Thus my mobile remains cold call free! They also sound WAY better than a mobile, especially if it is a landline on the other end too. They are also cheap and work during a power cut (well line powered phones do, which I have). However when everyone plugs them into the routers for the "VOIP upgrade" the router will need a backup power source for any chance of working during a power cut. How that *requirement* has been handled by BT etc annoys me but its there. When I call friends and family I usually use the mobile, it annoys me though. If I want to know if someone is in that house so I can deliver the xmas presents I'd rather RING THE HOUSE and not have to call everyone who may or may not be in the house :D. When I call businesses I use the landline unless I really must give them my mobile number because I want them to call me even when at work. I also like them better than my mobile. I work in IT and I like having ways to avoid glowing computer screens and certainly touchscreens as much a possible because they tend to annoy me.

@@dlarge6502 We use VoIP here in Australia too, have done for a few years now since our National Broadband Network Company was created by the federal government.

I really fail to understand that argument. Maybe she runs a phone shop from the 90's? The Uniross batteries came from the early 90's.

My decades old DECT phones take NiCAD and NiMH. Those GP batteries are likely rechargeable NiMH, and the Uniross ones are probably ancient NiCAD. I haven't seen them since the 90's. I have had Panasonic eneloop's in my handsets for at least 5 years. You can get the Ikea version for cheaper.

Rechargable batteries use alkaline electrolyte, the same electrolyte as non-rechargable types (besides Zinc chloride ones which are acidic). Thus when they leak which is rare, its the same crap that vinegar cleans off so well.

@@TD75 NiMH is alkaline, same leakage as non-rechargables.

@@dlarge6502 I did not know that the electrolyte in rechargeable batteries, thanks for the information 👍

Yeah..im pretty sure they should be rechargeable batteries in there

It charges the ni-mh AAA cells. Usually a constant trickle charge, which eventually after many years will totally kill the batteries so its a good idea to let them drain a bit from time to time and not leave the phone in the dock. Even my new BT DECT handsets dont intelligently stop charging the cells when they are full.

@@dlarge6502 Yup..we get that.. but do they look like ni-mh AAA cells in the video..?