SCHNEIDER DTV5535 DIGITAL PROFI CONCEPT 55 YEAR 1988.

 
The SCHNEIDER DTV5535 DIGITAL PROFI CONCEPT 55 is the first digital TELEVISION developed by Schneider using the DIGIVISION ITT technology and they called it the DIGITECH 2000 series.


The SCHNEIDER DTV1 CHASSIS is developed completely at SCHNEIDER based around DIGIVISION ITT DIGIT2000 chipset, and was fitted from 21 to 32 inches color television sets.

Digital Signal Processing DIGVISION ITT in Brief:

 FOR several years now the use of digital techniques in television has been growing. A considerable impetus came initially from the need for high -quality Tv standards conversion. The IBA's DICE (Digital Intercontinental Conversion Equipment) standards converter came into operational use in 1972. It's success demonstrated convincingly the advantages of processing video signals in digital form - digital signals are neither phase nor level dependent. The trend since then has been towards the all - digital studio: digital effects generators have been in use for some time, and digital telecines were announced earlier this year. An earlier example of the application of digital techniques to television was the BBC's sound-in-syncs system, in which the sound signal is converted to digital form so that it can be added to the video signal for network distribution. The sound-in-syncs system first came into use in 1969, and is was  widely employed in pay tv systems alongside with video scrambling methods in the 80's.  Digital techniques have already appeared on the domestic TV scene. The teletext signals are digital, and require digital processing. In modern remote control systems the commands from the remote control transmitter are in digital form, and require digital decoding and digital - to -analogue conversion in the receiver before the required control action can be put into effect. Allied to this, digital techniques are used for the more sophisticated channel tuning systems. The basic TV receiver itself continues to use analogue techniques however. Are we about to see major changes here? 
ITT Semiconductors in W. Germany have been working on the application of digital techniques to basic TV receiver signal processing since 1977 with the supervision of the Engineer Micic Ljubomir, and at the recent Berlin Radio Show presented a set of digital chips for processing the video, audio and deflection signals in a TV receiver. The set consists of a' couple of l.s.i. and six v.l.s.i. chips - and by very large scale integration (v.l.s.i.) we're talking about chips that contain some more 200,000 transistors. What are the advantages? 
For the setmaker, there's reduction in the component count and simpler, automated receiver alignment - alignment data is simply fed into a programmable memory in the receiver, which then adjusts itself. Subsequently, the use of feedback enables the set to maintain its performance as it ages. From the user's viewpoint, the advantages are improved performance and the fact that extra features such as picture -within -a -picture (two pictures on the screen at the same time) and still pictures become relatively simple to incorporate. The disadvantage of course is the need for a lot of extra circuitry. Since the received signals remain in analogue form, analogue -to -digital conversion is required before signal processing is undertaken. As the c.r.t. requires analogue drive signals, digital -to -analogue conversion is required prior to the RGB output stages - the situation is somewhat different in the timebase and audio departments, since the line drive is basically digital anyway and class D amplifier techniques can be used in the field and audio output stages. In between the A -D conversion and the various output stages, handling the signals in digital form calls for much more elaborate circuitry - hence those chips with 200,000 or so transistors. The extra circuitry is all incorporated within a handful of chips of course, but the big question is if and when the use of these chips will become an economic proposition, taking into account reduced receiver assembly/setting up costs, compared to the use of the present analogue technology - after all, colour receiver component counts are already very low. With the present digital technology, it's not feasible to convert the signals to digital form at i.f. So conversion takes place following video and sound demodulation. Fig. 1 shows in simple block diagram form the basic video and deflection signal processing arrangement used in the system devised by ITT Semiconductors. Before going into detail, two basic points have to be considered - the rate at which the incoming analogue signals are sampled for conversion to digital form, and the number of digits required for signal coding. Consider the example shown in Fig. 2. At both (a) and (b) the signals are sampled at times Ti, T2 etc. In (a) the signal is changing at a much faster rate than the sampling rate. So very little of the signal information would be present in the samples. In (b) the rate at which the signal is changing is much slower, and since the sampling rate is the same the samples will contain the signal information accurately. In practice, the sampling rate has to be at least twice the bandwidth of the signal being sampled. Once you've got your samples, the next question is how many digits are required for adequate resolution of the signal, i.e. how many steps are required on the vertical (signal level) scale in Fig. 2 The use of a four -digit code, i.e. 0000, 0001 etc., gives 16 possible signal levels. Doubling the number of digits to eight gives 256 signal levels and so on. ITT's experience shows that the luminance signal requires 8 bits (digits), the colour -difference signals require 6 bits, the audio signal requires 12 bits (14 for hi-fi quality) while 13 bits are required for a linear horizontal scan on a 26inch tube. These digital signals are handled as parallel data streams in the subsequent signal processing. Returning to Fig. 1, the A -D and D -A conversion required in the video channel is carried out by a single chip which ITT call the video codec (coder/decoder). A clock pulse generator i.c. is required to produce the various pulse trains necessary for the digital signal processing, and a control i.c. is used to act as a computer for the whole digital system and also to provide interfacing to enable the external controls (brightness, volume, colour etc.) to produce the desired effects. In addition, the control i.c. incorporates the digital channel selection system. The video codec i.c. uses parallel A-D/D-A conversion, i.e. a string of voltage comparators connected in parallel. This system places a high premium on the number of bits used to code the signal in digital form, so ITT have devised a technique of biasing the converter to achieve 8 -bit resolution using only 7 bits (the viewer's eye does some averaging on alternate lines, as with Simple PAL, but this time averaging luminance levels). The A -D comparators provide grey -encoded outputs, so the first stage in the video processor i.c. is a grey -to -binary transcoder. As Fig. 3 shows, the processes carried out in the video processor i.c. then follow the normal practice, though everything's done in digital form. The key to this processing is the use of digital filters. These are clocked at rates up to 18MHz, and provide delays, addition and multiplication. The glass chroma delay line required for PAL decoding in a conventional analogue decoder consists of blocks of RAM (random-access memory) occupying only three square millimeters of chip area each. As an example of the ingenuity of the ITT design, the digital delay line used for chroma signal averaging/separation in the PAL system is used in the NTSC version of the chip as a luminance/chrominance signal separating comb filter. Fig. 4 shows the basic processes carried out in the deflection processor i.c. This employs the sorts of techniques we're becoming used to in the latest generation of sync processor i.c.s. Digital video goes in, and the main outputs consist of a horizontal drive pulse plus drives to the field output and EW modulator circuits. The latter are produced by a pulse -width modulator arrangement, i.e. the sort of thing employed with class D output stages. The necessary gating and blanking pulses are also provided. A further chip provides audio signal processing. One might wonder why the relatively simple audio department calls for this sort of treatment. The W. German networks are already equipping themselves for dual -channel sound however, and the audio processor i.c. contains the circuitry required to sort out the two -carrier sound signals. These chips represent a major step in digitalizing the domestic TV receiver. It seems likely that some enterprising setmaker will in due course announce a "digital TV set". The interesting point then will be whether the chip yields, and the chip prices as production increases, will eventually make it worthwhile for all setmakers to follow this path (in 1984).



