Show us your Toobz (CRTs)!

[SNESNESCUBE64 | 539]

Being that this community is into games of a certain vintage, many folk around here still use CRTs. Show them off! I'm kinda curious to see how folk have their stuff set up and what they do with them.

Personally, I have a lot of arcade monitors since I do a lot of repairs. Here are some of the monitors I horde have.

Because I do a lot of repair, I have some test equipment, many with their own CRTs. I even have a CRT tester/rejuvenator for some of my repairs

And finally, the game players. I have two that I play games on, an RGB capable NEC autocolor and a trinitron widescreen. The trinitron is super neat because it takes in HDMI, playing switch on it is a neat experience.

 

These aren't all of my CRTs, I have a few more not visible here, but nothing crazy interesting or notable. My turn to show off is over, what do all of you folk out here have!  

 

[Sumez | 2,950]

My Philips consumer TV is a nice one I got back when I first got my own place in 2001 - at that point TVs were getting pretty cheap due to how commonplace they were with very little innovation (this was right at the brink of flatscreen plasma TVs, and rear projection TVs was the super expensive luxury stuff), so even though it's a Philips TV it was kind of a budget TV, but you honestly wouldn't know it - it has an absolutely great RGB picture, and supports both PAL and NTSC, 50hz and 60hz, and even though the screen got some scratches at a party more than a decade ago now, the tube has stayed with me every place I've been. I don't think I can let it go as long as it continues to work well.

The PVM is, well, it's a 20" PVM, so you know what you're getting. This is like the Rolls Royce of CRT monitors. A guy I knew was selling out a bunch of stock from a local TV station, and I picked one up at what I guess now would be considered a bargain price. These things are heavy.

There's one tube I like better than the PVM though. The 29" Nanao MS9 that comes with most Astro City cabinets is, straight up, the primary reason to get a cabinet like this. Well, technically the MS9 is a chassis PCB, and the tube is actually one of a few different ones, but it's all incredibly high quality, and rubbing your face right up against a massive tube monitor is the only real way to play arcade games  

[DorkOverlord | 686]

Here's my Trinitron 

[MrWunderful | 2,927]

 

and my old one (sold)

[SNESNESCUBE64 | 539]

2 hours ago, MrWunderful said:

That shell for the consolized MVS is super neat.

[drxandy | 3,225]

Toshiba AF gang whattup

Also kv-14m30 

I wanna get a pvm one day, very nice

[MegaMan52 | 2,445]

Childhood CRT TV:

The CRT I've been using since 2002:

Some of my other CRT TV's are shown in this video (along with my HDTV):

Edit: I also have this TV (it is not shown in the video):

I'd like to play a four-player game of Four Swords Adventures someday with five TV's, five GameCube's, and four Game Boy Players. I have the equipment, I just need to find the time.

Edited June 5, 2021 by MegaMan52

[SNESNESCUBE64 | 539]

7 minutes ago, MegaMan52 said:

Childhood CRT TV:

 

Looks like you got some vertical collapse issues there, bummer.

[SNESNESCUBE64 | 539]

10 minutes ago, drxandy said:

I wanna get a pvm one day, very nice

They aren't all they are cracked up to be in my opinion. Granted, I'm not one to try to chase a perfect picture, but they are so much money for a larger one. The little baby PVM 8041/8044s are excellent test monitors though or are nice for a bench setup. 

[Famicuber | 54]

Our family had like around three or four CRT's when I was growing up. I got this "Tevion" tube from a friend a few years ago when she stopped using it. The nicest image of that tube I have was when I was testing my song on my sound engine a while back. I've been playing Donkey Kong 64 with that tube more recently. 

[MegaMan52 | 2,445]

7 hours ago, SNESNESCUBE64 said:

I remember you mentioned you were playing on a CRT when we played Mario Kart 8 Deluxe on February 6. It actually looks reasonably good on that TV.

[SNESNESCUBE64 | 539]

9 hours ago, MegaMan52 said:

I remember you mentioned you were playing on a CRT when we played Mario Kart 8 Deluxe on February 6. It actually looks reasonably good on that TV.

I love that TV, colors look so bright and vibrant. It's definately not a perfect tv for games, but I'm glad I saved that one off the side of the road. Not very often do you see a 16:9 CRT.

[drxandy | 3,225]

12 hours ago, SNESNESCUBE64 said:

They aren't all they are cracked up to be in my opinion. Granted, I'm not one to try to chase a perfect picture, but they are so much money for a larger one. The little baby PVM 8041/8044s are excellent test monitors though or are nice for a bench setup. 

I get that they are super over hyped, I just like the idea of owning old pro equipment and those crispy pixels. I would love to go 20" but the smaller ones are so perfect space wise, if I found one for the right price I would bite for sure.  It's been on my wish list for like 10yrs but I haven't committed because I don't really neeeeeed one and always need more games lol.

Seeing y'all's got me

Edit: @MegaMan52I feel kinda dumb to have learned just now from yer video that you can use 1 Gameboy player disc to get multiple players running. That's really useful info!!

