I just need to vent for a second about the terrible build quality of appliances these days. My parents have a plain white top-load washing machine in their basement that they bought in 1995. It has zero computer chips, just a mechanical timer dial, and it has worked perfectly for over thirty years without a single service call.
Meanwhile, I bought a high-tech front-load washing machine four years ago for a thousand dollars, and the main computer control board just completely died out of nowhere. The repair technician told me it would cost $450 for the part and labor to fix it, which is almost half the price of a brand new machine.
It feels like modern appliances are intentionally engineered to be disposable junk so that you are forced to buy a new one every five years. They add all these fancy digital cycles and touch buttons just to create more components that can fail when exposed to moisture and heat. Is there any brand left that still makes simple, heavy-duty appliances that are built to last, or do we just have to accept that we have to budget for new appliances every few seasons now?