Want more retro videos? I shot a new short film on an 80's VHS camcorder: th-cam.com/video/mm7nqbz5IEU/w-d-xo.htmlsi=Zbu3VC__DubahPWF I also have a separate video reviewing the camcorder: th-cam.com/video/WET3pHBgiMU/w-d-xo.html
Old 1970's, 80's, and 90's CRT TV are built to last, most of it still works today without any problem. Meanwhile our brand new 4K Smart TV won't last 6 months after factory warranty expired 🤦
@@R3troZone i have a dell 2001fp CCFL backlight LCD monitor bought in 2004 that still works just fine... well sort of. the colour temperature is much worse than it used to be which is apparently a common occurrence for CCFL backlights. with LED it'll take much longer for that to happen but its common with CCFL backlights even after just 5 years of use apparently.
anything over rf is gonna be really hard to get crisp text over. there’s a really active scene of people that mod these old rf only enabled tvs to take composite, s-video and even component and RGB signals. a tune up and new capacitors also help with the sharpness as well. CRTs can actually look surprisingly crisp when given a better quality signal and given a tune up. great video by the way!!
@@InkDrop. go to Crtgaming on Reddit if your looking for a forum. If your looking for videos on the subject, #MyLifeInGaming on does alot of video game/cable related topics on there RGB masterclass. As for practical TV tampering, The 8-bit Guy has RGB crt mod video, that can be found by writing (How to mod a consumer tv 8-bit Guy) there's also RetroTech, which I personally recommend cause he changes caps adjusts the screen, and tuned many a crt tv.
Well, rf now is high def. You get great picture quality with rf. It's digital. Now pre-late 2000's, before OTA went digital, yeah, analog is going to be rough.
@@daveb224 It's not so much that RF is "high def", but that there's so few analogue signals broadcasting nowadays that one can get away with using it. One could filter unwanted signals out with a terminator or a RF switch. If you're only using a modulator, I'd suggest adding a terminator to the input so that no 'foreign' signals pass through. Digital over coax is something else, laggy when using it locally (digital broadcast/RF has an unavoidable buffer, remember) and still needs more expensive equipment.
I always find it amazing how a little digging can get all this older tech back up and running with modern stuff again...Old Vincent Price movies on these things are gorgeous! Wood Grain CRT club represent! I've got a Sears wood grain model from 1988, and its starting to crap out on me but I really dig that thing.
I’ve been a gearhead my whole life, was even a mechanic for a decade and always hated cars from the 80s. Mostly because so many of them were bogged down so bad and I felt the styling was horrendous and generic. But since the only one I see anymore are usually clean vehicles since all the rotted/rusted ones are finally in the boneyard; I’m starting to fall in love with cars from that time period. To this day though. My favorite car I ever owned was my 1985 T-Bird.
The bottom dial is not for cable. It's for the UHF "ultra high frequency" range. The top dial is VHF "very high frequency range". Turn the top dial to "U", and then you can turn the bottom dial to get UHF channels.
Exactly. When I was a kid in the 80s in northern NY we didn't have cable available in our area, but we had a large antenna on our roof which got us a better reception than rabbit ears on the tv did. NBC, CBS, and ABC were channels 3,5, and 9 on VHF. We could also get 11 and 16 out of Canada on a clear day. 24 was PBS. These were on UHF. Beginning in 1987 we could get Fox on channel 68 out of Syracuse. It always came in fuzzy because it was 80 miles away, that was the closest affiliate at the time.
This level of quality video is something deserving of much more popularity. And the way you present yourself is so casual yet professional at the same time and it simply makes a very good video to watch. Keep it up my man, awesome content!
I have 2 living rooms on my main floor. My front room has an 85 inch flatscreen, while my back room has a 26 inch 1985 crt floor model tv. I used 2 converters to transfer hdmi to coax and have a firestick hooked up to it for my cable app, youtube, netflix, etc. Text isn't crisp, but its readable and the actual video playback is tremendous, considering. I absolutely love it because its the same tv i had as a kid and i recently found it in great shape on the local classifieds for 50 bucks
Recently helped my mom clean out her den that had basically been used as a storage room for close to 20 years. Got access to her old RCA CRT from the 80s, which was our only TV until she got a flat screen Sony Trinitron WEGA in the early 2000s. The RCA hadnt been turned on in probably 15 years at least, i figured it wasnt going to work. We turned it on and it came right on and looks great for a 40 year old TV. Hooked up an old VCR to it and watched some old movies. Brought back good memories. These CRTs are a reminder of how reliable they are. Modern TV manufacturers claim the life of new LCD displays is about 10-15 years...that would have been considered rediculously low life for a TV 30 years ago, these older CRTs are getting up there in age and work just like new...things were just built better back in the day, sold as investments that were made to last.
Got the same Hitachi from a seller on eBay who never used it! He told me that his boss back in 1985 gifted it to him bc he had received a salary bonus for the holiday and it was a Christmas gift. The seller never used it so this thing is brand spanking new! Glad I came across this video! My love for CRT’s and favorably Hitachi’s is thanks to you!
Wow! I thought I was crazy for not having a tv for exactly the same reasons you mentioned at the beginning of this video! I live alone, mostly watch TH-cam but even if I do watch shows it’s usually on my laptop or iPad because I only need a screen for me. What’s more because I live alone I can take my iPad or laptop around my apartment to wherever I’m at easily allowing me to continue watching my preferred content. With a tv, you’d have to pause while you leave the room to say grab a snack or cook a meal but my way, I don’t have to. I have mentioned to friends that I don’t own a tv and they look at me like I’m crazy! I’ve even had one friend tell me she had “an extra tv” if I wanted it! But again, for me, my way is just far more convenient. So thank you for confirming that I’m not the only person that feels this way about having/not having a tv.
There are some advantages to using an older style TV for watching old videos on TH-cam that aren't in high definition and in the 4:3 ratio, a better TV with composite and S video would be perfect especially for DVD players... SpongeBob for example looks amazing on these old school TVs.
I had this tv as a kid! Born in 86. I still have a snes and ps2, a big collection of vhs and shoot vhs-c for my band and shoot polaroid. All about this vibe and always have been. More relevant and signifcant today in an all digital world in my opinion. Something tangible, hands on and responsive.