All previously types were analog chassis technology (TV1 TV2.....) and since SCHNEIDER have had a very brief TV manufacturing history these are even quite rare and not sold much.

The SCHNEIDER DTV5535 DIGITAL PROFI CONCEPT 55  is a DIGITAL Colour television receiver or set , are known in which the majority of signal processing that takes place therein is carried out digitally. That is, a video or television signal is received in a conventional fashion using a known analog tuning circuit and then, following the tuning operation, the received analog television signal is converted into a digital signal and digitally processed before subsequently being converted back to an analog signal for display on a colour cathode ray tube.

In a conventional television receiver, all signals are analog-processed. Analog signal processing, however, has the problems at the video stage and thereafter. These problems stem from the general drawbacks of analog signal processing with regard to time-base operation, specifically, incomplete Y/C separation (which causes cross color and dot interference), various types of problems resulting in low picture quality, and low precision of synchronization. Furthermore, from the viewpoints of cost and ease of manufacturing the analog circuit, a hybrid configuration must be employed even if the main circuit comprises an IC. In addition to these disadvantages, many adjustments must be performed.

In order to solve the above problems, it is proposed to process all signals in a digital form from the video stage to the chrominance signal demodulation stage. In such a digital television receiver, various improvements in picture quality should result due to the advantages of digital signal processing.

Therefore digital television signal processing system introduced in 1984 by the Worldwide Semiconductor Group (Freiburg, West Germany) of International Telephone and Telegraph Corporation is described in an ITT Corporation publication titled "VLSI Digital TV System--DIGIT 2000." In that system color video signals, after being processed in digital (binary) form, are converted to analog form by means of digital-to-analog converters before being coupled to an image displaying kinescope. The analog color video signals are coupled to the kinescope via analog buffer amplifiers and video output kinescope driver amplifiers which provide video output signals at a high level suitable for driving intensity control electrodes of the kinescope.

The SCHNEIDER DTV5535 DIGITAL PROFI CONCEPT 55    Is a multistandard set and relates to a digital multistandard decoder for video signals and to a method for decoding video signals.
Colour video signals, so-called composite video, blanking and sync signals (CVBS) are essentially composed of a brightness signal or luminance component (Y), two colour difference signals or chrominance components (U, V or I, Q), vertical and horizontal sync signals (VS, HS) and a blanking signal (BL).

