Product ratings and brand reliability.(air conditioners, camcorders, digital cameras )(Buyers guide)

The product rating and brand reliability information that follows is designed to help you zero in on the model you want to buy. Start by reading the general buying advice for the product you're interested in. The page numbers for these reports are noted on each Ratings page. Then turn to the Ratings chart to get the big picture in terms of performance.

The Quick Picks highlight the best models for most people plus models that may be especially suited to your family's needs. The Recommendations provide additional detail on features and performance for individual models. The key numbers helps you move between the charts and the other information. Products with equal scores are listed alphabetically.

Consumer Reports checked to make sure most of the products rated in this Buying Guide were still available when the book was published. However, depending on how long after publication you use this book, you may find a Rating for a product that is no longer available. Or, you may not find a Rating for a model that is available because it hadn't been tested as of publication. Models similar to the tested models, when they exist, are also listed. Such models differ in features, not essential performance, according to the manufacturers.

Besides checking for similar models, you can also refer to the brand repair history charts for some products. Most products today are pretty reliable, but some brands have been more reliable than others.

Every year we survey readers on repairs and other problems they encounter with household products. From their responses, we derive the percentage of a brand's products that have been repaired or had a serious problem. The reliability graphs that accompany the Ratings give brand repair rates for 13 product categories. Our findings have been consistent over the 30-plus years we've surveyed brand reliability, though they are not infallible predictors.

A brand's repair history includes data on many models, some of which may have been more or less reliable than others. And surveys of a brand's past models can't anticipate design or manufacturing changes in its new models. Still, you can improve your chances of getting a trouble-free product by getting a brand that has been reliable in the past.

Product categories include appliances such as washers and ranges, electronic products such as computers and digital cameras, and lawn mowers and tractors. Note that repair histories for different products are not directly comparable.