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Looking to buy an CRT HDTV (will be my first HDTV)

post #1 of 38
12/24/10 at 5:22pm
Thread Starter 
Hey, I'm wanting to buy a CRT HDTV and I'd like to know what the top 5 models are with these specifics: Has 720P support ( I don't think any of them has 1080P), has HDMI support (For PS3 and HTPC connection) Flat screen, 16:9 or 4:3, 30" to 36". Has no overscanning / cropping (shows the full picture as it is)

I plan to search craigslist / ebay hoping to find one with the model numbers, I already search XBR and XSS series none in my area so I'm looking for other good ones too


I have a 19" 4:3 CRT currently, I realllly want something bigger, I plan to buy some blu rays once I buy a PS3 or try to play 720p content from my computer onto it.

I have a mixed DVD collection with 4:3 content and 16:9 content
I don't know if I should get a 4:3 or a 16:9 argh


quick questions:
Do CRTs need to be calibrated? Or are they pretty accurate with colors.
Will all HD CRTs make SD DVD content look good?
Will CRTs show the full DVD picture or does some get lost at the edges of the screens?

Oh and I'm hoping to be able to get one of these CRTs for around 100$, cause I'm really tight on money one of the reasons I haven't bought an HDTV yet, do you think it's possible?

Thanks
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post #2 of 38
12/24/10 at 6:21pm
Depending on where you live it's possible to find a deal like that I suppose. You may just have to look for awhile. Most people selling them at that price just want to get rid of them I would guess.

Keep in mind these sets went out of production awhile ago, so it's hard to say what condition the one you find will be in. I've purchased two in the last two years(both Sony)and was fortunate to get sets that were in in excellent condition. No warranties or guarantees left on these things, so you might get lucky or you might get a very used up tv. Make sure to look at in person before you buy.

Standard definition stuff looks better than it would on an LCD, but it still isn't going to knock your socks off. These tvs display 1080i, and will convert any other signal to that resolution. HD looks great, as do ps3/xbox games.

It probably wouldn't be worth getting it calibrated if you are trying to save money.

The Sony xs955 and xbr960 are the ones to look for as they have they desirable 34" super fine pitch tube. Any of the Sony HD CRT's would probably look great compared to your old one though. There are some other brands but I have no experience with any of them.

Good luck!
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post #3 of 38
12/24/10 at 7:28pm
Philips & Samsung also made some units.
you would want a 30'' 16;9 or more to be bigger than 19 4;3.
some 4;3 hd were made but don't know if any had hdmi inputs.
stick at with craigslist you should get one for $100 or so. been picking up a couple crt's myself. if you can find one in a bedroom or spare room with low miles lol
good luck
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post #4 of 38
12/25/10 at 10:34am
Quote:
Originally Posted by madmadworld View Post

Philips & Samsung also made some units.
you would want a 30'' 16;9 or more to be bigger than 19 4;3.
some 4;3 hd were made but don't know if any had hdmi inputs.stick at with craigslist you should get one for $100 or so. been picking up a couple crt's myself. if you can find one in a bedroom or spare room with low miles lol
good luck

The SONY KD-36XS955 is 4:3 and it has an HDMI input. I should know... I own two!

TLK
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post #5 of 38
12/25/10 at 10:35am
Any Sony that use SFP technology.. Truly unbelievable.. I see detail my Samsung CRT doesn't show, & also betters my dads 61 inch DLP 1080p in terms of minute detail. & wide screen. No LCD in the 32inch range will better any good HD CRT..
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post #6 of 38
12/25/10 at 10:37am
I'd try a 30inch XBR955.. Cheapest out of the rest & has HDMI support & is similiar to the 960 minus the weight..
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post #7 of 38
12/25/10 at 11:28am
Craigslist is a good way to go as noted above, but also keep an eye on the FREE section. A week ago I lucked into a very nice Panasonic CT-34WX54 just for the trouble of driving a few miles and lifting it into my van. Especially in the next couple of weeks as people ditch their old sets after opening their new TVs last night or this morning. In prior years I have noticed an explosion of free TVs listed right after Christmas.

It will undoubtedly take a lot of tenacity, as you are not alone, but the possibility of a great find is there.
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post #8 of 38
12/25/10 at 11:38am
Thread Starter 
Thanks for the advice everyone!

so far I have found two 30XS955 on craigslist, ones 100 miles away for (70$) I hope he emails me back, he posted the ad 15 days ago.