The different coding processes, e.g. NTSC, PAL and SECAM, introduced into the known colour television standards, differ in the nature of the chrominance transmission and in particular the different systems make use of different colour subcarrier frequencies and different line frequencies.
The following explanations relate to the PAL and NTSC systems, but correspondingly apply to video signals of other standards and non-standardized signals.
The colour subcarrier frequency (fsc) of a PAL system and a NTSC system is fsc(NTSC) = 3.58 MHz or fsc(PAL) = 4.43 MHz.
In addition, in PAL and NTSC systems the relationships of the colour subcarrier frequency (fsc) to the line frequency (fh) are given by fsc(NTSC) = 227.50 * fh or 4•fsc(NTSC) = 910 • fh fsc(PAL) = 283.75 * fh or 4•fsc(PAL) = 1135 • fh so that the phase of the colour subcarrier in the case of NTSC is changed by 180°/line and in PAL by 270°/line.

In the case of digital video signal processing and decoding the prior art fundamentally distinguishes between two system architectures. These are the burst-locked architecture and the line-locked architecture, i.e. systems which operate with sampling frequencies for the video signal, which are produced in phase-locked manner to the colour subcarrier frequency transmitted with the burst pulse or in phase-locked manner with the line frequency, respectively.

The principal advantage of the present invention is a color television receiver is provided having a fully digital color demodulator wherein the luminance signal and the chrominance signals are separated and digitally processed prior to being converted to analog signals in that the all-digital signal processing largely eliminates the need for nonintegratable circuit elements, i.e., particularly coils and capacitors, and that the subcircuits can be preferably implemented using integrated insulated-gate field-effect transistor circuits, i.e., so-called MOS technology. This technology is better suited for implementing digital circuits than the so-called bipolar technology.

 The  SCHNEIDER DTV5535 DIGITAL PROFI CONCEPT 55  is a multisound tv digital sound processing.

It has a DTI.(dti digital transient improvement pertains to a circuit for steepening color-signal transitions in color television receivers or the like particularly in DIGIVISION DIGIT2000 . ) circuit arrangement designed for use in digital color-television receivers or the like and contains for each of the two digital color-difference signals a slope detector to which both a digital signal defining an amplitude threshold value and a digital signal defining a time threshold value are applied. At least one intermediate value occurring during an edge to be steepened is stored, and at the same time value of the steepened edge, it is "inserted" into the latter.

The bandwidth of the color-difference channel is very small compared with the bandwidth of the luminance channel, namely only about 1/5 that of the luminance channel in the television standards now in use. This narrow bandwidth leads to blurred color transitions ("color edging") in case of sudden color-signal changes, e.g., at the edges of the usual color-bar test signal, because, compared with the associated luminance-signal transition, an approximately fivefold duration of the color-signal transition results from the narrow transmission bandwidth.

In the prior circuit arrangement, the relatively slowly rising color-signal edges are steepened by suitably delaying the color-difference signals and the luminance signal and steepening the edges of the color-difference signals at the end of the delay by suitable analog circuits. The color-difference signals and the luminance signal are present and processed in analog form as usual. This circuit arrangement is designed for use in digital color-television receivers or the like and contains for each of the two digital color-difference signals a slope detector to which both a digital signal defining an amplitude threshold value and a digital signal defining a time threshold value are applied. At least one intermediate value occurring during an edge to be steepened is stored, and at the same time value of the steepened edge, it is "inserted" into the latter. This is done by means of memories, switches, output registers, and a sequence controller.

ADVANTAGE - Increased picture sharpness and highly improved signal-to-noise ratio.


SCHNEIDER has started production of TV in 1982-83 and ceased the production in the 2005.

The set here in collection is a 21 inches with 110° degree CRT TUBE and it's stereo , multistandard all features digital television.

AV SCART SOCKET IS present and headphones stereo jack too.

The set is featuring the DIGIVISION ITT technology but the chassis design is developed by SCHNEIDER itself with a 2 board concept design, Power board + Signal processing board called    DTV1 CHASSIS,




