No More CRTs

[mr.bill]

Except for the rare exception, consumer TVs are not directly compatible with arcade game video feed. Trust me, the arcade community would be all over this if it were that easy. They have (as I think I stated somewhere earlier in this thread) found where you can swap in a tube from a consumer TV to an arcade monitor chasis but that has its own compatibility requirements and also isn't an operation for the faint of heart.

 

actually its quite easy to do a tube swap. there are youtube videos showing you how, there is a web page that tells you what tubes are compatible. I just swapped a 25" last month. if you can open the tv, thats the hard work. Metered the yoke and and it was correct for k7000. all I had to do was transfer the tube and swap the yoke connector. went from tired tube to perfect picture.

 

basically, any tv set you find from the 80's to mid 90's is a good candidate for a tube swap.

 

using a tube rejuvinator also works. but you can kill the gun if your not careful. But its generally a tool of last resort. you are taking life off the tube using it. So there is a tradeoff. sencore makes a more automated rejuvinator, but I have never used it. I have a bk 490 with pretty much every attachment to do tubes.

[zzip]

I didn't even know that they were still making new CRTs. I'm guessing once the supply of new CRTs run out people will just switch to used CRTs. Are there any issues adapting television CRTs to vertical arcade games or vector games? I don't see the supply of used television CRTs running out for a very long time.

 

So all the CRT TVs and monitors that you can't even give away today.. we should hold onto them because they'll be valuable someday?

[Keatah]

..we should hold onto them because they'll be valuable someday?

 

Right or wrong, weird or clear-headed.. That's the thinking of many vintage gaming enthusiasts. The only times I've seen attitudes change is when the hobbyist is confronted with moving or storage issues.

[Isgoed]

sigh. Another one of _these_ articles.

 

Yes, poorly researched, poorly structured.

 

But also, you must understand that the problems presented here are only TECHNICAL problems to be solved. Have any of you who are whining actually keeping up with the advances in CRT emulation through shader code? It's developing at an insanely fast rate (I know, I'm right in the middle of it), and within the next decade, we will be able to completely mimic a wide range of tube, phosphor and mask characteristics, which will allow for the intended look to be preserved. It WILL reach the point where we can select a given monitor model and have the support code to simulate the desired characteristics.

 

-Thom

 

Maybe you are right, crt emulation might be better in the upcoming years.

The biggest problem for me, though is that de modern displays are 16:9, so changing a crt for a "flatscreen" in a cab will give you a smaller display when changing the aspect ratio to 4:3.

[SiberianSpForces]

My brother was telling me about an article that said DARPA was supposed to be doing something with CRT tech.I fried searching, but couldn't find it.

Edited September 13, 2017 by SiberianSpForces

[BigO]

My brother was telling me about an article that said DARPA was supposed to be doing something with CRT tech.I fried searching, but couldn't find it.

There's this about vacuum tubes and electron beams, but not really CRT's in the context of displays:

http://gizmodo.com/a-century-old-device-may-be-the-future-of-electronics-1723927350