I myself use a CRT daily for TV, Netflix, retro gaming and stuff for quite a long time. it's not from the 80's, but from the early 2000's i would say (not sure). it is just something quite odd, but satifying at the same time. these things are neat, definetly recommend you to use one too! Edit: Mine is a small black 4:3 TV. Not sure on how big the screen is, but it is about the same size as yours!
Before I remodeled my bedroom and got my first projector, I relied on a Toshiba-branded TV/VCR/DVD player combo, and it handled my TV and VCR functions properly. The CRT would be light gun friendly, and there would be no lag to deal with. I can use the VCR to play and record my fighting game matches, particularly on games that have no replay loading or saving features.
What I love about recent classic game re-releases is that they offer various filter modes to emulate the look of a CRT TV. The actual games themselves look uglier and more pixelated on our LCD displays than they actually appeared on tvs of the day when they came out, so these filters help recreate the original look, removing that ugly pixelation and completing the experience.
3:21 That is the UHF dial and it can be used for cable on some tvs, also UHF over-the-air and cable tv have different frequencies and depending on the model it can support cable and over-the-air tv but most of the time it only supports over-the-air.
Pro tip: With those HDMI to RF converters, open it and remove the tiny resistor that's tying the video to ground, for some reason they added this resistor which is messing the impedance. The resistor is a tiny SMD resistor but it's easy to spot as it sits alone on the bottom portion of the board. The image will become sharper and brighter! You don't need any special tools just flick it off with a knife.
Bro you are one of the most interesting and underrated content creators. I love vintage old stuff like Crts and Jdm cars and I instantly fell in love with this channel when you talk about your Toyota Mr2, as that is a dream car I want to own one day. Keep up with your amazing content!
Thanks a lot man. I do feel I have a somewhat unique niche and style on TH-cam. Hopefully someday I’ll be able to get big enough to have more actual resources to work with haha. My latest cinematic Midship Retra hopefully will be a somewhat big break for me but obviously I can’t count on anything
I watch Black Mirror Bandersnatch one time and I fall in love with these types of tvs. It's crazy how they have the potential to make a comeback like vinyl did.
Watching as a long time CRT enthusiast I was tempted to pause the video to comment on the inaccuracies of the script several times. Nice video anyway :)
then as a teen in 1989 i had a 20 inch samsung but the idea of knobs stayed with me and i had to wash soo many cars just to get that tv set but it was worth it i remember the time my dad bought a VCR in 1983 a top loading VCR and god how i used to record tv shows , news, and cartoons like thundercats and heman
That's a really nice looking set. Hitachi was a VERY good brand back in the day. Looks to me like the picture isn't quite filling out the screen as it should. While playing Sonic, you shouldn't be able to see that blue border. It could come down to some of the electrolytic capacitors reaching the end of their usable life or just the horizontal and vertical adjustments need a tweak. Also, try adjusting the inner ring on the 2-13 channel knob and see if you can get the image sharper.
Our family just purchased a CRT for our small kids to watch. And yes there are many hoops to jump through but my understanding is that they don’t emit blue light and it is much better for your eyes/ brain/ circadian rhythm. Hooked up an Atari system and just got a DVD/ VCR player for it too! It’s so much fun to watch and play games on. I feel like to move forward.. we have to go back 😉🤩
Beautiful TV! Also great tutorial on converting digital to RF analog signals! I myself have an old 1989 13” Zenith Space Command that sits on my desk next to my normal PC monitor, so being able to use it as a 2nd or 3rd monitor for retro games on the fly would be a nice addition!
Superior Video. I'm a vintage electronics collector myself. I have two of the exact same stereo receivers that you have. Those Sharp brand receivers really have good sound. The nicest feature is the A/B speaker switch built right into the system. The only disadvantage is that you can not have both pairs of speakers on at the same time. As far as TVs; I have about 10 to 12 of the little RCA black & white 12" sets; about six each that are alike in the model style. Some have the brightness and volume above the tuner knobs and the others have the bright and volume below the tuner knobs. A couple of these TVs don't work quite right so I'm tempted to swap out some of the insides to see if I can get maybe two or four more working.
the extra dial is for another higher band of tv signal known as UHF. on that band one could recieve up to 58 (i think?) other channels that werent very good because the signals just didnt go as far as those on the standard VHF band. i have a CRT TV specifically for playing PS2 and older games because the new TVs dont seem to express the shading correctly. either turn the contrast up and wash it out to see things in the dark or turn it down so everything but the dark parts of games can be seen correctly. Other info; if your CRT begins to display the colors, contrast incorrectly or the screen begins showing distortions it may just be that the inside is dirty. Remove the back of the case and clean the board with canned air but dont use anything that conducts electricity unless you know what you're doing. there are capacitors in there that still contain thousands of volts of electricity even when the TV has been unplugged.
I'm an absolute 80's movie and technology nerd and I really want one, I also grew up with low quality yt videos on an ipod touch so I can see myself actually using it
I am 40 years old and I am glad CRT are gone, Those RF connections use to zap me as a kid while hooking up my SNES and NES and then had to get a VCR for the N64, PS2 and Dreamcast era for the composite cables. Until I got a VGA box and hooked my Dreamcast on my 14 inch Compaq Monitor which that gave the best signal. Then got the component cables for my PS2 to play progressive scan games on my first 1080p Sony Bravia TV I bought in 2007. To me OLED is still the future and glad I have the last 3D LG OLED from 2015 for my PS3. No Burn ins
I still use a knob TV in my bedroom, and keep my old vcr and SNES on it, mainly because the SNES and VHS looks better on it, but my old TVs sound is way better than any flat screen I've ever owned, it's nice to fall asleep to that old warm tube sound.
Im going back to the future! Im used to the "filter" of VHS and CRT so i just "upgraded my TV room with a modern Sony CRT widescreen. Loving it and my eyes as well. I don't knkw why, but i dont like the sharpness of BlueRay and LCD screens. Maybe got a eye disfunction 😂 Love my old gear. The bad thing would be power consumption i guess.
