Are there real people at RCA?

[EC8010]

I've tried to contact RCA using their (remarkably unfriendly) website. If you root around for long enough, there is a "contact us" section. It took a lot of bludgeoning before their system would accept my input. Finally, I received two standard messages both written by computer, one asking for more details. I replied, adding the details that had been rejected in the first communication (they had a limit of 500 characters which tripped way before that limit). I then received a third standard (and completely irrelevent) message.

My question is:

Does anybody know how to contact real people at RCA who can answer technical questions? Failing that, I'll simply settle for a real person.

[kelticwizard]

Neither one of these contacts are likely to yield anyone directly who can answer technical questions. But they are associated with RCA, and can possibly give you the way to talk to someone in Engineering.

First, the parent company of RCA, which is Thomson Group. Here is their contact phone number:
http://www.thomsoncommercial.com/contact.asp


RCA is traditionally associated with Manhattan. Here is the phone number for the New York Distributor. Again, they might at least be able to give you the way to get a tech question answered. It is the same number and address as RCA records, so at least you know you are dealing with some direct descendent of the company known as RCA.

RCA Distributing Corp Of New York
1133 Avenue Americas
New York, NY 10036
(212) 930-4488

You would be surpirsed at how helpful real people can be if you can find a way to contact them.

Good luck.

[EC8010]

Originally posted by kelticwizard
You would be surprised at how helpful real people can be if you can find a way to contact them.

Exactly. Thanks for the help, I will try those, and with a bit of luck, I will get somebody who can't help me themself, but knows somebody who might be able to...

[fdegrove]

Hi,

Thanks for the help, I will try those, and with a bit of luck, I will get somebody who can't help me themself, but knows somebody who might be able to...

In France they'd call that "le caroussel" which would be the "Mary go around" in frenglish, I think...

Shut doors like this often do open once you've become a big $ customer...

If Thomson really has taken over RCA you're really into frogland which doesn't bode too well as far as archives go...gosh...

Cheers,

[kelticwizard]

EC8010:

Just for curiosity's sake, how did you make out on this? Did you actually come into contact with someone who can answer your question?

[EC8010]

I failed miserably at RCA. However, other friends not only moved the body, but arranged the funeral...

Just as well I didn't need to rely on RCA.

[kelticwizard]

(Sigh) I was afraid that would be the case.

Just for the heck of it, was the tech question about tubes?

No way to get info about a product the company makes, or used to make. Am I the only one who gets the uncomfortable feeling that the ways of the world are shifting, and I am unable to keep up with them?

[fdegrove]

Hi,

No way to get info about a product the company makes, or used to make. Am I the only one who gets the uncomfortable feeling that the ways of the world are shifting, and I am unable to keep up with them?

Nope...same feeling here and same feeling form a lot of my buddies...

It just ain't what it used to be, KW.

Sad, very sad...brace yourself.

Cheers,

[kelticwizard]

Frank:

About ten years ago or more, I was talking to a tech who worked on a friend's Phase Linear. I don't know if they had them in Europe, but over here these were the huge super amps of the seventies that caused quite a splash.

The company was bought by Jensen. Okay, not really a hifi manufacturer anymore, but with a proud lineage anyhow.

The tech said that he was unable to get any parts, blueprints, or anything whatsoever out of the Jensen owned Phase Linear company. Not even a knob. Nothing.

Okay, it is obvious that Jensen bought the company for the name recognition. Jensen could easily have called their car amps Jensen amps, but putting the name Phase Linear shows a connection to some legendary amplifiers.

But if Jensen valued the name and tradition of Phase Linear-and why else would they buy the company?-then why not keep a few things on hand, like blueprints and few parts, just to maintain the connection? How hard can it be to devote part of a file cabinet to old Phase Linear blueprints, or to devote part of a shelf in a vast warehouse to Phase linear parts?

On the one hand Jensen is trying to tell the public that they have a direct inheritance to a classic brand, then they turn around and deliberately try to obliterate any real connection to that brand's products. It seems counter productive.

[EC8010]

Originally posted by kelticwizard
(Sigh) I was afraid that would be the case.

Just for the heck of it, was the tech question about tubes?

Yes, indeed. I was after an internal RCA publication on valve design/manufacture. Fortuitously, Frank's excellent site: tubedata.org has just hosted the material I was looking for.