I found this excerpt from a recent F.C.C. enforcement letter to be quite interesting:
"The general rule is that consumer electronics are protected only by manufacturer design from receiving any unwanted radio signals and home electronics have no priority over any radio or broadcast service." Curiously, this came out of an FCC investigation into a consumer complaint about RFI to an appliance from a CB operator who was apparently running illegal power. The excerpt is from the first paragraph of the enforcement letter at the link below.
http://www.fcc.gov/eb/AmateurActions/files/Probu10_06_01_5179.htmlThe message of that statement is quite clear and very powerful:
It is the responsibility of the manufacturer to assure quality design in their products, and F.C.C. licensed services are not subservient to consumer appliances.Licensed amateurs have earned and are granted operating privileges within assigned portions of the spectrum. If some appliance, in the presence of a correctly installed and operated amateur transmitter, starts receiving signals it's not designed to receive, then the appliance is malfunctioning and needs to be fixed. Unfortunately, the
REAL problem is most likely that the manufacturer of the appliance took a lot of shortcuts in the design and production of their toaster/television/phone/home theater system or whatever.
The first question I would ask someone who is experiencing interference from a properly operating amateur station is, "Have you contacted the manufacturer of the device that is having the problem?" The flawed assumption that all of these issues are the fault of the amateur operator is a popular but incorrect notion. Your amateur license does not authorize you to modify, repair, or otherwise adjust your neighbors' appliances. It also does not require you to reach into your pocket and start buying an endless supply of filters and ferrite to compensate for poor design and manufacturing by domestic and offshore manufacturers.
KC2UGV already brought this up very appropriately in his comments above, but it's worth repeating. I'll bet the receiver in that home theater system has a PART 15 sticker on it. The PART 15 message also should be present in the owner's manual. It's another very powerful statement that is intended to clarify interference issues, so be sure to ask your neighbor if they've bothered to read it:
1. THIS DEVICE MAY NOT CAUSE HARMFUL INTERFERENCE2. THIS DEVICE MUST ACCEPT ANY INTERFERENCE RECEIVED, INCLUDING INTERFERENCE THAT MAY CAUSE UNDESIRED OPERATION.Aside from giving advice or conducting transmission tests for a neighbor as they take measures to clean their stuff up, I think it's a serious mistake to get overly involved with their problem, especially with the dubious quality of the stuff that is sitting on the shelves of every Walmart and "big box" store in the country. That doesn't mean you shouldn't be civil about the situation, but you are not responsible for everything your neighbors bring into their homes.
73,
Rob W1AEX