That Hitachi TV brings back memories for me. My parents had one as a kid. It is so sad how all these vintage TVs wind up being recycled or thrown away and only a few of them survive. Actually, my parents had 2 Hitachi TVs from the same era, including the one you have in the video.
@CRTpixels here! Great video! Love the Sonic example shown here! I've never streamed on my CRTs, but lately I've had a big desire to stream retro anime on one of my TVs. Thanks for the help!
Even budget CRTs handle motion better than LCDs and OLED, and they had no input lag and good black levels, which you have to a pay a premium for today.
I feel we got ripped off by LCDs of today, the old TVs you could just plug in and play, maybe buy S video cables but that was it, now we need ultra expensive TVs and a sound bar to get similar performance to that old school CRT.
@@PaperBanjo64 They both have pluses and minuses. LCDs are better in the day or with room lighting on, are much lighter and thinner and use less energy, and LED ones turn on quickly without need of a warm-up time. Their screen geometry is perfect, they are easier to make in widescreen, which most people seem to prefer, even though 4:3 was a better one-size-fits-all aspect ratio than 16:9 in my opinion. Modern LCDs are much better than the earlier ones. They are easier to make in Chinese factories with cheap, slave-like labor.
the motion being handled better is down to flicker but yea theres no way to truly replicate that on a modern display but the closest you can get is putting a desk fan in front of a modern screen spinning at the right rpm with a cover that hides most of the screen being visible (reducing the amount of time you see each part of the screen for at any given space in time is why crts handle motion so much better because your eyes feel like a lower framerate is a higher one if you see each frame for less time, and since your eyes have less time to process each frame as well, a still image, you also get better motion clarity because it doesnt blur while you are moving your eyes but the display isnt moving or so im told)
tldr you are right but the motion can be mostly emulated on a lcd or oled because its mostly flicker related however one it severely reduces brightness and two no display manufacturer will bother to implement such a thing so you have to resort to hacky workarounds to do it and if you are wondering why they dont, well another reason is 3 being that many people didnt like the eye strain from flicker as well as other inconveniences and as a result many people who arent too concerned about motion clarity, input lag, black levels and colour accuracy chose to dump crts for LCDs (still not sure what the point of OLED was though but i guess they do have better black levels and way bigger screens than CRTs) also power consumption of crt tvs is actually often lower than lcd tvs because while in the days of CRTs 30 inches was huge, but nowadays many LCDs that people actually use are like 70 inches or something so as a result the power consumption number is pretty similar.
@@randomgamingin144p Perhaps that is a little how black frame insertion works. It would be interesting if there was a device that could be made to put in front of modern screens that made it appear more like a CRT, without having to use upscalers like Retrotink or software effects. There is a specialized LCD monitor made for compatiblity with old gaming and computer hardware called Checkmate... at first I thought it had a special screen filter but I think it may just be IPS-LCD with old inputs like RCA connections, so I don't really get what it is.
Grew up pretty much the same as you. I was born in 95 and for years my gaming consisted of NES, SEGA Saturn/ genesis, even ATARI. I didn’t get my ps2 until like 2003. Obviously as technology and gaming progressed, I put the old games away for a while and all the old TVs got junked to make room for the new HD televisions. Nothing wrong with modern TVs…until you want to dig those old gaming consoles out of the attic. Old games look absolutely horrible on modern TVs and not friendly on the eyes.
Well, I’ll be dipped. I’ve got a 1981 Hiatchi CT-1302. I’m only 24, but I’ve had mine since I was 12. Picked it up for 3 bucks, and its never let me down. The issue you have with the volume is oxidization inside the potentiometer that the volume is controlled with. I have always been a technically inclined person, and have since ended up with an automotive tech career. This problem is easy for me to fix, but not so much for other folks. I’ve had an xbox hooked up for years to stream everything and I haven’t known anything different. Its funny to me to see anyone else try to use one of these for their daily lives, however i wouldn’t trade mine for anything else. Love the style, love the MR2 (Ive got a 92 corolla alltrac wagon that just hits all the right buttons), keep it up. Very interesting to see things on youtube that have been my way of life for a long time.
Nice video.The charm and the glow that people often mention, I believe, is the wider spectrum of colours found in CRTs (to the edge of ultraviolet and infrared). New OLEDs seem to be getting closer but still aren't quite there yet. As you mentioned, you can't capture it well on video because we'll be watching it on LED screens anyways. So it's missing that vibrancy.
believe it or not a 13 inch tv set and a 14 inch tv set makes a lot of difference witch is weird only being one inch more but trust me that inch makes a lot of difference as a kid i had a 1984 GoldStar almost the same as your HITACHI CT1302 but mine was all black and it was 14 inches and yes it was a color tv set with no buttons just knobs
I always wanted an old dial TV. Then I found this video a while back, but I didn’t get this particular TV because I was impatient. But I’ve always admired how yours looked, it’s funny but I like how the name “Hitachi” looks, just simple yet a nice name, the wood frame in the front. It’s just beautiful. I’ve been through a couple dial TVs now, but I wanted to get this one because I just always loved how perfect yours looks; I found one and I’m really happy! Also, if you didn’t find out yet, ST is for Skin Tone, it makes flesh colours more accurate. I think this feature was very fancy for the time from an episode of The Simpsons.
I have a 4K tv and a nice 1080P tv, but I guess my CRT will always have its place. Bought in 2003 and still works great. Color, black level is great on a CRT. I remember the tv's with dials and wish all CRT tvs had the ability to adjust horizontal, vertical manually.
I've been using strictly CRT displays since 2016 and honestly forget most of the time now that normally people don't see CRTs anymore. Shit I'm watching this on a CRT and I was halfway through the video before that even dawned on me.
i have my late grandpas television from around 1981, but it is so primitive that it doesnt have color or any electrical inputs. Except a headphone hole that works perfectly fine
Retro game pirating is usually considered okay if the games are not available to buy, so you can find rom sites everywhere. But the problem with old movies is we don't have an option to download old low res movies and watch them the way they were intended. Star wars ep. 4 was modified as well because they didn't like certain things on modern tvs, but that was the beauty back then
This is pretty much how I use my old TVs. My main TV is a 1985 Zenith System 3 which I use on a daily basis. I am not a gamer, and the idea that CRTs are only good for gaming bothers me. LCDs make me sick when I use them for too long, so my main monitor is a CRT and my TVs are all CRTs. I do have cable, so I use that as well as a firestick. Works just as good as a new TV and the picture is just as good as a new TV as well aside from resolution.
