This TV is so cool. It has it's quirks because the CRT is a little tired, but I've been able to get a seriously nice picture out of it. It also has a brand new flyback transformer installed, as the original died.. I chose an ASTI Magnetics flyback, but have an HR Diemen as a spare (The HR is of much higher quality, but it took a seriously long time to ship). The TV year is unknown, as the only IC on it just says "ENGINEERING SAMPLE", which makes me believe this TV wasn't actually in production, and googling the model number yields no results, other than my own posts. The TV was found in a thrift store in Pasco County Florida. It looks SO mint, minus one, just ONE scratch at the top center.. Otherwise this TV is scratch, dent, all free of defects. The woodgrain is in PERFECT condition.. I did have to make some modifications to the drive circuits on the TV though, namely replacing resistors with different values, due to the slightly tired CRT, but the screen looks seriously good now. When I found it: http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v395/Evilweredragon/IMG_0347.jpg http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v395/Evilweredragon/IMG_0348.jpg First power up: http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v395/Evilweredragon/IMG_0352.jpg Notice the blooming of the yellow, and the seemingly mis-aligned chroma on the left side of the yellow shirt.. This was a combination of the tired CRT and misaligned chroma delay. It had another problem though, when warmed up, it'd start making arcing sounds and the picture tube would flash. When I cleaned it, I found this: http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v395/Evilweredragon/IMG_0403.jpg The flyback was literally cracking apart. No good, this is a fire hazard. This needs to be taken care of. So I removed the flyback: http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v395/Evilweredragon/IMG_0423.jpg New flyback arrives and installed: http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v395/Evilweredragon/IMG_0462.jpg http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v395/Evilweredragon/IMG_0463.jpg This is the initial powerup. I was getting ready to leave to work so all I did was adjust focus and G2, thats all. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v395/Evilweredragon/IMG_0471.jpg Kinda iffy colors, but whatever, it worked, and no arcing or flashing. Awesome! I get home, and continue my adjusting, which took approximately 2 weeks to finally get right, as I don't have any tools to do this, but the TV DOES have a service switch, which collapses the vertical to make it a lot easier. After total adjustments to the drive circuitry, and chroma delay. Source was Beauty and the Best LaserDisc. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v395/Evilweredragon/colors-1.jpg http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v395/Evilweredragon/colors2.jpg With these shots, you couldn't even tell the CRT is tired, everything looks nice. Oh, and convergence? http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v395/Evilweredragon/IMG_0495.jpg And NTSC color bars. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v395/Evilweredragon/IMG_0491.jpg Perhaps a little saturated, but looks FANTASTIC. Sega Genesis as a source: http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v395/Evilweredragon/IMG_0515.jpg http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v395/Evilweredragon/IMG_0529.jpg (Yes, that's still SEGA. That's the Genesis port of Mario Bros). Beauty shots of the pristine condition this TV in. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v395/Evilweredragon/_IGP6897.jpg http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v395/Evilweredragon/_IGP6902.jpg http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v395/Evilweredragon/IMG_0624.jpg Sorry for all these pictures, but I was SO very happy with the results. Now videos! Before when the flyback was arcing. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9VU97yfXScE After everything was all done to the TV. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_b9_12DTosA http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HBk5Z2-LFZc http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_UfkNbuiGqQ (When I mention it just started clearing up, it was doing it on it's own for a while, but it wasn't AS perfect until after I made some adjustments to the chroma side.)
Looks nice, Wish I could keep a decent CRT around, but no space anywhere for one. Would be great to find one with multiple RGB inputs for my old consoles.
Dude, that TV is gorgeous. I'm glad that it ended up with somebody who can appreciate it, rather than ending up in a dump somewhere.
Hahah, so retro! Reminds me of my parent's old TV which we still had in the early 90's as a secondary TV in the basement - in retrospect, this old TV makes me feel as if I grew up in the 1970's, Lol (it was even in b/w!).
