Consumer electronics
[3][n 1] In the 2010s, this distinction is absent in large big box consumer electronics stores, which sell entertainment, communication and home office devices, light fixtures and appliances, including the bathroom type.
Stores also sell smart light fixtures and appliances, digital cameras, camcorders, mobile phones, and smartphones.
[6] For its first fifty years, the phonograph turntable did not use electronics; the needle and sound horn were purely mechanical technologies.
The vacuum tubes that had made radios practical were used with record players as well, to amplify the sound so that it could be played through a loudspeaker.
IC technology led to more advanced and cheaper consumer electronics, such as transistorized televisions, pocket calculators, and by the 1980s, affordable video game consoles and personal computers that regular middle-class families could buy.
Not including facilities in Korea, it has 24 manufacturing complexes, 40 distribution bases and 15 branches spread over all continents except Antarctica.
[10] The increase in popularity of such domestic appliances as 'white goods' is a characteristic element of consumption patterns during the golden age of the Western economy.
[11] Europe's White Goods industry has evolved over the past 40 years, first by changing tariff barriers, and later by technical and demand shifts.
Yet the sequence of electrical and mechanical durables have altered the activities and experiences of households in America and Britain in the twentieth century.
With the expansion of cookers, vacuum cleaners, refrigerators, washing machines, radios, televisions, air conditioning, and microwave ovens, households have gained an escalating number of appliances.
The high rate of technology evolution or revolution requires large investments without any guarantee of profitable returns.
Contemporary society uses all manner of electronic devices built-in automated or semi-automated factories operated by the industry.
Most consumer electronics are built in China, due to maintenance cost, availability of materials, quality, and speed as opposed to other countries such as the United States.
The event, which grew from having 100 exhibitors in its inaugural year to more than 4,500 exhibiting companies in its 2020 edition, features the latest in consumer electronics, speeches by industry experts and innovation awards.
In addition to telephony, digital mobile phones (2G) support a variety of other services, such as text messaging, MMS, email, Internet access, short-range wireless communications (infrared, Bluetooth), business applications, video games and digital photography.
They are distinguished from feature phones by their stronger hardware capabilities and extensive mobile operating systems, which facilitate wider software, internet (including web navigation over mobile broadband), and multimedia functionality (including music, video, cameras, and gaming), alongside core phone functions such as voice calls and text messaging.
Smartphones typically contain a number of MOSFET integrated circuit (IC) chips, include various sensors that can be leveraged by pre-included and third-party software (such as a magnetometer, proximity sensors, barometer, gyroscope, accelerometer and more), and support wireless communications protocols (such as Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, or satellite navigation).
In 2017, Greenpeace USA published a study of 17 of the world's leading consumer electronics companies about their energy and resource consumption and the use of chemicals.
These metals are also used in the renewable energy industry meaning that consumer electronics are directly competing for the raw materials.
[47][48] The energy consumption of consumer electronics and their environmental impact, either from their production processes or the disposal of the devices, is increasing steadily.
[51] A 2012 study in the United Kingdom, carried out by the Energy Saving Trust, found that the devices using the most power on standby mode included televisions, satellite boxes, and other video and audio equipment.
[52] A report from the International Energy Agency in 2014 found that $80 billion of power is wasted globally per year due to inefficiency of electronic devices.
[50] A high number of different metals and low concentration rates in electronics means that recycling is limited and energy intensive.
These include people's mistrust of used equipment in terms of whether it will be functional, safe and the stigma for some of owning second-hand goods.
But the benefits of reuse could allow lower-income households access to previously unaffordable technology while helping the environment at the same time.
[56] Desktop monitors and laptops produce major physical health concerns for humans when bodies are forced into unhealthy and uncomfortable positions to see the screen better.
Sleeping less prevents people from performing to their full potential physically and mentally and can also "increase rates of obesity and diabetes", which are "long-term health consequences".
"People who frequently use their thumbs to type text messages on cell phones can develop a painful affliction called De Quervain syndrome that affects their tendons on their hands.
The best-known disease in this category is called carpal tunnel syndrome, which results from pressure on the median nerve in the wrist".