I really like the video but I do want to point out that a big reason to own a CRT, aside from using it for retro games, is that standard definition content (640 x 480) such as old TV shows, old cartoons (animation looks particularly awesome on a CRT) VHS movies, DVDs, etc., will look much better on a CRT. This is because the CRT is not doing any upscaling and displaying the video content in its native resolution. HD TVs have to upscale 480i/p content to a the native resolution of the HD TV and it never looks anywhere near as good as on a CRT.
If your wondering why you see red and blue lines on a crt television is because of the convergence and could be adjusted but would need to open the back to do so while worrying about risking your life because of the high voltage.
Well let not get to hasty here, you should look into CRT monitors that were made for computers in the 90's and then that would be a better comparison to what monitors we have to day. Those CRTs VGA computer monitors were more HD then regular CRT TVs back in the day.
I use my commodore 1702 crt monitor to watch TH-cam via composite. Most text is completly legible and it is fun, in addition can play my retro games via s-video, so crt crispy.
i still have a crt as my main TV (last of the flat screen Toshiba's) it weighs 80kgs. i will try your idea as there is only crap on mainstream TV now (MSM controlled by the Gov etc) . i haven't got the money to upgrade to a smart TV. Thanks for the video.
Not your imagination at all. Superior technology. No lag. No motion blur. No stuttering. No need for endless "calibration". Perfect for sports, games and films. Have to ask why modern TV's aren't bench marked against CRT?
I wish they would fix modern TV's input lag so I can speed run video games, so instead I'm forced to use CRT TVs. Imagine that an older technology better than today.
The TV was meant for UHF and VHF over the air broadcast. The lower knob is for UHF channels, when the top is set to "U" - not really cable tv. This is 240p/480i, not 480p. Retro games are 240p, broadcasts in 480i. The effect seen in sonic is due to composite video and would display the same over RGB on a CRT as in LCD monitors. The ref modulator is converting composite. Just fyi.
2:31 Well, you meant 480i, not 480p. Plus, flat-panel displays (even the 4:3 ratio EDTVs) supported 480p via Component (YPbPr), VGA or HDMI connections.
Not even 480i, but 525i, of which only 483 lines (give or take) were visible. Later, 485, 486, 487 and our favorite 480 was used in digital equivalents of 525/60. All TVs, including modern flat panels, support interlaced video signal and 4:3 proportions, but they of course deinterlace it internally.
You sure this is 1985? This looks pretty old fashioned for 85. I been a TV engineer for 40 years, and TV's had advanced beyond those clunky dials by then, but maybe American TVs still used the older tuners. As for your volume knob, get some switch/contact cleaner (NOT WD40 or oil based) in a can with a little hose attachment and squirt some right in the base and work the knob fast through the full range quickly, as it evaporates.
It's not the CRT (in most cases) where the details go away, and small print is a blur, it's the method delivered to said CRT. In your case, RF (radio frequency) is the worst method, as all the video information, and sound are blended, which interferes with each other (why brighter scenes tend to have some buzz in them). If you fed the signal directly in, it would be a hare clearer, but the best ways is to modify the TV to accept composite, or RGB for the best results, making those dithered pixels appear once again (again, limited by the CRT, especially if it's got a low dot pitch. The smaller the "Triads" (the RGB segments you see on-screen), the better RGB can look.
You might never see this but seriously if u don’t want and don’t use the TV I will take it because I’m planning to make a thriller series based in the 80s and I need a TV and that one is the perfect one! 😭😭
![PASULOL รามเกียรติ์ ตอนที่ 4 นนทกพบรัก [Ramakien Ep.4: Nonthok in love]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/tMUQgmZzf_A/mqdefault.jpg)
Want more retro videos? I shot a new short film on an 80's VHS camcorder: th-cam.com/video/mm7nqbz5IEU/w-d-xo.htmlsi=Zbu3VC__DubahPWF
I also have a separate video reviewing the camcorder: th-cam.com/video/WET3pHBgiMU/w-d-xo.html
Old 1970's, 80's, and 90's CRT TV are built to last, most of it still works today without any problem.
Meanwhile our brand new 4K Smart TV won't last 6 months after factory warranty expired 🤦
Yeah. Flat panel tv after 2 years: am die
Crt tv from 1980: works fine
I have a 32 inch LED I bought in 2007 that still works just fine.
@@R3troZone i have a dell 2001fp CCFL backlight LCD monitor bought in 2004 that still works just fine... well sort of. the colour temperature is much worse than it used to be which is apparently a common occurrence for CCFL backlights. with LED it'll take much longer for that to happen but its common with CCFL backlights even after just 5 years of use apparently.
anything over rf is gonna be really hard to get crisp text over. there’s a really active scene of people that mod these old rf only enabled tvs to take composite, s-video and even component and RGB signals. a tune up and new capacitors also help with the sharpness as well. CRTs can actually look surprisingly crisp when given a better quality signal and given a tune up. great video by the way!!
That's crazy. Mind linking me to the forum where this happens?
@@InkDrop. go to Crtgaming on Reddit if your looking for a forum. If your looking for videos on the subject, #MyLifeInGaming on does alot of video game/cable related topics on there RGB masterclass. As for practical TV tampering, The 8-bit Guy has RGB crt mod video, that can be found by writing (How to mod a consumer tv 8-bit Guy) there's also RetroTech, which I personally recommend cause he changes caps adjusts the screen, and tuned many a crt tv.
Well, rf now is high def. You get great picture quality with rf. It's digital. Now pre-late 2000's, before OTA went digital, yeah, analog is going to be rough.
CRT's have always had a more vibrant feel to them in my opinion, but that could just be nostalgia
@@daveb224 It's not so much that RF is "high def", but that there's so few analogue signals broadcasting nowadays that one can get away with using it. One could filter unwanted signals out with a terminator or a RF switch. If you're only using a modulator, I'd suggest adding a terminator to the input so that no 'foreign' signals pass through.