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An Increasingly Versatile Device The domestic television set used to be simply the thing that reproduced the programmes transmitted by one or other of the three programme networks  unless you happened to be connected to one of the wire systems that have experimented with local TV and pay TV at various times. But have you noticed what an increasingly versatile thing the TV set is becoming?
- The first major extension to the domestic TV set's possibilities came with the VCR, enabling you to record off air or replay prerecorded tapes. Domestic VTR systems have at a price  been with us for roughly a decade now, but till the advent of the easy to handle VCR most low-cost VTR systems were intended for use with monitors, with the signal interconnections at video and audio frequencies.
- Then came TV games, first found in the pubs and amusement arcades, later appearing in compact, relatively inexpensive packages for home use. The significant point here was the entry of digital techniques on the domestic TV scene. On the broadcast side, digital techniques had been making a substantial contribution to operations for some years, starting with the BBC's sound-in-syncs system (1969) in which the TV sound signal is compressed, converted to digital form and inserted in the line sync pulse period, and culminating with the IBA's famed DICE, which provides electronic standards (lines, fields, colour) conversion by converting the signals to digital form, processing them, then converting them back into analogue form.
Rather far from TV games you might think, but it's all part of the same process - the increasing impact of digital techniques on the world of television. In fact the technology of TV games has evolved considerably since their first appearance.
The approach then was to employ a fair number of standard digital i.c.s to build up the circuitry required. But why not go about it in the same way as the calculator manufacturers?
It didn't take long for the semiconductor people to see this new possibility for using their l.s.i. technology. This made it a relatively simple matter to provide a range of games with just a single i.c.  the basis of the present generation of TV games.
Add a second i.c. and the whole thing comes up in glorious colour. But it doesn't end there. The talk was now is of adopting microprocessor technology and making the system programmable, so that an almost unlimited range of games of varying degrees of complexity can be played. The favoured system seems to been to use prerecorded cassettes to provide the various programmes. And once you do that, you can extend the system to all sorts of other uses - teaching systems and so on. In fact you've made the TV set into part of a home computer installation - as we outlined in Teletopics last month. It's not impossible then to imagine some "viewers" using their TV sets for games, instruction and VCR use, while keeping up to date with teletext news and getting extra information via the PO's Viewdata system - and never watching a transmitted programme at all! We've come a long way then from the days of the TV set as a goggle

(goggle ????? or gooooooooooogle).................. box.
Teletext decoders and TV games were already being built into a few sets. What other digital innovations can we expect in TV sets? (may be DVB)
One now well established use of digital techniques is to provide all electronic channel selection.
The varicap tuner simply asks to be controlled in this way, and the system lends itself readily to remote control operation. Once you're controlling the tuner and generating various signals digitally there are other things you might as well do. Like flashing the selected channel number on the screen, or the time (coming shortly in Television!). Sets which do this sort of thing have been available on the Continent for some while now.
- The latest development along these lines is the picture within a picture a reduced size picture from another channel being inserted in the corner of the main display (PIP), so that you can watch two progrpnmes at once or see when to change over to a programme due to start on another channel. This involves some interesting digital processes - you've got to lose lines, and compact the video information by reading it into a memory at one speed and reading it out at another, in effect operating at two standards simultaneously while keeping both in sync (remember how difficult it has sometimes been to keep a set in sync on one standard!).
- There's only one thing that prevents a space-age TV installation in every home: cost.
But the cost of electronic hardware has a habit of falling dramatically once production has achieved a certain level. TV games are already commonplace, and teletext decoders have  become a lot cheaper once specialised i.c. modules for the purpose go into large scale production. From this point in time, it already seems that one can regard the days when the TV set simply displayed one of the programmes available as the age of stream TV.

....................................But we all know how it ended !

One more comment about digital in 2000..............

Over the years we have learnt that one of the most important things in video/ TV technology is selecting the best system to use. We have also seen how difficult this can be. Prior to the start of the colour TV era in Europe there was an great to-do about the best system to adopt. The US NTSC system seemed an obvious choice to start with. It had been proved in use, and refine- ments had been devised. But alternative, better solutions were proposed - PAL and Secam. PAL proved to be a great success, in fact a good choice. 

The French Secam system seems to have worked just as well. Apart from the video tape battles of the Seventies, the next really big debate concerned digital TV. When it came to digital terrestrial TV (DTT), Europe and the USA again adopted different standards. 

One major difference is the modulation system used for transmission. Coded orthogonal frequency   division multiplexing (COFDM) was selected for the European DVB system, while in the USA a system called 8VSB was adopted. COFDM uses quadrature amplitude modulation of a number of orthogonal carriers that are spread across the channel bandwidth. Because of their number, each carrier has a relatively low bit rate. 

The main advantage of the system is its excellent behaviour under multipath reception conditions. 8VSB represents a rather older,  pre phase modulation technoogy: eight  state amplitude modulation of a single carrier, with a vestigial sideband. The decision on the US system was assigned to the Advanced Television Systems Committee (ATSC), reporting to the FCC. The system it proposed was approved by the FCC on December 26th, 1996. The curious date might suggest that there had been a certain amount of politicking. In fact there had been an almighty row between the TV and computer industries about the video standard to adopt, the two fearing that one or other would gain an advantage as the technologies converged. It was 'resolved' by adopting a sort of   "open standard"  we are talking about resolution and scanning standards here - the idea apparently being that the technology would somehow sort itself out.

 There seems to have been rather less concern about the modulation standard. 8VSB was adopted because it was assumed to be able to provide a larger service area than the alternatives, including COFDM, for a given transmitter power. Well, the USA is a very large place! But the US TV industry, or at least some parts of it, is now having second thoughts. Once the FCC had made its decision, there was pressure to get on with digital TV. In early 1998 there were announce- ments about the start of transmissions and broadcasters assured the FCC that DTT would be available in the ten areas of greatest population concentration by May 1999. Rapid advances were expected, with an anticipated analogue TV switch -off in 2006. So far however things have not gone like that. At the end of 1999 some seventy DTI' transmitters were in operation, but Consumer Electronics Manufacturers Association estimates suggest that only some 50,000 sets and 5,000 STBs had been sold.

