Lights of America LED bulbs 2025LEDE12-65k claim 40 watt bulb equivalent and 30,000 hr life. Real world says 25 watts equivalent and maybe 1,000 hrs. Do not buy this junk.

Browsing through Walmart here in Toronto, Canada, I stumbled upon some LED light bulbs on sale. From a company named “Lights of America”, they have a smaller base for use in a chandelier. Regularly $5.50CAD, they were going for $2.00CAD. Labeled “Made in China”, I hesitated. I could buy them, research them, and if necessary, return them if I was not happy. The results of research were that these LED light bulbs are junk and should be returned. They not only do not live up to brightness claims, but also only last a max of 1,000 of their claimed 30,000 hours of use.

My experience is that light bulbs made in China do not last long, especially the compact florescent ones. LED is a new technology, giving off no heat and is safe to dispose. They also last much longer than CFs. These comparisons, however, assume the bulbs are properly made.

It did not take a long search on Google, after fishing through all the web sites that sell these bulbs, to find some very negative reviews. Intriguingly, the company “Lights of America” was being charged by the US Federal Trade Commission, for fraudulent claims. Their claim that their 1.5 watt bulbs are as bright as a 40 watt incandescent is in dispute. Light output is closer to a 25 watt bulb than 40. More critically, their supposed bulb life of 30,000 hours has been tested to yield an actual figure of no more than 1,000 hours.

In the FTC’s original complaint against Lights of America, Inc. and its two principals, filed in September 2010, the agency charged that since 2008, Lights of America has overstated the light output and life expectancy of its LED bulbs. The agency also charged that Lights of America misled consumers about how the brightness of its LED bulbs compares to traditional incandescent lights.

At the court’s direction, the FTC’s amended complaint details where and when the challenged claims were made, and alleges that specific testing contradicts many of the defendants’ claims. For example, defendants claimed that certain bulbs lasted 30,000 hours, but U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) testing found that they lost as much as 90 percent of their output after only 1,000 hours. The amended complaint also alleges additional facts to show that the individual defendants controlled the company and knew, or should have known, about the practices the FTC is challenging.

Here is the original FTC charge:

The FTC alleges that in many instances, Lights of America’s LED bulbs produced significantly less light, as measured in lumens, than the company claimed in its promotional materials. For example, one bulb was promoted as producing 90 lumens of light output, but Lights of America’s own tests showed it produced only 43 lumens.

Also, in many cases, Lights of America deceptively compared the brightness of its LED light bulbs with incandescent bulbs, the FTC alleges. For example, the firm claimed that one of its LED lantern bulbs could replace a 40-watt incandescent bulb. However, while the typical 40-watt incandescent bulb produces about 400 lumens, the Lights of America LED bulb produced only 74 lumens.

Moreover, the FTC complaint states that in many instances, Lights of America’s LED bulbs would not last as long as the company’s promotional materials said they would. In one case, for example, the firm said that one of its LED recessed bulbs would last 30,000 hours. Independent tests, however, showed that the bulb would not last as long as claimed because it lost 80 percent of its light output after only 1,000 hours.

While I find the use of LEDs very compelling, it is difficult to justify the price of $2.00CAD for the bulb. LEDs are in general expensive to buy, and therefore LED bulbs reflect this. These LED light bulbs use 20 LEDs, which means each LED costs about $0.10CAD each. This is by far much cheaper than buying good quality LEDs individually.

Overwhelmingly the reviews of Light of America LED bulbs is terrible. Junk. The nerds at CandlePowerForums support their junk claim with some meaningful numbers. I do trust that they know what they are doing. PhysicsForums says much the same. Several people have received recall notices from Costco offering refunds. Walmart will only refund bulbs that are not already burned out. The two year warranty from LoA requires you to pay for postage back to California, which is more expensive than the actual bulb. The LoA warranty is bogus.

The Lights of America web site does not even mention these chandelier lights, even though they are sold throughout the US and Canada. The packaging also does not mention lumen ratings. It is all very sneaky and I do not want any part of it. Their web site also makes no mention of their legal troubles with the Federal Trade Commission. Nor is there any resolution or steps taken to help customers.

I am very disappointed in the 40 w equiv. 1.5 Watt LED bulbs I got from Walmart. They put out very little light. More like a 15 watt standard bulb. No where NEAR a 40 watt like they claim.