Digital over coax is something else, laggy when using it locally (digital broadcast/RF has an unavoidable buffer, remember) and still needs more expensive equipment.
I always find it amazing how a little digging can get all this older tech back up and running with modern stuff again...Old Vincent Price movies on these things are gorgeous! Wood Grain CRT club represent! I've got a Sears wood grain model from 1988, and its starting to crap out on me but I really dig that thing.
It probably just needs a capacitor refresh
Am using a mid 80s sharp tv at the moment. CRT has lot of hours on it and shows reddish.
Love these old tvs. Don't ever get rid of it
My brother is into all the old audio and camera stuff (and I am into 80s cars), so I can relate to this video pretty well
Even though I was born in '06, I've always taken interest in 80s stuff.
I’ve been a gearhead my whole life, was even a mechanic for a decade and always hated cars from the 80s. Mostly because so many of them were bogged down so bad and I felt the styling was horrendous and generic. But since the only one I see anymore are usually clean vehicles since all the rotted/rusted ones are finally in the boneyard; I’m starting to fall in love with cars from that time period. To this day though. My favorite car I ever owned was my 1985 T-Bird.
your brother is my clone lol
The bottom dial is not for cable. It's for the UHF "ultra high frequency" range. The top dial is VHF "very high frequency range". Turn the top dial to "U", and then you can turn the bottom dial to get UHF channels.
Exactly. When I was a kid in the 80s in northern NY we didn't have cable available in our area, but we had a large antenna on our roof which got us a better reception than rabbit ears on the tv did.
NBC, CBS, and ABC were channels 3,5, and 9 on VHF. We could also get 11 and 16 out of Canada on a clear day. 24 was PBS. These were on UHF. Beginning in 1987 we could get Fox on channel 68 out of Syracuse. It always came in fuzzy because it was 80 miles away, that was the closest affiliate at the time.
Can you even get TV channels on a TV like this anymore?
Yup - that’s where you found pbs!
@@GoodlyPenguin nope, analog tv went out in 2008, but you can get a digital converter box so you can plug a modern digital antenna into a tv like this
It's a beauty. Emulation can't compare to playing old games on a tube tv. It just looks and feels right.
This level of quality video is something deserving of much more popularity. And the way you present yourself is so casual yet professional at the same time and it simply makes a very good video to watch. Keep it up my man, awesome content!
I have 2 living rooms on my main floor. My front room has an 85 inch flatscreen, while my back room has a 26 inch 1985 crt floor model tv. I used 2 converters to transfer hdmi to coax and have a firestick hooked up to it for my cable app, youtube, netflix, etc. Text isn't crisp, but its readable and the actual video playback is tremendous, considering. I absolutely love it because its the same tv i had as a kid and i recently found it in great shape on the local classifieds for 50 bucks
I own two tvs. A 15" Dynex flat screen. And a "13 RCA crt. The crt was my first ever real serious tech purchase with my first proper job payday.
I still have a old CRT ill boot up every so often to play a few classic games. Its fantastic, reminds me of my childhood
Recently helped my mom clean out her den that had basically been used as a storage room for close to 20 years. Got access to her old RCA CRT from the 80s, which was our only TV until she got a flat screen Sony Trinitron WEGA in the early 2000s. The RCA hadnt been turned on in probably 15 years at least, i figured it wasnt going to work. We turned it on and it came right on and looks great for a 40 year old TV. Hooked up an old VCR to it and watched some old movies. Brought back good memories. These CRTs are a reminder of how reliable they are. Modern TV manufacturers claim the life of new LCD displays is about 10-15 years...that would have been considered rediculously low life for a TV 30 years ago, these older CRTs are getting up there in age and work just like new...things were just built better back in the day, sold as investments that were made to last.
I have to give your Hitachi major respect. It looks beautiful
You’re living a true retro lifestyle! I’m a big fan of the red Toyota MR2.
Got the same Hitachi from a seller on eBay who never used it! He told me that his boss back in 1985 gifted it to him bc he had received a salary bonus for the holiday and it was a Christmas gift. The seller never used it so this thing is brand spanking new! Glad I came across this video! My love for CRT’s and favorably Hitachi’s is thanks to you!
Did it come with the original box?
@@RedTroPc no it was this janky looking box, I’m surprised it survived the journey
God, i love the whole aesthetic of old CRT
Wow! I thought I was crazy for not having a tv for exactly the same reasons you mentioned at the beginning of this video! I live alone, mostly watch TH-cam but even if I do watch shows it’s usually on my laptop or iPad because I only need a screen for me. What’s more because I live alone I can take my iPad or laptop around my apartment to wherever I’m at easily allowing me to continue watching my preferred content. With a tv, you’d have to pause while you leave the room to say grab a snack or cook a meal but my way, I don’t have to. I have mentioned to friends that I don’t own a tv and they look at me like I’m crazy! I’ve even had one friend tell me she had “an extra tv” if I wanted it! But again, for me, my way is just far more convenient. So thank you for confirming that I’m not the only person that feels this way about having/not having a tv.
There are some advantages to using an older style TV for watching old videos on TH-cam that aren't in high definition and in the 4:3 ratio, a better TV with composite and S video would be perfect especially for DVD players... SpongeBob for example looks amazing on these old school TVs.
That's actually the reason I came to the damn video
Tom & Jerry coming in old TV SpongeBob coming in new TV
I had this tv as a kid! Born in 86. I still have a snes and ps2, a big collection of vhs and shoot vhs-c for my band and shoot polaroid. All about this vibe and always have been. More relevant and signifcant today in an all digital world in my opinion. Something tangible, hands on and responsive.
I myself use a CRT daily for TV, Netflix, retro gaming and stuff for quite a long time. it's not from the 80's, but from the early 2000's i would say (not sure). it is just something quite odd, but satifying at the same time. these things are neat, definetly recommend you to use one too!
Edit: Mine is a small black 4:3 TV. Not sure on how big the screen is, but it is about the same size as yours!
Before I remodeled my bedroom and got my first projector, I relied on a Toshiba-branded TV/VCR/DVD player combo, and it handled my TV and VCR functions properly. The CRT would be light gun friendly, and there would be no lag to deal with. I can use the VCR to play and record my fighting game matches, particularly on games that have no replay loading or saving features.
