Consumer CRT/modern flat-screen/ PVM?

[Tartarus]

That was something that went through my mind was what did they have set on this how bright is it what did they do

that is pretty interesting I had no idea that they had calibration discs like that

[Bowlsnapper]

6 hours ago, Tartarus said:

yeah that's the first thing I did was factory reset the TV I didn't change anything after and I didn't select movie mode theater mode whatever I never or any of that

Experiment with the modes. you may get better colors that way.

[prtscn]

5 hours ago, Bowlsnapper said:

Experiment with the modes. you may get better colors that way.

closest mode to calibrated TV is movie/cinema mode, other modes are gimmicks.

Calibration patterns in video are open source.

https://www.avsforum.com/threads/avs-hd-709-blu-ray-mp4-calibration.948496/

And if you have calibration device for more in depth calibration there is an open source software:

https://www.avsforum.com/threads/hcfr-open-source-projector-and-display-calibration-software.1393853/

You get better colors, better contrast, less eye strain because most profiles have blue channel so high up to make impression of a brighter TV.

Worst offenders are laptop screens. If you work with a computer all day, calibration will help with tired eyes.

[coldasijs]

On 8/4/2023 at 2:57 AM, Bowlsnapper said:

I've seen the reviews. Old games are not designed with OLEDs in mind. The OLEDs don't scale pixels correctly and things tend to basically bleed over. The colors really aren't right and things just look odd. They come out smeared. CRT's are best for old games. OLEDs are much more geared toward newer media and things that run at the screens' native resolution. But so are CRTs, and things designed for that resolution look best.

I actually haven't tried running anything retro on the plasma. I'll load some consoles up on the box in emulators and see how they look at 480.

Scsling should be the same for OLED, plasma or LCD. They all have a defined pixel grid. Scaling on modern screens should be easier because of the higher pixel count. For exsmple 240p has a nice 9x scaling to 4k. 480p is 4.5x scaling which is indeed will cause sharpness issues. Problem is that modern screens is that first of all they don’t except most inputs from retro consoles, they usually don’t except anything below 480p. 
 

I use a retrotink 5x for my sega MD and XBOX, I can tell you sn upscaler makes things look awfully good and sharp on my 1440p monitor. Still it isn’t a CRT, but with the scaliness it comes close.

BTW I’m in the market for a CRT, looking at the last gen pc CRTs. A Sony FW900 would be the dream, but I cannot spare both kidneys to buy it. So looking at a Diamandtron or Trintron with 4:3. Some of them do 1440p “native” or more. The reason I call it native is that sll though CRTs can scale beyond their native pixel count defined by the aperture grill or shadow mask, but you loose some sharpness. 

 

[Bowlsnapper]

1 hour ago, coldasijs said:

Scsling should be the same for OLED, plasma or LCD. They all have a defined pixel grid. Scaling on modern screens should be easier because of the higher pixel count. For exsmple 240p has a nice 9x scaling to 4k. 480p is 4.5x scaling which is indeed will cause sharpness issues. Problem is that modern screens is that first of all they don’t except most inputs from retro consoles, they usually don’t except anything below 480p. 
 

I use a retrotink 5x for my sega MD and XBOX, I can tell you sn upscaler makes things look awfully good and sharp on my 1440p monitor. Still it isn’t a CRT, but with the scaliness it comes close.

BTW I’m in the market for a CRT, looking at the last gen pc CRTs. A Sony FW900 would be the dream, but I cannot spare both kidneys to buy it. So looking at a Diamandtron or Trintron with 4:3. Some of them do 1440p “native” or more. The reason I call it native is that sll though CRTs can scale beyond their native pixel count defined by the aperture grill or shadow mask, but you loose some sharpness. 

 

Thank you for posting the info. You're obviously more knowledgeable than I am in that regard!

For playing old games on an OLED, I was talking mainly about using the Xbox's emulators with HDMI. That's the only way you'd get an input without a retrotink.

I would DIE for an fw-900. They're just so fucking expensive... I would like to get an alternative, if possible. Widescreen is preferred but not a must. A lot of games, even modern ones, will run at 4:3. I wanna see ray tracing on a CRT. That would be Christmas for me.