First off, they last about a month before going out. Walmart was ok about taking those back since I kept the packing and receipt but the ones that failed after 95 days they wouldn’t accept even though the package says if the bulb fails within 2 years take it back to the retailer OR send it back to lights of america. Well, Walmart says the packing can say that but it doesn’t fall within their return policy so they won’t take them back. If you try to get lights of America to replace them the will charge you in shipping the amount of a new bulb so is that really under warranty if they are ripping you like that? After buying 8 bulbs, 7 are already out. 2 of those failed after only an hours use or less (turning on the light about 3 to 4 times at most). I know LED will be the way to go in the future but right now, they don’t put out enough light and don’t last very long due to the manufacturing process. Lights of America should be ashamed. They really have a gimmick going with their 2 year return policy. It is far cheaper and better on the environment using standard bulbs until they get this technology down a little better. Bulbs that last a few clicks of the light switch fill up a land fill faster than the 100 year old bulb technology that last 2 or 3 years

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Given all the terrible reviews of dim light and short bulb life I think the best thing is to return them and get GE CFs. In the future LED technology will improve and prices will go down. Today you simply buy LED junk.

Sure there are many excellent Chinese made products, but they are drowned out by an ocean of cheap quality junk. It irks me madly when I use a product for a short period of time, only to have it break. Usually the product experiences regular wear and tear use, not abuse. When I take it apart to try to fix it, I often find critical components are made of cheap plastic. These components are hidden from the consumer, who only finds out when it breaks for no good reason. These products are giving China a bad name. Such is the case of a paper shredder kindly given to us by a neighbour. Premature breakage of products is a waste of natural resources, cheats consumers and is plain and simple bad for the environment. I hate it.

My neighbour was kind enough to give me her paper shredder. This one was a no brand name, no factory name, Made in China, model number WMC6X. It is slow and could only shred 6 pages at a time, which is Ok for our family. She bought a faster and more expensive model. The Little Weed and I started shredding paper. After a couple minutes the shredder would heat up and shut down. Once cooled down it would resume working. A couple of days goes by and while shredding we hear a thunk and the shredding mechanism refuses to move while the motor is running. I begin to take it apart to find out if the shredder had slipped a belt or something else, such as a paper jam.

What I found was disappointing. The motor’s main axle was connected to the shredder’s transmission and subsequently to the shredding teeth. The shredder’s transmission was completely made of cheap plastic gears. The reason the shredder stopped working was because the first gear directly connected to the motor had destroyed itself, thereby decoupling the motor drive from the rest of the transmission. The shredder was therefore irreparable.

The shredding teeth mechanism was made of metal and was in pristine condition. Who was the smart one that decided the transmission gears should be made of cheap plastic?

All I could think of is what a waste of natural resources. We spend the resources to make this product, ship it across from China to Canada, only to have it fail prematurely due to a couple of cheaply made plastic gears? Now we need to dispose of it? By this method we will pillage Mother Nature and Mother Earth very quickly, short changing our children and grandchildren. Who is the winner here?

Chinese made paper shredder, no brand name nor factory, model number WMC6X, irreparable because of this cheaply made plastic gear. While there were many metal parts in this paper shredder, the gears driving these metal parts are plastic? Who decided this? What a waste of resources, not to mention cheating the consumer. Photo 3x macro.

I am unsure who to blame. Do we, as North American consumers demand and therefore receive products as the cheapest price possible, even if it quickly breaks? Are these paper shredders designed by North American engineers to a price point, rather than a quality standard? Do we blame the Chinese factory for skimping on quality in order to maximize their profit? Either way, these shoddily made products are a waste of money for consumers and a waste of natural resources for the whole Earth. We need to work better and smarter if we want to have a future as bright as our past.

I have traced the model number of this shredder down to the Aurora Office Equipment Company Shanghai, SHANGHAI, E237840, 388 JIANXIN RD, JIADING DISTRICT, 200000 SHANGHAI, CHINA. Please do not buy their products, as they are badly made. Apparently Ace Hardware carries them under the Aurora brand name. This company is connected to the Aurora Group of Taiwan.

I had just parked my car, right in front of the road across from the NoFrills entrance and heard a cry out. Twenty feet from me an older Italian lady had just fallen and was laying down on the road in front of NoFrills. She was face up, lying on her back. Her left leg was outstretched and straight, right leg was bent at the knee , right foot flat on the ground. Her white purse was partially underneath her left leg and partially in between her legs. I did not see her fall, though I was first to get to her. There was a bit of blood on the ground and all over her hand. She was bleeding but not profusely. She wore a black sweater, top, pants and shoes. He wore a beige jacket, which had some blood on the front shoulder, presumably transferred from touching his wife’s hand.