The other one is 250$ and is about 400 miles away (ouch) but the man said the price is negotiable, maybe if I can talk him down to 150$ I'd attempt to drive there
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post #9 of 38
12/25/10 at 3:48pm
Ooooh, the 30xs955 is a very nice set-if that one is in good condition I'd snap it up. Its not as heavy as the 34 inchers and I think a bit more rare. I've been looking for one of those for a while now-I really like the compactness of the 30 inchers. I am not hung up on having a huge screen so that's a favorite of mine!
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post #10 of 38
12/25/10 at 5:38pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by salty View Post

Ooooh, the 30xs955 is a very nice set-if that one is in good condition I'd snap it up. Its not as heavy as the 34 inchers and I think a bit more rare. I've been looking for one of those for a while now-I really like the compactness of the 30 inchers. I am not hung up on having a huge screen so that's a favorite of mine!

I have the 910 which uses SFP technology.. Got it for 80.00..34inch plus the stand for free.. I do want the 30inch 955, as I see it as a upgrade over the 910.. & weights 158.. the 910 weights 198.. It literally took me & my friend 20 minutes to get it out of my truck, up the stairs, & into my home.. We were very careful not to damage the screen.. Well worth it.. I want to get it calibrated.

My dream TV is still a calibrated 960.. & high end CRT front projector would be good too..
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post #11 of 38
12/27/10 at 9:55am
Thread Starter 
Hey guys, I had no luck with craigslist so far, everyone who has one is like 400 miles away and I really don't feel like driving that far. That XS955 guy didn't even respond to me lol I guess he sold it.

I do have good news though and I need your opinion on it,
I found a local TV & Audio shop whose selling a 30HS420 for 100$, the man said the previous owners were rich people who traded it in for money towards a plasma. I haven't visited them yet but the a guy at a TV shop wouldn't of taken it if it had anything wrong with it.
I think it's best I snag that one out of there. I heard it's just like XS955's except it doesn't have Superfine Pitch, and I'll be sitting 10 feet and I heard you can't really tell from that far (I currently sit that far on my 19" lol)

One other thing I learned about it is you can't adjust the Convergence in that service menu, so I guess if it has good Convergence there I should just get it? (not quite sure what Convergence is but I think it's where you see tints on straightcolors)

What do you guys think? Is that a good set? It's got 15 perfect reviews on Amazon

I'm really impatient when it comes to this stuff I wanna go buy it and set it up now lol
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post #12 of 38
12/27/10 at 10:16am
Quote:
Originally Posted by itachi183 View Post

Hey guys, I had no luck with craigslist so far, everyone who has one is like 400 miles away and I really don't feel like driving that far. That XS955 guy didn't even respond to me lol I guess he sold it.

I do have good news though and I need your opinion on it,
I found a local TV & Audio shop whose selling a 30HS420 for 100$, the man said the previous owners were rich people who traded it in for money towards a plasma. I haven't visited them yet but the a guy at a TV shop wouldn't of taken it if it had anything wrong with it.
I think it's best I snag that one out of there. I heard it's just like XS955's except it doesn't have Superfine Pitch, and I'll be sitting 10 feet and I heard you can't really tell from that far (I currently sit that far on my 19" lol)

One other thing I learned about it is you can't adjust the Convergence in that service menu, so I guess if it has good Convergence there I should just get it? (not quite sure what Convergence is but I think it's where you see tints on straightcolors)

What do you guys think? Is that a good set? It's got 15 perfect reviews on Amazon

I'm really impatient when it comes to this stuff I wanna go buy it and set it up now lol

I would patiently wait for a SFP (910, 955, 960) model, but that's me.

TLK
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post #13 of 38
12/27/10 at 11:37am
If that TV is in great shape I think you'll be happy with it. The picture is still going to be very very nice, especially with the 30 inch as opposed to the 34 inch. I mean, you can't get even get the crappiest of the crappy LCD televisions for 100 bucks. And it's widescreen.

Of course, if you wait for a SFP TV you will be happy that you did too. Depends on how picky you are.
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post #14 of 38
12/27/10 at 9:42pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by itachi183 View Post

.... selling a 30HS420 for 100$, .... and I'll be sitting 10 feet and I heard you can't really tell from that far (I currently sit that far on my 19" lol).....

A 30" at 10 feet? Not only could you not tell that its not SFP, you might not even be able to tell that its Hi-Scan. I would recommend holding out for a 34" SFP or non-SFP. The size will make the biggest difference at 10 feet.
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post #15 of 38
12/28/10 at 9:10am
That's true. I sit about 7 feet from my 34", and that seems about right. Here is a viewing distance calculator for whatever it's worth.

http://www.myhometheater.homestead.c...alculator.html

We all have different tastes I suppose, but 10' from 30" is pretty far away.
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post #16 of 38
12/28/10 at 10:41am
Thread Starter 
I went in the shop today and the 30HS420 was so gorgeous I had to buy it, only 100$! and guess what I ended up working out a deal, I'm doing some work for him so I'm basically getting the TV for free.