 There have been many reports of technical problems, in particular with reception in urban and hilly areas and the use of indoor aerials, also with video/audio sync and other matters. Poor reception with indoor aerials in urban conditions is of particular concern: that's how much of the population receives its TV. The UK was the first European country to start DTI', in late 1998 - at much the same time as in the USA. The contrast is striking. ONdigital had signed up well over 500,000 subscribers by the end of 1999, a much higher proportion of viewers than in the USA. Free STBs have played a part of course, but it's notable that DTT 's reception in the UK has been relatively hassle -free. In making this comparison it should also be remembered that the main aim of DTT technology differs in Europe and the USA. 

The main concern in Europe has been to provide additional channels. In the USA it has been to move to HDTV, in particular to provide a successor the NTSC system. There have been plenty of channels in the USA for many a year. For example the DirecTV satellite service started in mid 1994 and offers some 200 channels. Internationally, various countries have been comparing the US and European digital systems. They have overwhelmingly come down in favour of the DVB system. There have been some very damaging assessments of the ATSC standard. The present concern in the US TV industry results from this poor domestic take up and lack of international success. Did the FCC make a boob, in particular in the choice of 8VSB? Following compara- tive tests carried out by Sinclair Broadcasting Group Inc., the company has petitioned the FCC to adopt COFDM as an option in the ATSC standard. Not only did its tests confirm poor reception with indoor aerials: they also established that the greater coverage predicted for 8VSB failed to materialise in practice. Could the USA have two DTT transmission standards? It seems unlikely. It would involve dual standard receivers and non  standardisation of transmitters. In the all important business of system selection, it looks as if the FCC got it wrong.

              ....................................   It is obviously wasteful to duplicate terrestrial TV transmissions in analogue and digital form. Sooner or later transmissions will all be digital, since this is a more efficient use of spectrum space. The question is when? It would suit some to switch off the analogue transmitters as soon as possible. 2006 has been suggested as a time to start, with ana- logue transmissions finally ending in 2010. All very neat and tidy. Whether it will work out in that way is another matter. Strong doubts are already beginning to be aired. 

 The government has, quite properly, laid down conditions to be met before the switch off occurs. Basically that the digital signal coverage should equal that achieved for analogue TV, currently 99.4 per cent of the population, and that digital receiving equipment should be available at an affordable price. The real problem is that there is a difference between a coverage of 99.4 per cent and 99.4 per cent of the population actually having digital receiving equipment. Why should those who are interested in only free - to -air channels go out and buy/rent a digital receiver? It is already becoming evident that this represents a fair chunk of the population. 

The ITC has warned the government that the 2006-2010 timetable is in jeopardy. Peter Rogers, the ITC's chief executive, has said "we need to persuade people only interested in watching free -to -air television to switch to digital. "

Unless we do, there will be no switch - over." Well not quite, because the analogue receivers will eventually wear out and have to be replaced. But that could take a long, long time. Meanwhile many people will expect to be able to continue to watch their usual TV fare using their existing analogue receivers. 

Research carried out by Culture Secretary Chris Smith's department has established that between forty and fifty per cent of the population expects the BBC licence to cover their TV viewing, which means what they get at present in analogue form. A substantial percentage of the population simply isn't interested in going digital. In fact take up of integrated receiver -decoders, as opposed to the free digital set -top boxes, has so far been very slow. 

Of five million TV sets sold in the UK year 1999 , only 10,000 were digital. There are important factors apart from overall coverage and how many people have sets. There is the extension of coverage, which becomes more difficult to achieve eco- nomically as the number of those not covered decreases. There is the problem of reception quality. And there is the question of domestic arrangements and convenience. Extending coverage to the last ten fifteen per cent of the population by means of conventional terrestrial transmitters will be expensive. Mr Smith's department seems to have conceded that other methods of signal delivery may have to be adopted - by satellite, by microwave links or by cable. The latter has of course never been economic where few households are involved. 

The frequency planners have been trying to find ways of increasing coverage even to well populated areas. There are so many areas where problems of one sort or another make the provision of DTT difficult. Satellite TV is the obvious solution. 

The time may well come when it is wondered why anyone bothered with DTT. Signal quality is becoming an increasingly important factor as the digital roll out continues. In areas where the signal is marginal, viewers could experience the extreme irritation of picture break up or complete loss like even todays. This is quite apart from the actual quality of the channel, which depends on the number of bits per second used. There is a maximum number of bits per multiplex, the total being shared by several channels. The fewer the bits, the poorer the picture in terms of definition and rendering. 