The weather was clear, blue sky with a slight 15km wind. Visibility was very clear. There were no obstructions nor tripping hazards on the roadway. The roadway was clear of vehicular traffic.

I asked her if she needed help and she said “Yes”. She had just fallen, she had cut her hand and thought her finger was broken. There was an avulsion on her middle finger, palmar side, left hand about one cm in diameter. She wore a gold wedding band on her left hand, on her fourth finger. I saw no other cuts, but did not clean up her hand nor did I explore further. We did not move her. Her husband, hovering over her, could not get her up and was very distraught. They were speaking Italian, so I do not know what they were saying. Eventually others came to out assistance. Someone immediately called 911. I asked for and received some tissue, which I put on her hand to soak up the blood. Someone gave me three plastic bags, which I put under her head. I asked her if she felt pain anywhere else and she said “No”. She was breathing well and was moving her legs and arms. We all asked her to lie still and not move. She was worried that she would hurt her knees, as she had had a couple of knee surgeries within the last couple of years. The last knee surgery was one year ago.

The lady lay right beside the speed bump, with her left for almost touching the speed bump, body diagonally away from the speed bump, like the base of a italicized “T”. It is possible that she tripped on the speed bump and fell down. The speed bump, from my view, was in good repair, had no obvious tripping hazards on its edges and was properly painted in bright yellow. This gave it high colour contrast against the dark grey pavement. However I did not see her fall so I cannot say for certain that she tripped on the speed bump.

There was not much else we could do but wait for EMS. Others arrived, held her hand and calmed her down. The Chinese lady that called 911 had gone into NoFrills and bought some absorbent cloth in order to soak up the blood. I worked on the husband, trying to calm him down and asked him to be strong for her. He eventually collected himself up.

We were about 10 people in the middle of the road within Agincourt Mall. I was wary, as my expectations of Scarborough drivers is very low. As we were blocking a complete lane, I was expecting someone to run us over. Thankfully this did not happen. I had to remind a couple of bystanders to stay out of the other lane because cars were driving through. Maybe I underestimate the ability of Scarborough drivers?

As the lady and her husband conversed in Italian and as we gave assistance the best we could, it became apparent that language was not an issue. That their English ability was low was not a factor in getting help from strangers. This is a testament to the people of Scarborough.

The husband was overcome with grief. It took many minutes for him to collect himself. It was obvious that he loved her very much and did not know what to do to help her. This was touching to me. After he collected himself he went back to his car and got a box of tissue.

With our help the couple calmed down. The lady’s breathing rate had dropped to more normal and she was speaking more calmly. The husband was also much calmer and stood by while we all waited together for the arrival of the ambulance.

I am not surprised that strangers came to the assistance of this couple. This is what is expected here in Canada and what happened today. Still, it is heartening to see this happen in real life, and does reaffirm the goodness of society in general. If you were this lady, or if this lady was your Mom, you would want this kind of help from strangers.

While there was blood involved, no one touched any blood. The lady was assessed for life threatening conditions. The scene was secured. An emergency 911 call was completed, with a description of place, patient and condition. There was calm all round. Nick, the manager of NoFrills and two other male employees came out to take a look. A female Nofrills employee came back with a couple of pairs of latex gloves, which some of the more experienced bystanders used. These ladies turned out to be nurses from the emergency department of, presumably, Scarborough Grace Hospital, which is 2 km away. Eventually an ambulance came with two from EMS. They were gentle with her, took about 15 minutes and then drove away.

As far as I could see, the lady had no other injuries. She should be able to recover without issue. I wish her well. For all the other people that helped out today, good on you for helping a lady in need. Your karma has been fortified today! Emeitofu.

Crest toothpaste. From $2.37CAD at Walmart down to $0.75CAD, saving 68.35% off retail

Extreme Couponing is a TV series on Discovery Channel that follows the trips of people who can buy $1,000 of products but reduce their total cost to $50 through the use of manufacturer coupons. Extreme they are, organized as well as driven by a personal urge to save. Many came from experiences where they had nothing or were about to file for bankruptcy. Here in Canada their tactics do not work the same, so I set out to find the best strategy for couponing in Toronto, Canada. My example is the purchase of Crest toothpaste, 130mg, discounted 68.35%. I cannot come close to the 95% discount of the Americans, but will keep trying.

Price Chopper, a local grocery chain, advertised Crest toothpaste, 130mg at 2 for $3.00CAD. Both Walmart and my local NoFrills will match a competitor’s price. I had never price matched at Walmart, so decided to try it. Sure enough they said they would. In addition, from a coupon booklet that came in the newspaper, I found two coupons for $0.75/each discount off any Crest toothpaste. Walmart also took these. The total cost after price matching and coupon was $0.75/each.