Speaking of CRT scaling, I have an HDMI version of the Samsung Slimfit CRT that I've been posting about recapping. It also has an ATSC tuner! It'll supposedly display 1080i, but I can tell just by looking at the phosphor that it would be downscaling to 480. You're absolutely right about the aperture grill/shadow mask ruining that. If the grill isn't set up for 480, then it would be splitting into 1080, which wouldn't be ideal, but computer monitors seem to do this without any issue, so I know it has to be possible... The HDMI set is in storage for now, but I'm going to do a recap on it when I close the unit and get all my monitors out. One computer monitor has scratches in the anti glare layer, so I'll have to peel THAT fuckin thing off, but it should look fine. The other one I know would benefit from a recap. I had to crank the brightness up on the flyback which means to me that the cathodes are almost spent. Isn't very sharp either, but I've yet to play with the focus very much...

This weird, never-sold-to-the-public monitor looks pretty damn good for sitting in a box for 38 years.

 

[throwaway01]

cool

[Bowlsnapper]

 

I seem to be having problems caching the levels and freezing up. Level loads after caching though. Odd.

Damn that looks good.

[coldasijs]

So I joined the club. Sony trinitron 20M7MDE. It outputs 480p and looks gorgeous. These monitors were used in the hospital, previous owner picked 2 of these up for free because they wanted to trow them out . Might get it serviced and definitely will replace the fan for a quieter one.

But that’s not all, today a friend will pick up a Barco ADVM20 for me. These babies could go up to 1080i. Sadly only via SDI. Info on this thing is very limited but it is possible to rgb mod these things. Worst case I would use it with my retrotink 5x HDMI to SDI. This is mainly for my sega as SDI apparently doesn’t like 240p-480i

[Bowlsnapper]

11 hours ago, coldasijs said:

So I joined the club. Sony trinitron 20M7MDE. It outputs 480p and looks gorgeous. These monitors were used in the hospital, previous owner picked 2 of these up for free because they wanted to trow them out . Might get it serviced and definitely will replace the fan for a quieter one.

But that’s not all, today a friend will pick up a Barco ADVM20 for me. These babies could go up to 1080i. Sadly only via SDI. Info on this thing is very limited but it is possible to rgb mod these things. Worst case I would use it with my retrotink 5x HDMI to SDI. This is mainly for my sega as SDI apparently doesn’t like 240p-480i

Wow. That thing IS nice. Looks like it has good geometry, colors and scanlines, like a PVM would. I hear about people picking these up for free from medical establishments and I wonder if it's too late to get in on that. Probably, since I can't imagine a place still using a CRT of they are well funded. Would you mind taking a couple pics of the TV itself? Maybe the back too? I'm impressed! Would you mind sharing how much you got it for? I can use my imagination if not.

[Bowlsnapper]

This is my Daewoo with RF-only input. It is so good, and so perfect, the RF input almost looks like RGB. It must have a very good modulator/receiver. It has perfect geometry and shows no age whatsoever in its picture. The scanlines match up PERFECTLY with the pixel grid. It's true 320X240 and old things look GREAT on it. It has a moddable jungle chip, but I don't even wanna fuck with it. I think I'm just gonna end up getting an RF splitter and use that.

I tried Halo 720P with the 1080 plasma (non-3d) and this is how it looked.

This thing looks so damn good, but it is VERY dark with the Pound, which was never an issue until I used the plasma. I had to turn the brightness all the way up. I'm ready, Nemesis. Go for Xenium!

[prtscn]

29 minutes ago, Bowlsnapper said:

This is my Daewoo with RF-only input. It is so good, and so perfect, the RF input almost looks like RGB. It must have a very good modulator/receiver. It has perfect geometry and shows no age whatsoever in its picture. The scanlines match up PERFECTLY with the pixel grid. It's true 320X240 and old things look GREAT on it. It has a moddable jungle chip, but I don't even wanna fuck with it. I think I'm just gonna end up getting an RF splitter and use that.

I tried Halo 720P with the 1080 plasma (non-3d) and this is how it looked.

This thing looks so damn good, but it is VERY dark with the Pound, which was never an issue until I used the plasma. I had to turn the brightness all the way up. I'm ready, Nemesis. Go for Xenium!