What I love about recent classic game re-releases is that they offer various filter modes to emulate the look of a CRT TV. The actual games themselves look uglier and more pixelated on our LCD displays than they actually appeared on tvs of the day when they came out, so these filters help recreate the original look, removing that ugly pixelation and completing the experience.
3:21 That is the UHF dial and it can be used for cable on some tvs, also UHF over-the-air and cable tv have different frequencies and depending on the model it can support cable and over-the-air tv but most of the time it only supports over-the-air.
I love that more people do this type of stuff like me hahah, I even have my own mini TV station to display to multiple CRTs across my house
@@snoosri I only do one channel, but I said I broadcast it to every TV in the house.
Pro tip: With those HDMI to RF converters, open it and remove the tiny resistor that's tying the video to ground, for some reason they added this resistor which is messing the impedance. The resistor is a tiny SMD resistor but it's easy to spot as it sits alone on the bottom portion of the board. The image will become sharper and brighter! You don't need any special tools just flick it off with a knife.
I used to have this model in the 80's. Thanks for the flashback.
Bro you are one of the most interesting and underrated content creators. I love vintage old stuff like Crts and Jdm cars and I instantly fell in love with this channel when you talk about your Toyota Mr2, as that is a dream car I want to own one day. Keep up with your amazing content!
Thanks a lot man. I do feel I have a somewhat unique niche and style on TH-cam. Hopefully someday I’ll be able to get big enough to have more actual resources to work with haha. My latest cinematic Midship Retra hopefully will be a somewhat big break for me but obviously I can’t count on anything
I watch Black Mirror Bandersnatch one time and I fall in love with these types of tvs. It's crazy how they have the potential to make a comeback like vinyl did.
As a 90s kid and Retro gaming Lover, Loved it man! keep it up ✌
Watching as a long time CRT enthusiast I was tempted to pause the video to comment on the inaccuracies of the script several times. Nice video anyway :)
Our main tv is a large Maganvox CRT from 1995, we use a roof antenna with a VCR and PS2
Awesome video. Keep up the good work!
I’m glad my parents kept all of our crt tvs from back in the day. All of them still work too.
Mine didnt. Doomed to live in the city...
This is great I want to try this as well im stuck in the 90's
then as a teen in 1989 i had a 20 inch samsung but the idea of knobs stayed with me and i had to wash soo many cars just to get that tv set but it was worth it i remember the time my dad bought a VCR in 1983 a top loading VCR and god how i used to record tv shows , news, and cartoons like thundercats and heman
While the color ratios may be off, etc... The refresh rates are actually better than most consumer LCD panels🙂
That may be true for CRT monitors, but these TVs ran at 60hz in NTSC regions and 50hz in PAL regions.
That's a really nice looking set. Hitachi was a VERY good brand back in the day. Looks to me like the picture isn't quite filling out the screen as it should. While playing Sonic, you shouldn't be able to see that blue border. It could come down to some of the electrolytic capacitors reaching the end of their usable life or just the horizontal and vertical adjustments need a tweak. Also, try adjusting the inner ring on the 2-13 channel knob and see if you can get the image sharper.
0:42 I’m definitely one of those hipsters. I wear a SONY Walkman on my belt almost everyday.
Our family just purchased a CRT for our small kids to watch. And yes there are many hoops to jump through but my understanding is that they don’t emit blue light and it is much better for your eyes/ brain/ circadian rhythm. Hooked up an Atari system and just got a DVD/ VCR player for it too! It’s so much fun to watch and play games on. I feel like to move forward.. we have to go back 😉🤩
Beautiful TV! Also great tutorial on converting digital to RF analog signals! I myself have an old 1989 13” Zenith Space Command that sits on my desk next to my normal PC monitor, so being able to use it as a 2nd or 3rd monitor for retro games on the fly would be a nice addition!
Superior Video. I'm a vintage electronics collector myself. I have two of the exact same stereo receivers that you have. Those Sharp brand receivers really have good sound. The nicest feature is the A/B speaker switch built right into the system. The only disadvantage is that you can not have both pairs of speakers on at the same time. As far as TVs; I have about 10 to 12 of the little RCA black & white 12" sets; about six each that are alike in the model style. Some have the brightness and volume above the tuner knobs and the others have the bright and volume below the tuner knobs. A couple of these TVs don't work quite right so I'm tempted to swap out some of the insides to see if I can get maybe two or four more working.
It's a start to a collection. I have about 50 vintage tv sets black and white as well as color sets in wood veneer cabinet.
7:14 I was watching this on my CRT and thought "but that's how it looks on a CRT, not on a modern. Oh, I'm on a CRT" 😅
the extra dial is for another higher band of tv signal known as UHF. on that band one could recieve up to 58 (i think?) other channels that werent very good because the signals just didnt go as far as those on the standard VHF band. i have a CRT TV specifically for playing PS2 and older games because the new TVs dont seem to express the shading correctly. either turn the contrast up and wash it out to see things in the dark or turn it down so everything but the dark parts of games can be seen correctly. Other info; if your CRT begins to display the colors, contrast incorrectly or the screen begins showing distortions it may just be that the inside is dirty. Remove the back of the case and clean the board with canned air but dont use anything that conducts electricity unless you know what you're doing. there are capacitors in there that still contain thousands of volts of electricity even when the TV has been unplugged.
I'm an absolute 80's movie and technology nerd and I really want one, I also grew up with low quality yt videos on an ipod touch so I can see myself actually using it
I am 40 years old and I am glad CRT are gone, Those RF connections use to zap me as a kid while hooking up my SNES and NES and then had to get a VCR for the N64, PS2 and Dreamcast era for the composite cables. Until I got a VGA box and hooked my Dreamcast on my 14 inch Compaq Monitor which that gave the best signal. Then got the component cables for my PS2 to play progressive scan games on my first 1080p Sony Bravia TV I bought in 2007. To me OLED is still the future and glad I have the last 3D LG OLED from 2015 for my PS3. No Burn ins
I still use a knob TV in my bedroom, and keep my old vcr and SNES on it, mainly because the SNES and VHS looks better on it, but my old TVs sound is way better than any flat screen I've ever owned, it's nice to fall asleep to that old warm tube sound.