The savings look spectacular but save the applause. Instead of the Crest brand I could have purchased the very comparable Colgate toothpaste 130mg for $1.27/each. My family considers these two brands equivalent. The savings rate of 68% off retail now drops to 41% of retail. It is still impressive, considering the low margins on grocery and daily use items.

Specific American retail marketing promotions make extreme couponing possible. The first is that certain grocery stores double or triple coupon values at specific promotions. If you can combine an in-store special with triple coupon values, this can save you a lot of money. Also the coupons I have received limit the number of coupons you can use during one trip to only 4. Americans seem to have no limit on the number of coupons they can use in a trip. Americans can subscribe to Groupon and other web sites, pay a nominal fee and receive hundreds of coupons, which when used together with an in-store sale as well as triple coupon values, you can rack up substantial savings. This is not possible here in Canada.

Here in Canada we do not have stores that double or triple coupon values. We also have coupon limits of 4 per visit. This greatly reduces the possibility of huge discounts. Still, I will keep looking.

The other psychologically interesting thing about extreme couponers is their similarity to hoarders. Hoarders have a need to buy and keep but not use products. Extreme couponers are meticulously organized and exact in their strategy. They plan their purchases to maximize their gains by finding out when the store will have the most stock, which cashier is best (male cashiers seem to better handle extreme couponing), and how much they will eventually have to pay.

I wonder if extreme couponers are purchasing products they will actually use, or will all their products eventually go to waste. Some donate their products to a local charity, which is great. Products that you purchase on sale but do not use will eventually spoil and go to waste. There is no savings to be had if you buy a product you do not use. Maybe extreme couponing is a competitive sport where the objective is to beat the stores and manufacturers but does not cost very much to play. If this is their hobby, then I am very supportive.

Extreme couponing just is not as attractive here in Canada. Correct me if I have missed something.

Links:
-Extreme Couponing Isn’t as Extreme in Canada
-The Truth About Coupon Stacking in Canada
-London Drugs and Coupon Stacking

Which Toronto Chinatown is better? Uptown or Downtown? I test both.

It is rare for me to visit Toronto’s downtown Chinatown because I live in North-East Toronto, where we have the highest concentration of Mainland Chinese in Toronto. Today we went to MEC.ca (Mountain Equipment Co-op) for cycling gear, so stopped and had lunch in Chinatown at Spadina and Dundas. Having not been there for many years, it was interesting.

Firstly I was amazed at the diversity of people in the Downtown Chinatown. People of all nationalities walk around, shop and eat, just like local Chinese, because they, unsurprisingly are local Torontonians. We saw a wide variety of people visit Chinese bakeries, shop at Chinese grocery stores as well as small “Carry Everything Chinese” variety stores. Initially this was surprising to me, but then again we are in Toronto, where diversity is commonplace and we all get along.

Uptown at places like Pacific Mall (Kennedy/Steeles), and more so at local strip malls and stores, Asianness is the rule. You might see the odd Caucasian or non-Asian individual perusing merchandise, but more likely they are employed at the mall as maintenance workers. Non-Asians in malls uptown truly stand out. Upon reflection, this seems quite odd for multicultural Toronto. More so is the fact that North East Toronto also has a large contingent of Indians and Pakistanis, who are not commonly seen in Chinese stores. The corollary is also true. While I frequently visit Indian grocery stores and restaurants, there are usually no other Chinese besides myself. Though it does not cause me any discomfort nor hesitation, it is notable. People Diversity level: Downtown is better

We visited a local Chinese barbeque restaurant downtown for some roasted duck and roast pork on rice. Though it was nice, it was not over and above the quality I can find uptown. Prices are also not as cheap as in the past. I actually think we can get the same meal for less uptown, but I am a local. I am not complaining, because Chinese food quality here in Toronto is universally pretty good. Barring the occasional health inspection failures that occur both uptown and downtown, visitors to Toronto expect and receive excellent and authentic Chinese food. Restaurant Food Quality and Price: draw

We passed by numerous local grocery stores while in the Downtown Chinatown. A usual quick glance at prices of produce as well as comments from the spouse yielded the same conclusion: Prices both downtown and uptown are about the same. Each store might have their loss leaders, but overall, prices are the same. We cherry picked. Downtown may have a slight advantage in freshness, but this arguable. Uptown stores do not display produce outside and therefore may be incrementally cleaner. Grocery Produce Pricing: even

