Best CRT colour TV?

[MALC SCOTT]

I rescued a Toshiba 36zp48 from the tip 9 years ago. The faulty DFS module was replaced and it has displayed perfect quality pictures and sound since.
The on/off knob broke a couple of months ago, anyone got a spare? Malc.

[Clydeuk]

I can remember looking really hard for the wires on my Sony, I had to get really close and displaying a white raster there were two very faint lines across the screen. I never noticed them in normal viewing.

I believe the issue was more pronounced on their monitors, perhaps due to being sat closer to the screen and concentrating more on particular areas.

Best set I ever had for geometry was a 25 inch Mitsubishi. Shame the tube wasn't the best for longevity.

[ben]

I still miss the Schneider DTV (Hitachi badged) 28" 4:3 100 Hz set I used to have in the bedroom. I was sceptical of the 100hz after seeing some horrible 100hz Samsungs (now there's a brand I really hate). But this Schneider was great, especially bearing in mind I mostly watched old VHS and Beta tapes on it. Unfortuantely there were frame output problems every few years, and it was a nightmare to work on in terms of access, so it got scrapped. A 26" Grundig cuc60 now takes its place!

I'm undecided about Sony. Almost all the ones that have come my way (ae /be/ fx chassis types mostly) had pinkish/greenish tints and a few had CRT go low emission (AKB blanking) after 6-8 years, which seems far lower than other brands. I'm sure they were great when working but they just seemed to be poor value for money.

[McMurdo]

Mitsubishi had a pretty decent pic on their black diamonds, I had one for a few years and it was better than the sony trinitron that replaced it (and is still my main tv).
Most of the last generation CRT tv's looked appalling to me, especially the flat-square tubes with the really thick glass where the pic always looked dull and lifeless; whether Philips or Vestel.

[Gillian]

The Philips G8 delta gun picture was excellent when new too.

[cheerfulcharlie]

I think the G8 MK1 was one of the best colour sets of all time especially with the 22' A56 120ax tube.

...and that Trinitron tube that people wax lyrical about was overrated IMHO

[hans]

I never had a New tv.

From memory all the Sonys I saw (had 5+ years of use) were not more than "good". Many were horrible to watch due to soft tubes. Probaly good when New though. BOs were "average". Philips had in general good sets and tubes, but some of their tubes got soft faster than others. Some A67 540X were utter crap, but other gave very good Pictures. Other tubes that were bad reliability wise were Telefunken, Probably good Picture when New, but died fast. ITT/SEL tubes lost focus fast. I newer saw a good Picture on a Sylvania tube.

I never liked the Toshiba tubes. The were in sets like Luxor, Grundig and Rank. The colours didn't seem quite Natural.

I remember Hitachi tubes as good. Can't remeber which sets used them...

Some of the Videocolor tubes were quite good, but others could be quite bad.

Some sets that amazed me:

Luxor B2 With the Philips A67 510X tube. At the time I repaired them they were about 15 years old, if the tube was good they had a very Sharp and contrasty Picture.

70's Telefunken sets could give very good Picture, if you gave them Philips tubes. A 712 With a low milage tube was hard to beat.

I now have a 28" Philips "Blackline S something" (about 15 years old) which I have saved because I haven't seen a set With a better Picture recently. I made my crt 32" Loewe and my 42" plasma Panasonic look uninspired when compared.

[German Dalek]

For me the best is the PHILIPS K 9i with a A 66-510X.
Natural colours with a long live tube.
2 speakers with controls for treble and bass, thats what you need
to enjoy music on television.

German Dalek

[threeseven]

Originally Posted by cheerfulcharlie

I think the G8 MK1 was one of the best colour sets of all time especially with the 22' A56 120ax tube.

I'll second that. I worked at CES at the time and worshiped the G8! I just could not afford one, even from the staff shop! It was also an excellent set to work on.

[mhennessy]

Domestically, I've never seen a good delta-gun CRT - I'm probably slightly too young, but all the ones I saw were worn out and/or badly set up. I also never understood why people were so impressed by the G11/20AX combination. But a good K30/30AX was unbeatable. Much better than the TX10 (and I ought to be biased because my uncle at the time worked at Enfield). I also had a 26" B&O set with a good 30AX CRT, but it wasn't a patch on the 26" Philips K35 I also had at the same time (complete with "beam booster" velocity mod PCB). Trouble is, the 30AX CRT doesn't enjoy a long service life. And when you see them today, they are amazingly "grey" when switched off, meaning that you need a dark room to watch them properly. More modern sets were darker (tinted glass and anti-reflective coatings), so gave better contrast ratios in more typical room lighting.