There have already been complaints about poor quality. The question of domestic arrangements is one that has not so far received adequate public attention. Most households 2000 nowadays don't have just one TV set that the family watches. They have a main one, probably, almost certainly one or more VCRs, and several other sets around the house to serve various purposes. What 'the percentage of households that have digital TV' should really mean is the percentage willing to replace all this equipment. It will be expensive, and people would not be happy if they were told to throw away their other equipment when they get a single nice new all  singing all dancing widescreen digital TV set. It fact there would be uproar. The move from analogue to digital is not like that from 405 to 625 lines, which went fairly smoothly.

In those days few people had video equipment or a multitude of sets. The transition to digital is not going to be smooth, and the suggestion of a switch off during 2006-2010 already looks totally unrealistic. Unless the government subsidises or gives away digital TV sets - and why should it? - people will expect their existing equipment to continue to be usable.  

So it's likely that analogue TV will be with us for many years yet. But that would be the end of analogue too. 

.............................Indeed...............................

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Schneider Rundfunkwerke AG
The company has it's roots in a company founded by Felix Schneider in 1889 in Türkheim in Swabia, Germany, that manufactured industrial woodworking machinery. The company entered the audio business in 1965 by starting the manufacture of radios cabinets etc. and moved into the manufacture of other Brown Goods soon thereafter and became in particular associated with music systems in the 70's and 80's. The Schneider company was unusual for West German companies at the time in that they focused squarely on the manufacture of low budget & value products, while the rest of the electronics sector was increasingly focused on higher priced products in response to the ever increasing valuation of the German Mark. Entered the computer market in 1984 when they started marketing Amstrad computers under their own name in central Europe, initially with notable success, but split up with Amstrad in 1987 when they rejected to distribute the AT compatible computers that the latter company was introducing at the time as they thought they where unsellable, but rather decided to hire the entire European design team from Commodore that had been responsible for designing the PC compatible designs Commodore had introduced a couple of years earlier in addition to the Amiga 2000. This resulted in the introduction of the Euro-PC line of computers in late 1988, an interesting designs in some respects, for instance the first PC compatible that had all hardware I/O and set-up functions controlled by the BIOS configuration program rather than having to open the computer and move jumpers around, another unusual BIOS related feature is that you could start the configuration program anytime, even when the OS was running, although innovative this line was not a resounding success but it did pave the way for Schneider to become one of the larger European computer OEM's in the 1990's. The company bought the trademark, product lines and factories of the Dual company from Thomson in 1988, this was not primarily to get the product lines but rather it appears to be in response to the need for a new trademark for some European markets, notably France, were the Schneider brand was either owned by local companies or there where very well known companies with that name operating in other business sectors. The old Dual factory in St. Georgen was closed down in 1993 after sales of turntables tumbled and the manufacture of the turntable lineup was taken over by Alfred Fehrenbacher but they are located in the same town as the original Dual Co., the Dual trademark was licensed to the Karstad retail chain in 1996 but by that time Schneider was only using the trademark in France one on hand and for record players internationally. The company's name was changed to Schneider Electronics AG at some time in the 1990's and different operations where organised into independently run divisions. In the latter years it was perhaps best known locally as a manufacturer of low and mid range televisions and video recorders but they had started manufacturing those in 1983 but in the early 1990's the Schneider Technologies AG subsidary developed some innovative TV's for professional usage, the most interesting of these being the laser TV which was based around a solid state RGB laser gun developed in conjunction with Jenoptik, this allows for huge screens without the usual multi screen/projector setups or the lack of brightness usually associated with projectors. Worsening trade conditions in the late 90's however meant that the company declared itself bankrupt on January 26 2002, TCL International Holdings bought production facilities, stocks and trademarks for 8,2 million € in September 2002 and used those to form a new company called Schneider Electronics GmbH.


 Schneider Rundfunkwerke AG Bernhard Schneider died at the age of 84. He was one of the pioneers of consumer electronics and the PC age.
 
Bernhard Schneider died at the age of 84. He was one of the pioneers of consumer electronics and the PC age.
The community of Türkheim mourns the loss of an outstanding entrepreneurial personality who has left its mark on entrepreneurs and people in the community of Valais and throughout the Lower Allgäu: Bernhard Schneider, co-founder of Schneider-Werke in Türkheim, died in 2019 at the age of 84.

The funeral took place  Friday at the wish of the deceased in the closest circle in Türkheim. Throughout his life Bernhard Schneider was not one who pushed himself into the public eye. Until the end he lived in seclusion with his family, which was always the most important thing for him. People who met Bernhard Schneider describe him as an absolute family man. And that's exactly how he ran the company together with his brother Albert: like a family. The success story of the Schneider plants in Türkheim began with wood washing machines.

