Worst product design...Sylvania receiver (circa late 1972). My dad worked for them, and higher power receivers (50 wpc) were starting to be introduced due to transistor cicuitry. Employee discounts were HUGE, I was a freshman at U. Miami (Fla.) and I wanted to rock the dorm! When the FM multiplex IC went bad, a buddy and I replaced it. Disassembly proceedure: remove several mounting screws from both front and back panels, disconnect and remove the front (control) and back (input/output rca jacks) panels connected via MUTIPLE JUMPER CABLES, remove the power transformer WHICH WAS BOLTED DIRECTLY TO THE WOOD CABINET (I kid you not!...more jumper cables!) Slide the circuit board (only one HUGE flimsy board...no sub boards) out of either end of the now hollow (open ended) wood cabinet! This board was also not mounted on any kind of metal chasis! Disassemble/reassemble time 1 hour plus! And this from a company that built electronics for the defense industry!
The worst sound system
Our group from work went to a bar here in Chandler AZ for beers and wings and they had their the music (sic) cranked upwards of 90db, it was hard to talk over. The speakers were "kick boxes" like designed for between the back seat and the rear cab of a pick-up truck hung on the wall about five feet up, piezo tweeters and all. The sound coming from these things was enough to cause mental distress, boom, boom, screech, screech, lord only knows what kind of crappy electronics provided the drive to these things. I won't even call them speakers and nobody seemed to mind the terrible sounds in this bar except me. I mean, this was so bad I wanted to leave immediatly but I did stay for a couple of beers and the wings. But, that got me to thinking, who put this crap together and why do all of these people sit in this place and either enjoy or put up with this sound? I will never go back to this bar just because the sound is the worst I've ever heard.