[slidertogrid]

One of the best early colour sets was the National Panasonic 85G. Most sets never went wrong and the picture knocked spots off anything else available at the time. The only problem was that they were only available as 18" screen.
When you compare them to the other small screen sets of the time though there was no contest. The Ct200 with it's picture size control marked Brightness.. The Sony 18BANG10UB... The Thorn 8000 muddycolourstreakoflare..
The G11 must rank among the longest lived sets, reliability was only average or below especially with early sets but once reworked they went on for ever. Admittedly often on a second tube but I can remember repairing them well into the 1990's by which time some sets were coming up for 20 years old.
My mate still has my old 32" Sony that must be coming up for 15 years old by now It's never gone wrong but the tube is now looking a bit tired.
Who was it said "Old Sonys never die, they just slowly fade away..." ?
My Cousin has a Toshiba 28" set that is about 20 years old. Still used every day as a main set only one fault in all that time, the little blue disc capacitor in the line stage that goes off like a shotgun!
Tosh gets my vote as far as later sets are concerned!

Rich.

[wd40addict]

Not really domestic. But I remember being stunned by a Barco monitor in the 80s when I was an apprentice. It was used to show training videos on U-matic and the picture and sound from this was streets ahead of anything I'd seen/heard in anyone's living room (including B&O, Sony etc)!

[music-centre]

I am still using only CRT sets, the only LCD here is the computer monitor, I thought the best of the late widescreen sets were good really. When LCD ones took over I was given 3by people throwing them out, all with as new tubes and working well.

Samsung WS-32A116D which has 100HZ scanning but I really cant see any of the strange movement affects and that sort of tiny dot affect around objects on the screen that used to annoy me on earlier models and its a good natural and bright picture.

Panasonic Acuity TX-32PD50 which was the last of the large Panasonic sets just after the PD30 I think, again its a good bright picture, some of the scanning modes better than others.

Sony KV-28LS30U (I think that's the number) the best sound of the 3 sets and a very good picture.

Trouble is I have more sets than rooms to use them in now! there is also an earlier Sony in a black case and a Philips 4:3 Matchline one with the Mahogany type case and stand.

I agree about the Philips G8 working well, I had a 26in set for years when they were a current model, that I wish I still had.
Steve.

[electronicskip]

I think the best CRT Tv i ever owned for picture quality was a Sony KV27XRTU (Apologies if the model number is wrong)
Was a lovely trinitron unit with "ears" Stereo speakers either side of the main unit.
I had it for years until i finally brought a Philips widescreen tv.

[Clydeuk]

I loved the G8, we had 2 on rental in the early 80's, a 520 and a 550. I remember the 550 had a cracking picture but was by then getting on and didn't last very long. I suspect it was probably boosted to get the last year or so out of it. I remember when the guy came to replace it (we upgraded to a teletext set) he was shocked that we had been using it with such a bad tube. The replacement (a Panasonic) certainly was an eye opener, to me it looked like we were looking out of the window the picture seemed that good.

I agree about the G11/20AX, I never saw a great one the picture always seemed to be lacking, compared with the Decca 100 using the same CRT which I thought worked really well.

[Maarten]

Originally Posted by ben

I'm undecided about Sony. Almost all the ones that have come my way (ae /be/ fx chassis types mostly) had pinkish/greenish tints and a few had CRT go low emission (AKB blanking) after 6-8 years, which seems far lower than other brands. I'm sure they were great when working but they just seemed to be poor value for money.

Did you by any chance keep notes on where those low emission CRTs were made? UK, Germany or Japan?

[John123]

Originally Posted by Gillian

I always though Salora took some beating .
If you look closely at a Sony picture ,you could see the shadow mask suspension wires on the picture about 2cm in from each side .
Purity was also a problem with Sony too .
I worked for a Salora dealer ,which later moved on to Finlux .
The Luxors were also good as well as Philips .

Still have a Salora 28K70 that we got in 1987 from a dealership in Bedford. I believe the Videocolor tube it employs was also found in some professional video/ arcade monitors from the time (Hantarex etc).

It's a high hours set so naturally it's looking a tad soft now (focus pot on max), but text is still pretty sharp and still producing a very clean picture. Never had any real issues apart from dry joints and a new E-W transistor.

[Maarten]

Salora made pretty good sets back then. It was only with their M chassis (later reincarnated as Nokia Eurodigi) that they lost that reputation.

[John123]

Originally Posted by Maarten

Salora made pretty good sets back then. It was only with their M chassis (later reincarnated as Nokia Eurodigi) that they lost that reputation.

Yes, I recall they went downhill into the nineties. Bit of a shame as they were a very innovative company.

[ntscuser]

Surely the "best" is entirely dependent on what you want it for?

Some early colour TVs had lovely cabinets but laughably-bad colour decoders.

For many years if you needed a multi-standard monitor then the Sony Profeel was clearly the best choice.

Then again we used Philips Matchlines almost exclusively for public demonstrations, almost all the TV salesmen I knew personally also had Philips Matchlines at home. The cheap Samsung portables we used in RGB mode as check monitors in the showroom knocked out incredible pictures too.

The final generation of Beko models represented incredible value-for-money and bulletproof reliability. My LG-badged Beko has performed faultlessly for eleven years now without ever needing attention.

JVC and Toshiba had excellent connectivity to other devices but were often three or four times the price of a similar sized Beko.