The only problem is at the right left side of the tv there was a little bit of red coming off the text on the HD sports channel, the middle text and other text around the screen looked perfect so I had no idea if it was the sports channel doing it or the TV, either way it wasn't that bad.

I'm going to be getting some HDMI cables in the mail soon and need to plan on how to calibrate this thing, Should I just follow the sony service code thread for settings on my set? And do I have to calibrate for each input i.e. component,hdmi, I could plug my computer with HDMI and use the test patterns on lagom LCD page I think those would work.

Anyway thanks for the help everyone!
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post #17 of 38
12/28/10 at 12:33pm
Congrats! I'd like to have one of those 30" sets-there's something about a smaller screen that I like. Maybe reminds me of all the years of my youth when all we had was a 19" trinitron.

I'm no expert, but I think one of the tradeoffs of CRT's is that focus and geometry are never perfect. Both of my big Sony's have a bit of red shifting to the side in one of the corners, along with a few geometry imperfections. I fiddled around with the focus and geometry settings in the service menu and found that it was as good as it could be. I don't mind it, and the benefits far outweigh the disadvantages for me.

The big service codes thread is a great resource!
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post #18 of 38
12/30/10 at 12:39pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by itachi183 View Post

I went in the shop today and the 30HS420 was so gorgeous I had to buy it, only 100$! and guess what I ended up working out a deal, I'm doing some work for him so I'm basically getting the TV for free.

The only problem is at the right left side of the tv there was a little bit of red coming off the text on the HD sports channel, the middle text and other text around the screen looked perfect so I had no idea if it was the sports channel doing it or the TV, either way it wasn't that bad.

I'm going to be getting some HDMI cables in the mail soon and need to plan on how to calibrate this thing, Should I just follow the sony service code thread for settings on my set? And do I have to calibrate for each input i.e. component,hdmi, I could plug my computer with HDMI and use the test patterns on lagom LCD page I think those would work.

Anyway thanks for the help everyone!

Well done! A quick check on Amazon revealed the cheapest used set at $ 300, and I'm assuming the shipping on that baby wouldn't be cheap!
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post #19 of 38
1/16/11 at 1:59pm
I have to echo the feeling that 10 feet from a 30" is relatively far. I thought 8 feet from my 50" was too far! You aren't going to be able to tell the difference between the SFP and regular HS screen. I am currently about 8 feet from a 32" SD set and that is about as far as I would ever want to go. I can't imagine sitting 10 feet from a 30" 16:9 screen. 4:3 content would be like a postage stamp!
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post #20 of 38
1/16/11 at 2:03pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by itachi183 View Post

The only problem is at the right left side of the tv there was a little bit of red coming off the text on the HD sports channel, the middle text and other text around the screen looked perfect so I had no idea if it was the sports channel doing it or the TV, either way it wasn't that bad.

I'm going to be getting some HDMI cables in the mail soon and need to plan on how to calibrate this thing, Should I just follow the sony service code thread for settings on my set?

Sounds like a convergence problem. Hopefully it isn't too noticeable during regular use.

I use the AVIA disc to calibrate. I don't go through the whole thing. I just pull up a crosshatch pattern to adjust geometry, which I do through the TV's service mode. Then I use the basic video patterns to adjust contrast/brightness/sharpness/color/hue, all done through the regular user menu. I do keep service mode on so I can turn off the red/blue/green guns to help with color adjustments.
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post #21 of 38
1/16/11 at 2:45pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by dcorban View Post

Sounds like a convergence problem. Hopefully it isn't too noticeable during regular use.

I use the AVIA disc to calibrate. I don't go through the whole thing. I just pull up a crosshatch pattern to adjust geometry, which I do through the TV's service mode. Then I use the basic video patterns to adjust contrast/brightness/sharpness/color/hue, all done through the regular user menu. I do keep service mode on so I can turn off the red/blue/green guns to help with color adjustments.

I have the service manual.. What do you suggest I do to better the picture?
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post #22 of 38
1/18/11 at 5:42pm
If you can find one, get a NEC Multisync XP37+. It has a high dot pitch but can sync at QXGA 2048x1536 and text is easily readable. Unfortunaltely it has no HDMI but 720p or 1080p at any frequency is awesome.
Mine sincs at QXGA (94.8khz horizontal and 59.7 hz vertical) and I have yet to see a better TV at the awesome size of 37 inches!
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post #23 of 38
1/19/11 at 4:54pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by neccrttv View Post
Unfortunaltely it has no HDMI but 720p or 1080p at any frequency is awesome.
You could probably plug it into an HDFury3 or another HDMI-to-VGA/RGBHV adapter for the HDMI support.