Switch RGB range on TV to match pound cable, so it wont crush black levels. Since pound cable is fixed to limited or full range.

[Bowlsnapper]

32 minutes ago, prtscn said:

Switch RGB range on TV to match pound cable, so it wont crush black levels. Since pound cable is fixed to limited or full range.

On the plasma? What's on the CRT is an actual N64. The plasma is what has the Pound output. I didn't see an option for RGB range on the plasma, but there did not seem to be a way to lift the brightness without the blacks becoming too gray.

[prtscn]

17 minutes ago, Bowlsnapper said:

On the plasma? What's on the CRT is an actual N64. The plasma is what has the Pound output. I didn't see an option for RGB range on the plasma, but there did not seem to be a way to lift the brightness without the blacks becoming too gray.

Yeah, HDMI. Different manufacturers have different names for it, you have too look manual for it. pound cable black level is at 16, TV is set to 0 so from shade 0 to 16 is pure black.

 

[Bowlsnapper]

6 minutes ago, prtscn said:

Yeah, HDMI. Different manufacturers have different names for it, you have too look manual for it. pound cable black level is at 16, TV is set to 0 so from shade 0 to 16 is pure black.

 

Yeah, I saw the black level, but it's not just blacks with this desplay, it's the whole picture. That's the only problem. I'll look again but I think the pound may be too dark for it. I'll try to use it with the 3D TV too, to see if there are more adjustments I can make. But the Viera I'm currently hooked up to has very limited options.

[prtscn]

5 minutes ago, Bowlsnapper said:

Yeah, I saw the black level, but it's not just blacks with this desplay, it's the whole picture. That's the only problem. I'll look again but I think the pound may be too dark for it. I'll try to use it with the 3D TV too, to see if there are more adjustments I can make. But the Viera I'm currently hooked up to has very limited options.

https://images10.newegg.com/User-Manual/User_Manual_89-187-079.pdf

similar model, picture>advanced picture settings>black level

[coldasijs]

@Bowlsnapper skip the pound cable completely  . These cables are notorious for being either too bright(sega megadrive) or too dark. On top of this they have variable inputlag of 1-2 frames. 
 

But anyway 720p looks awesome on a plasma. I love the low polygon look of the xbox games. CTR nitro is one of those that looks awesome on 720p and 16:9. Picture below is upscaled to 1440p. But there is no extra AA applied or anything. I think this game was natively designed as a 16:9 because it didn’t look this great on my pvm when I tested it last week.

[Bowlsnapper]

11 hours ago, coldasijs said:

@Bowlsnapper skip the pound cable completely  . These cables are notorious for being either too bright(sega megadrive) or too dark. On top of this they have variable inputlag of 1-2 frames. 
 

But anyway 720p looks awesome on a plasma. I love the low polygon look of the xbox games. CTR nitro is one of those that looks awesome on 720p and 16:9. Picture below is upscaled to 1440p. But there is no extra AA applied or anything. I think this game was natively designed as a 16:9 because it didn’t look this great on my pvm when I tested it last week.

I try to match the native resolution with plasmas, so it looks better. Like I have a 720p plasma, and I use that for 720p signals. And I try to use the 1080 for 1080 signals. Although the 1080 does 720p fine. It's not as shit as an LCD. It looks a hell of a lot better. 

I want a retrotink for sure. Although I would be bothered by stretched aspect ratios. I see what you're saying about the design. Some of the print is the proper aspect ratio but the bitmaps aren't. It does look like it sort of was designed that way, doesn't it? That's really beautiful looking and thank you for sharing

Do you have a suggestion for PVMs, both widescreen and 4:3?

I definitely am eager to try the HDMI mod from Nemesis. I'd love to be an alpha tester if I can. I want some real HDMI output... And not that b******* MakeMHZ proprietary output.

[coldasijs]

15 hours ago, Bowlsnapper said:

I try to match the native resolution with plasmas, so it looks better. Like I have a 720p plasma, and I use that for 720p signals. And I try to use the 1080 for 1080 signals. Although the 1080 does 720p fine. It's not as shit as an LCD. It looks a hell of a lot better. 