Im going back to the future! Im used to the "filter" of VHS and CRT so i just "upgraded my TV room with a modern Sony CRT widescreen. Loving it and my eyes as well. I don't knkw why, but i dont like the sharpness of BlueRay and LCD screens. Maybe got a eye disfunction 😂
Love my old gear. The bad thing would be power consumption i guess.
That Hitachi TV brings back memories for me. My parents had one as a kid. It is so sad how all these vintage TVs wind up being recycled or thrown away and only a few of them survive. Actually, my parents had 2 Hitachi TVs from the same era, including the one you have in the video.
@CRTpixels here! Great video! Love the Sonic example shown here! I've never streamed on my CRTs, but lately I've had a big desire to stream retro anime on one of my TVs. Thanks for the help!
It’s so hard to find a TV like that anymore. The 2 knobs at the top right and the wood grain.
Even budget CRTs handle motion better than LCDs and OLED, and they had no input lag and good black levels, which you have to a pay a premium for today.
I feel we got ripped off by LCDs of today, the old TVs you could just plug in and play, maybe buy S video cables but that was it, now we need ultra expensive TVs and a sound bar to get similar performance to that old school CRT.
@@PaperBanjo64 They both have pluses and minuses. LCDs are better in the day or with room lighting on, are much lighter and thinner and use less energy, and LED ones turn on quickly without need of a warm-up time. Their screen geometry is perfect, they are easier to make in widescreen, which most people seem to prefer, even though 4:3 was a better one-size-fits-all aspect ratio than 16:9 in my opinion. Modern LCDs are much better than the earlier ones. They are easier to make in Chinese factories with cheap, slave-like labor.
the motion being handled better is down to flicker but yea theres no way to truly replicate that on a modern display but the closest you can get is putting a desk fan in front of a modern screen spinning at the right rpm with a cover that hides most of the screen being visible (reducing the amount of time you see each part of the screen for at any given space in time is why crts handle motion so much better because your eyes feel like a lower framerate is a higher one if you see each frame for less time, and since your eyes have less time to process each frame as well, a still image, you also get better motion clarity because it doesnt blur while you are moving your eyes but the display isnt moving or so im told)
tldr you are right but the motion can be mostly emulated on a lcd or oled because its mostly flicker related however one it severely reduces brightness and two no display manufacturer will bother to implement such a thing so you have to resort to hacky workarounds to do it and if you are wondering why they dont, well another reason is 3 being that many people didnt like the eye strain from flicker as well as other inconveniences and as a result many people who arent too concerned about motion clarity, input lag, black levels and colour accuracy chose to dump crts for LCDs (still not sure what the point of OLED was though but i guess they do have better black levels and way bigger screens than CRTs)
also power consumption of crt tvs is actually often lower than lcd tvs because while in the days of CRTs 30 inches was huge, but nowadays many LCDs that people actually use are like 70 inches or something so as a result the power consumption number is pretty similar.
@@randomgamingin144p Perhaps that is a little how black frame insertion works. It would be interesting if there was a device that could be made to put in front of modern screens that made it appear more like a CRT, without having to use upscalers like Retrotink or software effects. There is a specialized LCD monitor made for compatiblity with old gaming and computer hardware called Checkmate... at first I thought it had a special screen filter but I think it may just be IPS-LCD with old inputs like RCA connections, so I don't really get what it is.
Grew up pretty much the same as you. I was born in 95 and for years my gaming consisted of NES, SEGA Saturn/ genesis, even ATARI. I didn’t get my ps2 until like 2003. Obviously as technology and gaming progressed, I put the old games away for a while and all the old TVs got junked to make room for the new HD televisions. Nothing wrong with modern TVs…until you want to dig those old gaming consoles out of the attic. Old games look absolutely horrible on modern TVs and not friendly on the eyes.
2:42 an old tube TV and a crate full of vinyl!? Now this guy is kewl!
30 year old games are some of the best there are!
Evangelion on a CRT seems beautiful
Well, I’ll be dipped. I’ve got a 1981 Hiatchi CT-1302. I’m only 24, but I’ve had mine since I was 12. Picked it up for 3 bucks, and its never let me down. The issue you have with the volume is oxidization inside the potentiometer that the volume is controlled with. I have always been a technically inclined person, and have since ended up with an automotive tech career. This problem is easy for me to fix, but not so much for other folks. I’ve had an xbox hooked up for years to stream everything and I haven’t known anything different. Its funny to me to see anyone else try to use one of these for their daily lives, however i wouldn’t trade mine for anything else. Love the style, love the MR2 (Ive got a 92 corolla alltrac wagon that just hits all the right buttons), keep it up. Very interesting to see things on youtube that have been my way of life for a long time.
We have the same taste in 80 stuff we both have MR2 mk1 I have a Walkman and the vinyl player
I have my Roku running on my old Sony CRT with a simple HDMI/AV converter. I love watching 1980s commercials and tv shows on it.
😂. The sheer whippersnapperdom. At least you know how to match the refresh rate when filming a crt. Sending love from 1980.
I've held onto my LG 29' flat CRT TV from 2005. Not exactly vintage yet but I plan to keep it for as long as I can. It's my last CRT TV.
Love it!! Reminds of watching TV as a kid.
80’s CRT had colors corrections, since in 1970’s since the official color TVs were in the market, they had saturation errors
Nice video.The charm and the glow that people often mention, I believe, is the wider spectrum of colours found in CRTs (to the edge of ultraviolet and infrared). New OLEDs seem to be getting closer but still aren't quite there yet. As you mentioned, you can't capture it well on video because we'll be watching it on LED screens anyways. So it's missing that vibrancy.
The reason to use them is they’ll last forever
believe it or not a 13 inch tv set and a 14 inch tv set makes a lot of difference witch is weird only being one inch more but trust me that inch makes a lot of difference as a kid i had a 1984 GoldStar almost the same as your HITACHI CT1302 but mine was all black and it was 14 inches and yes it was a color tv set with no buttons just knobs
I always wanted an old dial TV. Then I found this video a while back, but I didn’t get this particular TV because I was impatient. But I’ve always admired how yours looked, it’s funny but I like how the name “Hitachi” looks, just simple yet a nice name, the wood frame in the front. It’s just beautiful. I’ve been through a couple dial TVs now, but I wanted to get this one because I just always loved how perfect yours looks; I found one and I’m really happy! Also, if you didn’t find out yet, ST is for Skin Tone, it makes flesh colours more accurate. I think this feature was very fancy for the time from an episode of The Simpsons.