I am not a neat freak and generally expect low hygene standards in any Chinatown worldwide. Still, downtown Chinatown is noticeably dirtier than uptown. I am unsure why. There is more visible garbage in the streets and a unique rotting smell of grocery produce and Chinatownness. This smell was even noticed by my first weed. Uptown Chinatown is newer, but can also run down pretty quickly. I am sure that it is not because uptown Chinese are any cleaner. Street Cleanliness: Uptown is cleaner

Parking downtown is notoriously difficult, and today was no exception. Chinatown was, as usual, lacking in parking. Uptown there is so much space that parking is rarely an issue. Parking: Uptown is better

My friend David rides a bicycle to buy his groceries from a downtown Chinatown. It is easier to ride a bicycle downtown because streets are more crowded and therefore the speed of cars is slower. There are more Chinese grocers crowded together in higher concentrations downtown. While you can bicycle ride uptown, you risk getting run over by local drivers. Also uptown Chinese grocers tend to be larger and more like supermarkets. You ride to one and do all your shopping, which may not allow you to get the best selection. Shopping by Bicycle: Downtown is better

Yes, there is more to life than Chinatown. Apart from Chinatown, downtown has much more diversity of stores and events that uptown cannot match. Uptown you really need to search for specific stores and then plan to visit them. Downtown can be more exploratory. Other things to do: Downtown wins

The importance of speaking Chinese in a downtown store is less of an issue. At stores uptown, it is very advantageous to speak Chinese. Chinese is the default language uptown, while downtown it can be either English or Chinese. I suppose this is a secondary effect of downtown’s diversity and a real help to those who do not speak Chinese. Predominance of Chinese language: Uptown defaults to Chinese

Suffice to say that visits to either Downtown or Uptown Chinatowns will give you an authentic and interesting experience. Downtown Chinatown is walkable, while uptown Chinatown is cleaner. To judge which one is best I cannot say. Visit both and tell me what you think.

My friend bought this guitar and, due to lack of time, gave it to me. This acoustic guitar is a low end “Made in China” acoustic dreadnought, purchased here in Toronto, Canada. For the low price of $60CAD, this guitar is surprisingly high quality. It says in tune, sounds very good, is well finished and looks great. The neck is straight and intonation perfect. The action is high but can be somewhat lowered. I do hate the “Rocker” brand name. Whomever chose this name should be shot.

If you search for Rocker guitars on the internet you will find little information, even from the manufacturer. The full name of the company is “Rocker Music Tools”. The name “Rocker” is lame, as is the addition of “Music Tools”. Someone in China should be a little more creative. Rocker is imported into Canada by Audio One in Bolton, who also distributes Crate and Ampeg gear. The Rocker website is scarce on information but states the Rocker RA-200 has a spruce top, and rosewood fingerboard and bridge. I have no idea what wood they used for the body sides and back, and neck. I guess at this price point they don’t care, but I would like to know. All I can say is it is “brown wood”. How is that for specific technical information?

My friend purchased this guitar new for $60CAD from a no name music importer in Mississauga, suckered in on a supposed 50% off sale. They were lieing. The guitar comes wrapped in thin foam, encased in a cardboard box. An allen key for the truss rod was included.

Overall you can see that this guitar is not meant to compete with the higher end Epis and Fenders. The neck is thin, straight, feels smooth and is easy to play. The dreadnought size is a little large for me but acceptable. The guitar sounds pretty good and stays in tune. The wood is finished nicely with no defects, and shines up well. It is overall a nice looking guitar. The tuners do their job of keeping the guitar in tune. The intonation was checked with an electronic tuner and was perfect. The action was high and needed to be lowered.

Putting a capo on the first fret and pressing down on the 13th fret, height at the 6th fret was similar to the width of the high E, or 0.010″, so no change was required to the truss rod.

The frets are not jumbo and are skinny, forcing you to use extra hand force to get a note without buzzing, something quickly frowned upon my by eldest little weed. Still, she has gotten used to it. The ends of the frets are sharp and need sanding down. When running your hand up and down the neck you might scratch yourself. Varnish on the upper part of the fretboard, near the12th fret markers is prematurely chipping off, but is not sharp. The varnish is still wearing away. I know not why, because this is a brand new guitar with very little play time.

Rocker RA-200 dreadnought acoustic guitar, Made in China, surprisingly good quality

Rocker RA-200 acoustic guitar. Made in China. Soundhole rosette, macro 2.8x

The soundhole rosette is pleasant but not excellent quality. Looking at the macro photo the quality seems worse than in person. I like the blue colour of the rosette, as it reminds me of JingdeZhen Chinese pottery and tableware. The dentile is a nice design, but there are some quality issues that are evident.