Thanks. When I see TV's with woodgrain cabinets and knobs for tuners, I fall in love. I find it even more of a challenge though when it's a TV with a problem, which is why it was given away to a thrift store. But then, when it's apparently a prototype and a one-of-a-kind, it makes it even MORE of a challenge, because theres NO information for this TV at all, including SAMS technical manuals. The fact I got it running great is awesome.. It does have a side effect though, where in a perfectly black room and brightness turned all the way down, where it has a red glow on the top half, but that has to do with the flyback and tired CRT. Turning the G2 down and cranking the BIAS up limited that effect to nearly impossible to see, but did limit the maximum contrast. But the max contrast right now is still more than you'd need, so it's all fine. For information, this is the glow before the G2 was lowered. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v395/Evilweredragon/IMG_0510.jpg
My first TV when I was a kid was kinda like that. My parents had been using it for at least a decade I'm sure (probably more), so when they got a new TV (a really nice, 27" Sony Trinitron) they gave me that TV for my bedroom. Even at that age (probably 5 or 6) I was aware that it had a terrible picture, but I was excited to have my own TV nonetheless. I would imagine those kinds of TVs are rather hard to find these days, though. I was at a thrift store today, and all the TVs I saw must have been from the mid to late '90s.
Congratulation on the great work getting it up and running! It looks awesome!!! (both the TV itself and the picture quality)
I love CRT, I'm still using one now, HD is nice for HD games obviously but a lot of my gaming is on retro consoles. There's something about playing games the way they're supposed to be played that I really like, RGB on an old CRT looks amazing especially compared to the washed out effect you get on monitors. I can see my self keeping a CRT around for a while, I'm currently trying to hunt down a 4:3 19" CRT TV as I find they're the best TVs for retro consoles, not too big that things suffer overscan but not too small that you have to huddle round the TV just to enjoy it. Good job on restoring the TV, looks great!
You think there's some way to make it accept a cleaner input source? RF limits the potential of these old sets.
Not sure, but I use a Blonder Tongue professional RF modulator: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQ_83G8UEgs Since installing it, though still RF, it looks like the best Composite video I've seen..
Probably could get it to accept RGB. Modern TVs use RGB for the OSD which is the basis of those hacks for NTSC displays that don't include RGB inputs. Obviously on a TV that old there is no OSD so it might be undiscovered territory.
Now THAT is how the masses perceive RF. Honestly I'd say people like us who know "better", should be rather jealous. We have to spend big bucks on RGB etc to get regain the experience we'd lost once our ignorance of technical facts was corrected.
cool to see some tv stuff on here :3 awesome stuffs I swear I had a tv like that when I was younger XD I miss that thing lol... I'm not too sure about getting some other inputs on it but I do have a lot of modulators laying around (not the pro ones lol) XD they work good nuff.
Interesting how the American and Far Eastern manufactured sets like that one usually have a recessed CRT. The European designs of the same age usually had a push-through CRT design where the entire screen face was visible (along with the black border around it). The recessed design only became popular from around 1985 onwards with 'monitor style' TV's and foreign manufactured sets. Also, before SCART became the norm a few of the higher-end European sets had some form of A/V input. Usually a composite DIN input labelled 'VCR', and often a DIN audio socket for recording the TV audio (onto a tape deck etc). Some of you might find >this< blog interesting - lots of info and pics of Euro CRT TV's (excuse the translated English, I believe the dude who created it is Italian).
I noticed that, the european ones showed the edge of the CRT too.. So I noticed a problem with the flyback I had installed from ASTI Magnetics, which didn't seem quite right. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v395/Evilweredragon/jailbars.jpg So since I had another Flyback that was compatible, one from HR-Diemen, I went ahead and installed that one. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v395/Evilweredragon/IMG_0654.jpg Much better black levels. No ringing or banding now.
Yes the OEM flybacks are often no match for an original one. For continued reliability it might be a good idea to replace the flyback booster capacitor (electrolytic), and Horizontal Output Transistor (along with any other caps in the frame and power supply sections).
Those parts tested fine so I don't want to touch what isn't broke................yet.. Anyway, the HR Diemen flyback actually seems to be exceeding the original flyback in quality, I'm quite surprised. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hE_VHAT15y8