The history of Schneider-Rundfunkwerke AG goes back to 1859. It started when Felix Schneider made wood washing machines in Türkheim. Chance helped the Schneiders, who initially made their money with 40 employees in Eppishausen with the production of clothes lockers for the Bundeswehr and wooden housings for music chests and relocated to Türkheim in 1960. The company and senior manager Leo Schneider then switched to the production of consumer electronics in 1965. When the long-established radio factory "Emud" closed down in 1972 and shortly afterwards the office machine manufacturer "Walther" filed for bankruptcy and the factory gates closed, the Schneider brothers took decisive action and acquired a functioning radio factory. Right from the start, the Schneiders had a feel for the wishes of broad groups of buyers.
They opted for inexpensive compact systems in which records and CD players as well as radio receivers and amplifiers were integrated. The brothers had expanded the Schneider factories into a German flagship company until the 1990s and formed it into a company with a worldwide reputation. Legendary some products that could hardly be missing in a German living room: the music showcase with record changer from the 1960s, the "Schneider Powerpack" set a benchmark in terms of design and price as a hi-fi system in the 1970s.

The "German response to cheap Asian imports" came from the Schneider plants in Türkheim The first Schneider television set from 1983 is still considered the "German answer to cheap Asian imports". Even in 1984, when the home computer market was completely new, Schneider made an exclamation mark with the Amstrad CPC646, which made the Commodore 64 a serious competitor. At the end of the 1980s, it was the Schneider Euro-PC, which for the first time also reached a broad range of buyers with a price of 1300 Deutschmarks.

Bernhard Schneider and his brother Albert were visionaries like there were very few even in inventive Germany. Proof of this: The Schneider “Ökovision” was the first TV set that was fully recyclable - and that as early as 1992. Step by step, the Schneider plants grew quietly into one of the largest employers in the region. Up to 850 employees found a job here during the company's heyday. At the height of the company's success, the brothers retired from the management.

The company had high hopes for laser technology, but they could never be realized. Then everything went downhill rapidly: The Schneider plants could no longer keep up with the development of computer technology. Bernhard and Albert Schneider had to register for bankruptcy in 2002 and sell their trademark rights to the Chinese electronics company "TCL" after they had made the jump to the stock exchange and to the top of the German hi-fi equipment manufacturers.

It also incorporated the French Thomson plants in 2004 and became one of the world's largest manufacturers of TV sets with the fully acquired “Joint Venture TCL Thomson Electronics (TTE)”. The Chinese also ceased production at the end of 2005. The business park A 96 of Finsterwalder Transport & Logistik was later built on the company premises. The end of their company was also a severe personal blow for both brothers.

Above all, Bernhard Schneider took the fate of his employees to heart, to whom he had always felt committed. Financially, the downfall of the Schneider factories is said to have hit hard on the former stock billionaires: After the fall in the price of the Schneider paper, the stock packages were no longer worth much.

Schneider Rundfunkwerke AG The end of an era......... The last television set rolled off the assembly line in Türkheim in 2005. The former manager talks about the end for Schneider Rundfunkwerke:

Ackermann remembers. The brothers Bernhard and Albert Schneider had to register for bankruptcy and sell their trademark rights to the Chinese electronics company "TCL" after they had quietly made it to the stock exchange and to the top of the German hi-fi equipment manufacturers. It also incorporated the French Thomson plants in 2004 and became one of the world's largest manufacturers of TV sets with the fully acquired “Joint Venture TCL Thomson Electronics (TTE)”.

Like the Schneider brothers, for whom the cheap competition from the Far East had ultimately put a spanner in the works, the Chinese ultimately also failed and ceased production at the end of 2005. The remaining 120 employees were sitting on the street. After that, the banks were in charge. "They used managers who had no idea about blasting and blowing and only pulled money from the company," criticizes Ackermann, who saw ten board members from 1990 to 1998, but who did the work with the tailors, "even if it was sometimes very hard and required full commitment, ”was always a lot of fun. "I still have a good relationship with Bernhard and Albert Schneider, who live in Türkheim," assures the former company boss.

From flower to bankruptcy. Michael Ackermann knows the history of Schneider-Rundfunkwerke AG dating back to 1859 like the back of his hand. It started when Felix Schneider made wood washing machines in Türkheim. Chance helped the Schneiders, who initially made their money with 40 employees in Eppishausen with the production of clothes lockers for the Bundeswehr and wooden housings for music chests and relocated to Türkheim in 1960. The company and senior manager Leo Schneider then switched to the production of consumer electronics in 1965.

When the long-established Swabian radio factory "Emud" closed down in 1972 and shortly afterwards the office machine manufacturer "Walther" declared bankruptcy and the factory gates closed, the Schneider brothers took a quick decision and acquired a functioning radio factory for a sandwich. Similar to their Fürth competitor Max Grundig, the Schneiders had a feel for the desires of large groups of buyers from the start. They opted for inexpensive compact systems in which records and CD players as well as radio receivers and amplifiers were integrated. “Department stores like Quelle and Karstadt, but also the Gütersloh book club giant Bertelsmann were among our customers,” recalls former manager Ackermann. The company placed high hopes in laser technology. "They never came true, we were put off from year to year," Ackermann is still angry today. "Our management team were not electronics engineers and therefore fully relied on the promises of the development company in Gera," he chats out of the box. Ackermann also sees a major reason for the bankruptcy in the rapid development of computer technology, “with which Schneider could no longer keep up”.