Such a clean looking tv… wish I had the exact same one for my room and console..
Edit: I finally gotten a wooden grain tv!
I have a 4K tv and a nice 1080P tv, but I guess my CRT will always have its place. Bought in 2003 and still works great. Color, black level is great on a CRT. I remember the tv's with dials and wish all CRT tvs had the ability to adjust horizontal, vertical manually.
I've been using strictly CRT displays since 2016 and honestly forget most of the time now that normally people don't see CRTs anymore. Shit I'm watching this on a CRT and I was halfway through the video before that even dawned on me.
Great video! And love your tv! Reminds me of the one I had as a kid, very nostalgic.
Used to watch my cartoon s on a tv like that in the 80s when I was 9 Fun too see
This the perfect TV to break out during Halloween time
Pretty cool capitol ‘66 sleeves in the background
i have my late grandpas television from around 1981, but it is so primitive that it doesnt have color or any electrical inputs.
Except a headphone hole that works perfectly fine
Love the Hitachi.
Retro game pirating is usually considered okay if the games are not available to buy, so you can find rom sites everywhere. But the problem with old movies is we don't have an option to download old low res movies and watch them the way they were intended. Star wars ep. 4 was modified as well because they didn't like certain things on modern tvs, but that was the beauty back then
This is pretty much how I use my old TVs. My main TV is a 1985 Zenith System 3 which I use on a daily basis. I am not a gamer, and the idea that CRTs are only good for gaming bothers me. LCDs make me sick when I use them for too long, so my main monitor is a CRT and my TVs are all CRTs. I do have cable, so I use that as well as a firestick. Works just as good as a new TV and the picture is just as good as a new TV as well aside from resolution.
Small you say? My 1998 32 inch Sony Trinitron says hello. We subbed to you. (Yes I'm watching this on the Trini)
I really like the video but I do want to point out that a big reason to own a CRT, aside from using it for retro games, is that standard definition content (640 x 480) such as old TV shows, old cartoons (animation looks particularly awesome on a CRT) VHS movies, DVDs, etc., will look much better on a CRT. This is because the CRT is not doing any upscaling and displaying the video content in its native resolution. HD TVs have to upscale 480i/p content to a the native resolution of the HD TV and it never looks anywhere near as good as on a CRT.
I love them old tvs 😂
UGH... I want one now !!!
If your wondering why you see red and blue lines on a crt television is because of the convergence and could be adjusted but would need to open the back to do so while worrying about risking your life because of the high voltage.
It's my old TV! Got this exact bad boy when I was 12 as a hand me down. Played NES on this. Watched TNG on this. Good times.
You can clean your volume knob with some contact cleaning spray. It makes all the difference!
Technically the response time will be superb on that
Well let not get to hasty here, you should look into CRT monitors that were made for computers in the 90's and then that would be a better comparison to what monitors we have to day. Those CRTs VGA computer monitors were more HD then regular CRT TVs back in the day.
I use my commodore 1702 crt monitor to watch TH-cam via composite. Most text is completly legible and it is fun, in addition can play my retro games via s-video, so crt crispy.
i still have a crt as my main TV (last of the flat screen Toshiba's) it weighs 80kgs. i will try your idea as there is only crap on mainstream TV now (MSM controlled by the Gov etc) . i haven't got the money to upgrade to a smart TV. Thanks for the video.
that mr2 is so clean
So I do remember games looking better back then. It wasn't my imagination! Hahaha.
Not your imagination at all. Superior technology. No lag. No motion blur. No stuttering. No need for endless "calibration". Perfect for sports, games and films. Have to ask why modern TV's aren't bench marked against CRT?
I wish they would fix modern TV's input lag so I can speed run video games, so instead I'm forced to use CRT TVs. Imagine that an older technology better than today.
The TV was meant for UHF and VHF over the air broadcast. The lower knob is for UHF channels, when the top is set to "U" - not really cable tv. This is 240p/480i, not 480p. Retro games are 240p, broadcasts in 480i. The effect seen in sonic is due to composite video and would display the same over RGB on a CRT as in LCD monitors. The ref modulator is converting composite.
Just fyi.
2:31 Well, you meant 480i, not 480p. Plus, flat-panel displays (even the 4:3 ratio EDTVs) supported 480p via Component (YPbPr), VGA or HDMI connections.
Not even 480i, but 525i, of which only 483 lines (give or take) were visible. Later, 485, 486, 487 and our favorite 480 was used in digital equivalents of 525/60. All TVs, including modern flat panels, support interlaced video signal and 4:3 proportions, but they of course deinterlace it internally.
You sure this is 1985? This looks pretty old fashioned for 85. I been a TV engineer for 40 years, and TV's had advanced beyond those clunky dials by then, but maybe American TVs still used the older tuners.
As for your volume knob, get some switch/contact cleaner (NOT WD40 or oil based) in a can with a little hose attachment and squirt some right in the base and work the knob fast through the full range quickly, as it evaporates.
Finally, the way to rip videos from Netflix non-stop!
feel that on the scaling issues for gaming, i got a larger one now and im excited to try it !
It's not the CRT (in most cases) where the details go away, and small print is a blur, it's the method delivered to said CRT. In your case, RF (radio frequency) is the worst method, as all the video information, and sound are blended, which interferes with each other (why brighter scenes tend to have some buzz in them). If you fed the signal directly in, it would be a hare clearer, but the best ways is to modify the TV to accept composite, or RGB for the best results, making those dithered pixels appear once again (again, limited by the CRT, especially if it's got a low dot pitch. The smaller the "Triads" (the RGB segments you see on-screen), the better RGB can look.
Watching tis on an old hitachi dosent look to bad!
You might never see this but seriously if u don’t want and don’t use the TV I will take it because I’m planning to make a thriller series based in the 80s and I need a TV and that one is the perfect one! 😭😭