I want a retrotink for sure. Although I would be bothered by stretched aspect ratios. I see what you're saying about the design. Some of the print is the proper aspect ratio but the bitmaps aren't. It does look like it sort of was designed that way, doesn't it? That's really beautiful looking and thank you for sharing

Do you have a suggestion for PVMs, both widescreen and 4:3?

I definitely am eager to try the HDMI mod from Nemesis. I'd love to be an alpha tester if I can. I want some real HDMI output... And not that b******* MakeMHZ proprietary output.

You can select aspect ratio in the retrotink, so it’s not the retrotink who is stretching things but rather the xbox itself. Only a handful of games on the xbox where designed as native 16:9.

Definitely not an expert on PVM’s, but anything Sony would be my first pick. The sony pvm 20L5 is probably one to go for, but you have to be willing to sell a kidney for it .  Not to long ago there was a sony fw900 up for sale on eBay in Czechia, almost considered driving  up there to pick it up, however 1800 euros was a bit too crazy. Just think about for which console/resolution you want to use it for. 720p and up usually break the bank and are rare, but 480i and down are far more easier to find. And sometimes you just need to be lucky. The Barconet ADVM20 I bought recently was only 90 euros, old advertising poster which I found suggests it can do all the way up to 1080p! Haven’t got my hands on it yet, a friend picked it up for me and its still at his house.

Here are 2 more pictures of my Sony PVM

 

[coldasijs]

[Bowlsnapper]

8 hours ago, coldasijs said:

You can select aspect ratio in the retrotink, so it’s not the retrotink who is stretching things but rather the xbox itself. Only a handful of games on the xbox where designed as native 16:9.

Definitely not an expert on PVM’s, but anything Sony would be my first pick. The sony pvm 20L5 is probably one to go for, but you have to be willing to sell a kidney for it .  Not to long ago there was a sony fw900 up for sale on eBay in Czechia, almost considered driving  up there to pick it up, however 1800 euros was a bit too crazy. Just think about for which console/resolution you want to use it for. 720p and up usually break the bank and are rare, but 480i and down are far more easier to find. And sometimes you just need to be lucky. The Barconet ADVM20 I bought recently was only 90 euros, old advertising poster which I found suggests it can do all the way up to 1080p! Haven’t got my hands on it yet, a friend picked it up for me and its still at his house.

Here are 2 more pictures of my Sony PVM

 

I understand that the retrotink is upscaling basically a stretched image... It'll upscale whatever you put into it! Any 4:3 game is gonna be stretched and that's just the way it is, unfortunately. I would love to have one of those things to play with. It would help with scaling 240 content to 480, since I have so many CRTs that display natively in that resolution. Although my Daewoo monitor has a native of 240, but only has RF input... I was thinking about getting an RF adapter for the Xbox since they do exist, and running my emulators into that so that they could run at native 240 resolution which is what they were designed for, NES, Genesis, SNES etc. As well as the n64 console that I actually have with an everdrive. Damn those scanlines match up well! It's a satisfying feeling.

I've actually looked at the PVM20L5 specifically because it really caught my attention among all the others. It's pretty much the biggest PVM you can get as far as I know before you get into BVM territory. That's what I would choose too

I'm surprised you found an FW 900 for much cheaper than I've seen them, which is about 3500 to 4000. I honestly would have picked that up, because it WASN'T a bad price among all the others... And it's the best CRT monitor ever made. If you see one for that price again, I would buy it! As long as you have the discretionary cash on hand to spend on it of course.

[trencherfield]

Picked up this boxed new unused Sharp 14" with a scart input, for RGB. Fresh out the box with poly bits still stuck on it.

Bought it mainly as it was small, unused and great for testing old ZX Spectrums initially, but will see how the Xbox RGB looks on it too.

 

[Bowlsnapper]

3 hours ago, trencherfield said:

Picked up this boxed new unused Sharp 14" with a scart input, for RGB. Fresh out the box with poly bits still stuck on it.

Bought it mainly as it was small, unused and great for testing old ZX Spectrums initially, but will see how the Xbox RGB looks on it too.