At first glance the “Rocker Musical Tools” logo on the headstock looks like inlaid Mother of Pearl, but this is untrue. With some clever Chinese trickery and a high tech pattern that looks like a hollogram, the label can deceive the eye. No doubt it is a sticker of some kind, but nicely done and then varnished. One cannot feel the logo on the headstock. It does reflect light in a similar way to Mother of Pearl.

Rocker RA-200 acoustic guitar. Made in China. Logo is a high tech reflective material that looks like a hollogram. Definately not Mother of Pearl, but could trick you. Macro 2.8x

The action on the RA-200 was high enough to give me a hand cramp when playing a song of predominantly bar chords. The big weed also complained. I loosened the strings and removed the plastic bridge. The bridge was sanded down until the action was lowered. This did not take much time. Note that the bridge is not flat on the bottom and sanding it flat will quickly reduce the bridge height, so do this carefully. Action before sanding: Low E = 0.197″, high E = 0.164″. Action after lowering: Low E = 0.163″, high E = 0.135″, measured with a vernier caliper and a magnifying glass. There is a tiny bit of excess buzzing on the high E, 12th and 13th fret, so the action cannot be lowered any further.

The strings included were acceptable, though when I was lowering the action the high E broke as I was tuning it with my electronic tuner. For a new guitar this should not happen.

When your guitar costs less than the hard shell case that protects it, you cannot complain too much. The Rocker RA-200 plays well, sounds good and looks good. It is worth $60CAD but cannot be compared to the more famous name brands. Still, I would rather play the Rocker than some of the ultra low priced “Made in China” Epiphones and other name brands. These days, brand name alone is usually not indicative of high quality. Buyer beware.

Rocker RA-200 acoustic guitar. Made in China. Label in the sound hole.

Here in Canada, your average citizen cannot buy a gun. Guns are restricted to police and gun club members, who need to be registered. Guns are either stolen from gun collectors, or are smuggled in from the US in exchange for drugs. Gangs use guns to terrorize the public or other competing gangs.

Chung Hing is our local Chinese grocer. They have 6 cashiers. On a typical Sunday afternoon they would have three open. While it would not be crowded, it would be busy. In the past there has been trouble with black thieves armed with guns in the same plaza. Surprising this is not, but brazen it was. Chung Hing is not a high value target. They do have close circuit surveillance cameras that surround the store as well as show inside the store.

No one was hurt, so there will be no mention about this in the news. Still, many, including my family, are traumatized. Such brazen acts to hurt others breed ill will against the local black community, and with good reason. We continue to be wary and we have good reason. These gangs need to be stopped and thrown into jail.

Neilson Dairy in Canada will discontinue yogurt production. Damn.

Why I cannot say, but Neilson Dairy‘s yogurt here in Canada is being discontinued. I know this because I have been trying to find their yogurt for about a week now and there is none to be had. Today I called Neilson’s toll free line (1-800-672-8866) and was told the yogurt line has been discontinued. No reason stated. No alternative product suggested.

I only see the consumer end of the product, but this yogurt was never on sale and was in high demand. We buy 8 of the 175g Fat Free yogurt containers at once, because they sell out quickly. If you did not get to the big box grocer in the morning, often times the yogurt would be sold out. Weekly. This has occurred for years.

There must be a very good reason why Neilson would discontinue a popular product line without introducing an alternative product. We have no choice but to change over to Beatrice, which does not have a fat free line at NoFrills. If you are unhappy with their decision to discontinue yogurt production call their toll free line and share your opinion.

Fender Mustang I guitar amp is a modeling amp with 24 presets. Installing the Fender Fuse software is difficult but worthwhile because it allows you to change your preset amps

Growing pains, I say. It will get better, surely. This review will cover the Fender Fuse software package (v2.1.0.8) that is used with Fender Mustang and G-Dec guitar amplifiers. I have installed the Fender Fuse on my PC in order to configure a family friend’s Fender Mustang I. The Mustang is a versatile amp, but came too heavily rock for her tastes. She wanted some acoustic. The Good: After considerable toil I was able to install the software, download different amps to my PC and then store them on the Mustang. The bad: The software install process is overly onerous, required me to download a couple of other Microsoft packages, and is prone to crash. Summary: A very versatile software package and amp, but needs more stability.