Edited June 5, 2021 by drxandy

[DoctorEncore | 3,691]

I used to have a huge Trinitron I bought from a roommate in med school, but sadly I gave it away when I moved to go residency. I don't regret the decision since that thing weighed 100+ pounds and I didn't want to lug it around for ten years until I got a house, but I certainly miss it now that I've got a nice retro setup.

Some day I will reclaim a CRT beast of similar size.

[Link | 2,709]

Anybody want a 34” widescreen CRT? I’m kind of over it. Sony KV-34HS510. 

I have others, but they’re packed away while I’m waiting on renovations.

[MegaMan52 | 2,445]

Got this one for free with the remote.

[SNESNESCUBE64 | 539]

It's been a while since I've found a side-of-the-road special. Probably gonna steal the tube for a K7400 arcade monitor since it has the same exact tube. Sprayed it with the hose since it had a nice nicotine coating.

[RH | 4,903]

30 minutes ago, SNESNESCUBE64 said:

It's been a while since I've found a side-of-the-road special. Probably gonna steal the tube for a K7400 arcade monitor since it has the same exact tube. Sprayed it with the hose since it had a nice nicotine coating.

Really nice! I thought a thread like this existed on here but I couldn’t find it about a month ago when I got my latest road pick-up.

I’ll hold off talking about it, but I’ll make a follow-up post showing my CRTs and show the latest find. 

[RH | 4,903]

Below are most of the CRTs I’ve found and stashed. So far I’ve not paid any cash and I’ve found all of these on the side of the road.  These have been harder and harder to find around here but occasionally you can get lucky, which we will see.

First, this is my late model 24” Trinitron. This is my go-to unit for PS2/Xbox and later gaming.  
 

This next unit was my go-to unit for everything else.  I prefer bubble CRTs over flat ones and I was really, really happy to pick this up.  I actually saw the guy walking it too the road so I pulled in and talked to him.  He was a shop teacher at the area High School and he had this unit in his personal shop. When I picked it up, it had some type of brown tar like substance and it smelled weird. You’d think it was cigarette smoke/oil but it wasn’t I honestly didn’t think it was salvageable but I took it apart, gave it some good cleaning TLC and it had been an excellent Trinitron for NES/SNES  gaming for years.

 

But as you can see, it’s been relegated to a work bench.  I love that CRT too much to get rid of it, but I had to move it somewhere because a month ago… I found a replacement.  One I have been looking for locally for yeeeeears.  I don’t know what it is about this brand but JVCs seem to not exist in my county.  I’ve seen several Sony Trinitrons but JVCs have 100% eluded me.

About a month ago, some neighbors of ours were cleaning out there home.  Specifically, the matriarch had passed away about a year, and the older daughter came to move into the house a little bit before then to take care of her Mom and Dad.  I know the father has dementia and they had a big house cleaning to make room for their needs.

Anyway, most of their stuff they donated but the “trash” they set out by the road.  On top of bags of old make up and expired dry food goods was a CRT.  My son enjoys looking at any CRT we come across and since I have long-promised to not bring in and keep another one of these things, I was expecting my son to see it and read off something like “It’s a Magnavox”.  Well, he called out “it just says JVC.”

I had a minor flip-out.  Half excited, half shocked I just said “Don’t lie!”, to which he responded, “No really.  Is that good?” Well, I flew over there, lifted it up and sure enough, 100 yards from my own house was a late model, 18” JVC! Bingo!

 

I was a little worried because as you can see, this is a TV/VCR combo unit.  It’s been my experience that combo units usually have broken VCRs and lesser-quality tubes. I got this home, I did my typical inside and out cleaning, I hooked it up to a DVD player and boom, worked like a charm! Next I tested it with a VHS tape, which I don’t have photos of, but to my surprise, not only does the VHS player work perfectly, the tape I had worked so well that I could have sworn it was DVD quality, which is something I’ve never seen!

It’s only “flaw” is that it’s a flat screen. So, now I have 2x flat screens and my gaming area is missing a bubble.  That’s a real bummer but this thing is so beautiful and better looking than Trinitron tech, I can accept this as it is.

And the old Trinitron on my work bench, well, it replaced an old run-of-the-mill, 12” Panasonic.  It was perfect for testing. I couldn’t get rid of it so it’s going to find a corner to be tucked into under the steps in a closet of mine.

[Rhuno | 107]

Nice finds there, @RH! I remember WEGAs being all the rage! 

CRT is still my go-to for playing retro games. The "wrrrmmm" when they power on is music to my ears. 

Edited March 25 by Rhuno

[Rhuno | 107]

I currently have a Toshiba 27A32 which I got from a friend when he picked up a PVM. I also managed to score a 20M4U for free at the local dump. I'd been looking for any PVM for about 5 years, but couldn't really justify paying ebay prices. One day I drove through dump site and saw 2 pvms sitting in the junk pile. I took them both home and cleaned them up; one of them worked (pictured), the other did not. I kept the working one and gave the other to a buddy who is into repairs / restorations. I enjoy playing on both!