 

I really, really wish the US had standardized something like SCART. Even on cheap TVs, it enabled you to input a great signal source. Congrats on getting it new in the box! I managed to get 2 1985 Sony Trinitron KX-M270s new in the box and although they look like they can be modded for RGB, I don't even wanna fuck with it. They have one RCA input and it's composite video. Good enough for me. Lol. They were never sold to the public so I'm happy to have a rare set that you can't even buy second hand, brand new. 2 of them!  Got lucky enough to find an old service manual from 1985 too, has all the schematics and wiring diagrams.

 

According to prntscn, the RGB isn't good with the OG. But I'd be interested to see what you think of it, since I haven't had the chance to try... Is there any point in using SCART to component, or would it just downgrade the signal to component quality? I don't have an RGB display...

 

[coldasijs]

10 hours ago, Bowlsnapper said:

I understand that the retrotink is upscaling basically a stretched image... It'll upscale whatever you put into it! Any 4:3 game is gonna be stretched and that's just the way it is, unfortunately. I would love to have one of those things to play with. It would help with scaling 240 content to 480, since I have so many CRTs that display natively in that resolution. Although my Daewoo monitor has a native of 240, but only has RF input... I was thinking about getting an RF adapter for the Xbox since they do exist, and running my emulators into that so that they could run at native 240 resolution which is what they were designed for, NES, Genesis, SNES etc. As well as the n64 console that I actually have with an everdrive. Damn those scanlines match up well! It's a satisfying feeling.

I've actually looked at the PVM20L5 specifically because it really caught my attention among all the others. It's pretty much the biggest PVM you can get as far as I know before you get into BVM territory. That's what I would choose too

I'm surprised you found an FW 900 for much cheaper than I've seen them, which is about 3500 to 4000. I honestly would have picked that up, because it WASN'T a bad price among all the others... And it's the best CRT monitor ever made. If you see one for that price again, I would buy it! As long as you have the discretionary cash on hand to spend on it of course.

all tv's can display 240p natively. It's basically 480i, but instead of interchanging even-uneven lines between frames it will always show the even lines(or uneven). This is where the scanlines come from.

 

6 hours ago, Bowlsnapper said:

I really, really wish the US had standardized something like SCART. Even on cheap TVs, it enabled you to input a great signal source. Congrats on getting it new in the box! I managed to get 2 1985 Sony Trinitron KX-M270s new in the box and although they look like they can be modded for RGB, I don't even wanna fuck with it. They have one RCA input and it's composite video. Good enough for me. Lol. They were never sold to the public so I'm happy to have a rare set that you can't even buy second hand, brand new. 2 of them!  Got lucky enough to find an old service manual from 1985 too, has all the schematics and wiring diagrams.

 

According to prntscn, the RGB isn't good with the OG. But I'd be interested to see what you think of it, since I haven't had the chance to try... Is there any point in using SCART to component, or would it just downgrade the signal to component quality? I don't have an RGB display...

 

don't think RGB adds much over component. In theory it should have slighty better color accuracy, but in reality you will not see a significant difference. You can gain more with a better screen then going the RGB route.

 

[trencherfield]

11 hours ago, Bowlsnapper said:

I really, really wish the US had standardized something like SCART. Even on cheap TVs, it enabled you to input a great signal source. Congrats on getting it new in the box! I managed to get 2 1985 Sony Trinitron KX-M270s new in the box and although they look like they can be modded for RGB, I don't even wanna fuck with it. They have one RCA input and it's composite video. Good enough for me. Lol. They were never sold to the public so I'm happy to have a rare set that you can't even buy second hand, brand new. 2 of them!  Got lucky enough to find an old service manual from 1985 too, has all the schematics and wiring diagrams.

 

According to prntscn, the RGB isn't good with the OG. But I'd be interested to see what you think of it, since I haven't had the chance to try... Is there any point in using SCART to component, or would it just downgrade the signal to component quality? I don't have an RGB display...

 

I'll try and get hold of a proper offical Xbox scart lead as I currently do not have any typically. Then see how it looks and try and take some decent pics.

I've only got the MS composite to scart adapter at the moment. Might have a S_VHS scart adapter but I don't have an Xbox S_VHS lead either lol ..... back to trawl evilbay lol Never off that site of late!

[trencherfield]

Crap, the advanced MS scart lead is scalper money on the bay grrrr. Thought it would be peanuts for that!