Our family friend wanted to learn to play electric guitar and called on me to help out. She wanted to play rock, told the sales people she liked rock, so rock it was. I helped her choose an Epiphone SG and a Fender Mustang I for Christmas. She was ecstatic and her Mom was grateful. After Christmas she came over, I fine tuned her guitar for string height and intonation and explained her amp somewhat. The Mustang is a modeling amp that comes with 24 different present of supposedly famous amps. It is like an electronic keyboard that at a flick of a switch can play trombone or ukelele. The Mustang can morph into a Fender Twin Reverb, amongst many other amps.

Little did I understand that she really did not know what type of music she wanted to play. For an amp I chose the Mustang I for its versatility, 24 preset amp modeling, and ability to connect to a PC and download different amps. A couple of weeks later we receive a frantic call from here: Her amp was echoing too much and she did not know how to turn the echo off. No amount of phone coaching would fix the problem. I came to the conclusion that the Fender Mustang is too complex an amp for her to handle. When she delivered it to me for the second time I was easily able to turn the echo effect off. The next issue was that she had changed her mind and now wanted an acoustic sound from her amp. I hoped that the Fuse software would not let me down.

First off, the enclosed Fuse software CD would not start up. It was a dead piece of plastic. I could play any kind of CD but not read the one from Fender. Ok, I will download it from Fuse.fender.com which happened without issue. The install did not go too well. Firstly the install was extremely slow. Even the verification of the installation software took a long time. Once loaded up it stated I needed to install the Windows Installer 3.1, and then promptly stopped installing. I installed Windows Installer 3.1 from oldapps.com and restarted the Fuse installation, only to find that Fuse required me to install Microsoft’s dotnet framework. This also took a long time, a reboot, and a third attempt at installing Fuse. Now it wanted Microsoft’s Silverlight 4.0, included in the Fuse download thankfully, and I did not need to reboot. Now Fuse will load, show a “Please wait” graphic for 2 seconds and then I get a blank and black screen. Damn.

I search google for the cause of the problem. It turns out that Fuse requires Internet Explorer 7.0 and I only have IE6.0 installed. This is because I do not use IE at all and opt for Firefox or Google Chrome. Using Chrome I tried in vain to upgrade to IE7.0 only to have Microsoft pop up that I need to validate my copy of Windows, which I did two years ago. The Windows Genuine Advantage (WGA) plugin would not let install. I researched more on Google and find out that IE7.0 dropped their WGA validation requirement two years ago in 2008, so why am I still being asked for Windows validation? More importantly, why do I even need IE to run Fuse? Is not Fuse it’s own standalone piece of software?

The solution, oddly, was to close Chrome and use Firefox. Using Firefox the IE7.0 upgrade from Microsoft went without an issue. With Firefox there was no mention of WGA validation. I can only hope that today’s Microsoft upgrades do not screw anything else up on my system. Just in case I did add a setpoint before today’s software antics.

The installation attempt number 4 of Fuse, though slow, finished without error. I started up Fuse and waited. It takes Fuse 4 minutes to start. This is the slowest start bootup process I have experienced on any piece of software. Even Windows boots up faster.

Initially Fuse said that I needed to update the firmware on the Mustang I. Fuse displayed a clear message on how to power down and power up the amp a,d this procedure went without issue. The Mustang I’s firmware was quickly updated, and Fuse recognized I had a Mustang I connected. This installation process took over 4 hours.

Initially, Fuse is very confusing. There is no documentation from the online help within the software itself. For the life of me I could not figure out what Fuse wanted to do and how to get amps into Fuse and then into the Mustang I. I finally found the .pdf documentation for Fuse online but after reading it cover to cover this did not help much. I closed down Fuse and went to Youtube, where Damon Chivers from Fender UK, at Nevada Music Uk, gave me an excellent explanation and demo of the Fuse Software. He ran through all the features of Fuse, searched for, downloaded and tested an amp. So that is what Fuse does! There is a community of Fender Fuse users, they upload amps and we can all share. Ok, then.

I start up Fuse and wait 4 minutes. After nosing around Fuse I find that Fuse will crash inadvertently on a regular basis. I need to reboot my PC as well as restart the amp before I reboot. Once I tried to restart the amp when Fuse had come alive again and found one of my amp settings labelled “WHAT THE #^[!?”. At least someone in their software department has a sense of humour. The routine is when Fuse crashes, reboot your amp, then reboot your PC, start Fuse, wait the 4 minutes for it to wake up and then carry on with life.

It was quickly becoming clear why IE7.0 is required: The Fuse interface IS a web browser that both connects to the Internet as well as the Mustang amp. Impressive, I thought. As Damon had shown me I searched for clean amps, and a small list of interesting amps came up. I could also search by genre, number of reviews, ratings, title, etc, except that most of the search methods gave an error from Fender’s web site. Improvement is required here. Either remove the non-functional search methods or fix the underlying issues. I opted for search by title, tag or title because the rest do not work. Once I selected a clean amp to download, I was told by Fuse that I needed to upgrade to Flash Player 10.1, but before I tried to do anything else, Fuse crashed yet again.