You're lucky to have found that monitor. There're very few entries on Google.
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post #24 of 38
1/20/11 at 9:56pm
Yeah I was thinking of buing the hd fury since with a 3d gamer made by curtpalme I can play 3d games on the ps3!
http://www.curtpalme.com/3DGamer.shtm
quote:What do I need?

To experience 3D games using 3D-Gamer you need:

A PS3
A DLP projector/TV with an HDMI input that supports 720p at 100/120Hz
Mine does 720p at 120hz easily!
But I am not sure if it will work since it's for a dlp...
Found it for 100$ when the lower model XM37+ was being sold by another guy for 800$!Sold for a freaking 30000$ new
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post #25 of 38
1/21/11 at 2:37pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by itachi183 View Post

Has no overscanning / cropping (shows the full picture as it is)

All CRTs are going to have overscan. You can correct for some of it (depending on whether or not you can get into the service menus) but it won't likely ever be perfect. Don't expect to get 1:1 pixel mapping like you would with a 1080p LCD.


Quote:


Do CRTs need to be calibrated? Or are they pretty accurate with colors.

Calibration never hurts.

Quote:


Will CRTs show the full DVD picture or does some get lost at the edges of the screens?

This goes towards overscan. The less overscan, the more picture you'll get. There is bound to be some overscan no matter what.
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post #26 of 38
1/27/11 at 6:29am
I'm looking for a CRT TV for my laserdisc, VHS, video2000 and all other old analog formats and gameconsols. I want a 29-30 inch 4:3 TV that can take/do 720P. Is Sony the thing to look for? How about Mitsubishi? Any special models I should look for?
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post #27 of 38
1/28/11 at 10:24am
About the best (I've seen) out there is a Zenith C34w37 which is a 34" 16:9 flat screen, and has the DVI/HDMI input. I found this TV to be superior to the Sony, Panasonic and Mitsu's of similar kind when I bought mine 6 yrs ago.
Get out you wallet tho, I saw a used one on Amazon for $1080 the other day. I think I paid $2600 for mine, worth every penney.

Also the last of the Samsung 30" slimline CRT's are very good, has 2 HDMI inputs as well as USB port for calibration. New they were under $500
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post #28 of 38
1/28/11 at 9:13pm
I have a Loewe Aconda 38" 16:9 in piano black. ~$4000 new. Best picture I have seen on any display anywhere. The only 2 flat panels that have even tempted me were the kuros and the runco plasmas (the ones that used pioneer panels...go figure).

Of course I have a 57" DLP as well because 38" is just too small. But the lamp just went out and I put the Loewe in the living room and I still love it.

I paid $500 for mine from a client who upgraded. It does not have HDMI, but honestly, 1080i component video on this things is as good as it gets. If you happen to see one for sale anywhere, definitely check it out. And IIRC, the bezels are painted at BMW...or they use the same process....something like that. It is beautiful.
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post #29 of 38
1/30/11 at 4:10pm
Those 38" viewable Loewe Acondas were monsters. $4000 sounds like a bargain price. I know they sold for alot more than that. It looks like it supports 1080i? I somehow thought they were SD-only, maybe some were. I've seen a few available second hand but the owners always wanted so much money to part from them

The German television companies had a great reputation for the best SD CRT quality. It is a pity they missed the boat on flat panels.

There are down sides to a rare 92kg, HDMIless, eight year old 40" tube television made by a defunct brand. You'll need access to a good technician to repair it if it breaks down, and to spend money on an HDMI c0nverter and possibly a gamma corrector for those ageing phosphers.

http://www.ultimateavmag.com/content...9-hdtv-monitor
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post #30 of 38
1/31/11 at 9:25pm
The Aconda 38" retailed for $5k in the US. They then dropped to $4500, and then they had a $3500 "base" model without the high gloss bezel. We sold a ton of them before Loewe Opta pulled dist. out of the US. We sold 2 of their first 42" plasmas which looked awesome. And we sold several of the 55" DLP Articos models. Those were a dud....all of them have been replaced due to being "unrepairable". They had the worst rainbow effect I have ever seen.


All I know is that I will use my Aconda until it dies. I love the picture on that thing! And you are right, SD looks amazing on these sets. Their video processing is by far the best out there. I have my Tivo HD connected via composite right now and HD content looks nearly HD.

But I will have the 57" back up and running before Superbowl. lol
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