 Die SCHNEIDER Technologies Aktiengesellschaft (vormals Schneider-Rundfunkwerke AG) war ein Hersteller von Unterhaltungselektronik und Computern in Türkheim.

Die Geschichte der Schneider-Rundfunkwerke AG geht zurück auf das Jahr 1889. Felix Schneider begann in Türkheim im Unterallgäu mit der Fabrikation von Holzwaschmaschinen.

Unterhaltungselektronik:
Werbesticker der „Schneider Computer Division“ aus den 1990ern

Auf die Produktion von Unterhaltungselektronik stellte die Firma unter Firmenchef Leo Schneider 1965 um, als die ersten Musikschränke produziert wurden. Weitere Meilensteine in der Produktentwicklung waren 1971 Musik-Kompaktanlagen und 1983 TV-Geräte mit eigenem Chassis. Weitere Innovationen wie ein 500-Seiten-Speed-Videotext, der Prime Timer und Laser-TV folgten. Im Sommer 1996 stellte Schneider die Produktion im Zweigwerk in Nersingen-Straß ein.
Im Glanz vergangener Tage kann sich die deutsche Unterhaltungselektronik nicht mehr sonnen. Die Gegenwart ist ernüchternd. Heute kommen nicht einmal zehn Prozent der Fernseher, die hierzulande verkauft werden, aus deutschen Werken. Den Markt dominieren Firmen wie Samsung und LG. Vor zehn Jahren haben die Asiaten die Branche mit Flachbildschirmen revolutioniert, während die Deutschen noch an der Röhre festhielten. Nun setzen sie mit Billigpreisen Maßstäbe – auch weil sie unter viel günstigeren (Lohn-)Bedingungen produzieren. Ein Standortvorteil, der deutsche Herstellern wie ein Keulenschlag trifft. Markengeräte mit einem Meter Bildschirmdiagonale, die in Elektromärkten für 369 Euro verkauft werden, sind keine Seltenheit.
Insolvenz:

2002 stellte Schneider einen Insolvenzantrag, und im Oktober 2002 wurden die Produktionsanlagen in Türkheim, Warenbestände und die Schneider-Markenrechte an den chinesischen Elektronikkonzern TCL verkauft. 2004 fusionierte dann TCL mit dem französischen Thomson-Konzern zum weltgrößten Hersteller von TV-Geräten. Als Ende Januar 2005 die Produktion eingestellt wurde, arbeiteten noch 120 Mitarbeiter im Werk Türkheim.

Martin Runge kritisierte als wirtschaftspolitischer Sprecher der GRÜNEN-Landtagsfraktion den zuständigen Minister Wiesheu:

    "...Die „Sanierungsaktivitäten" von Staatsregierung und LfA, der landeseigenen Förderbank, waren so angelegt, dass sie von Anfang an keinen Gewinn für das Unternehmen und seine Mitarbeiter bringen konnten. Im Gegenteil: Staatsregierung und LfA sind mitverantwortlich am Niedergang und an der Zerschlagung der Schneider Technologies AG und ihrer Töchter Schneider Electronics AG und Schneider Laser Technologies AG... "

Das ehemalige Werksgelände in Türkheim wurde von einem Speditionsunternehmen aufgekauft, und im Sommer 2006 wurde mit der Demontage des Schneider-Schriftzuges die Ära der Schneider-Rundfunkwerke AG in Türkheim endgültig beendet.

  Some References:

"China's TV Maker Buys Bankrupt German Schneider", www.china.org.cn, 9 October 2002
"Defunct Audio Manufacturers - Sa to Se", audiotools.com, Schneider Rundfunkwerke AG

"Schneider Electronics GmbH.", investing.businessweek.com, Bloomberg, retrieved 17 July 2011

Einzelnachweise:

Das Ende einer Ära, Augsburger Allgemeine, 17. April 2015
Historie, Finsterwalder Transport & Logistik, abgerufen 1. Juni 2019

Walther, Die Firma und Ihre Rechner, abgerufen 1. Juni 2019

Mitbegründer der Türkheimer Schneider Werke ist tot, Augsburger Allgemeine, 25. März 2019

Schneider Gesamtkatalog 1981/82, Seite 4 bis 6, abgerufen 1. Juni 2019

Schneider Gesamtkatalog 1983/84, Seite 22 bis 23, abgerufen 1. Juni 2019

Schneider Gesamtkatalog 1993, abgerufen 1. Juni 2019

Dual Geschichte, Dual-Plattenspieler.de abgerufen 1. Juni 2019