I know there is a community of Fuse users out there that have uploaded their amp settings, or what Fuse calls “presets”. Upon searching on Google I found the same download tool I saw in the Fuse software. Using Firefox, I was able to search for, find and download different amps, all without Firefox crashing. As well I did not need Flash Player 10.1 to download amps. Alas, Fuse is very new, not even six months old, so there are not a huge install base of amps. Still, I found and downloaded 7 acoustic amps that I liked. Do yourself a big favour and use Firefox to download amps to your PC, and avoid using Fuse to download amps. Fuse seems Ok for installing the preset to your amp, but is unstable for searching and downloading amps. Fuse is a very unstable web browser that will definitely disappoint.

Start up Fuse, turn on your amp, wait the required 4 minutes, hit “Media Library”, then “Add to Library”, then tell Fuse to read in your previously downloaded amp. The amp loads and you can immediately try it out with your guitar and the Mustang. Different amps are similar to fonts in word processing in that you download them and then load them into your font software for use on your computer. Once in your media library, to save the amp to one of your 24 presets, right click on the amp where there will be an option to save. You will need to scroll through the orange/green/red settings 1 through 8.

From the Main Menu, hit Utilities, then backup, in order to backup your amp settings. With all the delays in getting Fuse to start and the regular software crashing I am still unsure how reliable it is. I cannot even launch Fuse when my Firefox browser is running, because it simply will not load.

Once you have downloaded your desired amps, they will be at different volume settings. This throws off many people, including myself. Once you switch to a different amp, no matter what the knobs say, the amp presets will override it. If the volume is too loud in a preset, you will need to change the amp’s physical volume knob to where you like it, and then hit the amp’s save button twice. This new setting will be saved and reflected back in Fuse. Alternately you can change the software volume setting in Fuse, which is then reflected back in your amp’s volume, but the physical volume knob setting will not change. This is important. Flick to a different amp and then flick back, and your amp will have changed, irregardless of the physical knob settings.

I have only been playing with this amp for a day. My impression is that the amp comes biased towards distortion. Installing the Fuse software is difficult and may be impossible if you are not competent using and installing PC software. The Fuse software is large, slow and prone to crash, so save your work often. Still, to be able to change your amp from a rock amp to an acoustic amp is pretty nice. The result is that after all the difficulties, Fender has allowed me to get together with a community of others in order to exchange amp settings. The software does work, and the results are excellent. Just be prepared for a fight.

When, not if, my family friend again changes her mind and wants to play more rock, Fuse will be ready to help me. Factory presets can be restored. New rock amps can be downloaded and tried, Different types of amp settings from other music genres can be tried just for fun and experimentation. I hope that Fender will spend more effort to make this Fuse amp software much more stable. IMHO building a stand alone user application based on IE is sheer software suicide.

Addendum: Jan 25 2011 After using it for a couple of hours today Fuse seems stable and did not crash once. I did not download any amps from the internet, nor did I transfer any new amps to the Mustang. I merely tweaked the volume controls, saved the settings to Fuse, which were then reflected in the Mustang.

It is a lot of fun to play around with various amp settings. You have a wide assortment o (predominantly) Fender amps, effects pedals, and rack mounted effects, many more than the average player could ever attain. From looking at other amp settings you can also learn what you could do to improve the sound of your amp. A recurring and nagging question I ask myself is if the modeling on the Mustang sounds as good as the real thing?

Addendum 2011 Jan 25, afternoon: After using Fuse to tweak amp settings for a couple of hours, NOT downloading amps, NOT transferring amps to the Mustang, NOT doing anything stupid silly, like purposely trying to kill it, I was showing my daughter the nice guitar tuner in Fuse. It is large and impressive. We always have our guitars in tune and use Seiko and Korg guitar tuners. She quickly noted that the tuner on Fuse said that her guitar always “in tune” guitar was out of tune, which was impossible to her. Once tuned up according to Fuse, we checked it with the Seiko tuner. Note to all: The Fuse/Mustang tuner is consistently out of whack by -20 on their scale, with no way of calibrating the tuner. People of the world, do not rely on the Mustang/Fuse tuner or you will be out of tune with others. Then, the Fuse software acted like it was giving me the finger and promptly crashed. Or was it giving me the moon? How’s that for attitude?