At an estate sale today was a mint 1975 rca xl-100 console working. Good picture. Is anyone interested in such set? I didnt get it yet. im debating if I should grab it.

If it's one you like and reasonable price, then you should get it. I've got several of these (CTC-68) and it seems like the CRT's tend to be either weak or very weak. I kind of like these sets but don't really like the design. The resolution of the picture tends to be not as good as even the RCA tube sets. They tend to have problems with intermittents at the module sockets. Also the slide pots are the WORST. The control lever tends to break off and the pot tends to wear out quickly.

I bought a solid state RCA XL-100 19" TV new in 1999, and have had it repaired twice (at my expense; the warranty did not cover the cost of these repairs) for the same problem: the RF port snapped off the tuner PC board. (By contrast, I have a Zenith 19" color set which has had no problems whatsoever in eight years.) My RCA has another problem, which I have chosen to ignore for now since the set works well enough on digital cable with a cable box: the EEPROM IC is defective, causing poor pictures on certain channels. When a technician from the local TV shop told me it would cost over $100 to replace the defective chip, reprogram it and all, I decided to leave the set as it is, since it makes a good picture using the cable box.

I used to think RCA television sets were among the best on the market, since RCA pioneered monochrome television in the late '40s and color TV in the mid-'50s. Now, I'm not so sure, especially after reading Chad Hauris's post a few minutes ago. The original XL-100s, while probably not as bad as Thomson's new sets, were apparently not of the same high quality as RCA's earlier TVs. Chad mentioned that the slide potentiometers on the early XL-100s wear out quickly and that the lever on which the control knob fits has a tendency to snap off after a period of time, not to mention the picture quality of the original XL100s being inferior to RCA's tube-powered receivers and the circuit-board problems. And this was in the '70s! I think RCA was on the downgrade long before Thomson stepped in and moved the company overseas; the downhill run began with the first XL-100s and has continued ever since.

RCA was obviously proud of its original XL-100 line, in which the XL-100 stood for extended life, 100-percent solid state. Today, the XL-100 label means nothing, as I found out several years ago from an RCA representative at the company's U. S. headquarters in Indianapolis, Indiana. The term "XL-100" on my set, and all other RCA televisions of the same era (late 1990s), was simply a model designation; it was dropped shortly thereafter.

I believe RCA may find itself out of business eventually if the company does not shape up and start building their TVs to last, as they once did when RCA's headquarters were in Camden, New Jersey, U. S. A. and until the XL-100 era began. I have read on RCA's website how great the pictures are on their TVs, especially the digital models. Sure, the pictures are probably good (excellent, even) when the sets are brand new, but a few weeks or months later the problems begin--and often do not stop; some of these problems are catastrophic failures as well. A friend of mine told me his parents' late-1990s vintage RCA table model, with Guide Plus and all the bells and whistles, blew a picture tube after only two years. They wound up getting a new set, since the repair technician told them the cost of replacing the CRT, with labor and all, would be as much as or more than what they would pay for a new TV.

I just purchased a three-year service contract for my already nearly 4-year-old RCA XL-100. I am hoping I don't have to use it but, given the number of repair problems these sets, not to mention current production models, have had and continue to have, I think the odds are against me all the way.

Yes, RCA has had a lot of solder joint problems from the mid-80's through the 90's in the tuners and control modules, even though they use different types of tuner modules through these years. In the later ones like yours, Jeffhs, the solder cracks around the board-mounted tuner and ends up messing up the data in the EEPROM if the problem goes on too long. Most of these problem sets are CTC 177. I have fixed some of these successfully in the early stages of the problem by resoldering all the joints to the tuner shield box and any other bad joints inside there and then resoldering the shield cover back on.

Thomson has come out with a template and special solder that they supplied to authorized service centers to help fix this, but I was able to get it with regular solder just as long as I caught it early enough when the symptoms were still just intermittents. By the time the picture disappears totally it is too late, the EEPROM has had it. I believe that there is a proprietary computer system that authorized servicers can use to reprogram these. Lacking such, I have never been able to fix one of these once the EEPROM got messed up. The problem with these sets is that ALL of the adjustments are in the EEPROM, the tuner control settings, the vertical height and horiz. frequency, etc. so if it goes you're in trouble.

I think probably the best RCA design was probably the CTC-16. The portable tube type sets are usually pretty good too with good CRT's, like the CTC-53. The chassis on the early 80's sets, like the CTC-92 and 101 are pretty good, too, especially once they got rid of the modules.

Have replaced the EEPROM in a few of the sets with bad tuners, RCA has a procedure to program them from the front panel, it is a pain, especially if you mess up when setting the Horiz frequency - to far in the wrong direction and you blow the HOT and possibly the flyback.

do you know the front panel epromm reprogramming procedure, or where I can find it?

I have an aunt/uncle with a solid state RCA console about this age or older, can't tell you if its an XL-100 (but maybe all the solid state sets were?) but as of my last visit a year ago it was still trucking along, good as new. There is also a couple that are longtime family friends, they had one that seemed to be early 70's. I havn't been over there for about 3 years, but it was still humming along at that time. (Their case was odd, they were one of the first I knew to get a big satellite dish in the 80's, also had a top of the line stereo VCR before we had even a cheap one! But they kept that old RCA as the daily driver all along!)

In my vast pile of stuff is a set of reel-to-reel recordings someone made, taking the audio off of a tv, mid 70's. They mostly recorded specials & movies (plus what seems like must have been every episode of "Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman"!) Anyway, the commericals are great! Several for RCA's Colortrak, see if I can remember how it goes: "...before you see the picture the RCA Colortrak aligns it, defines it..." and "RCA keeps making television better and better"

One more thing, while I'm running on and on...as a young teenage radio collector I came across a pull-out section from an old Reader's Digest, advertising the XL-100. From 1972, I recall. I mailed it to the then president of MAARC, Joe Koester, with a note saying he might want to save it for future collectors. He politely sent it back to me with a kind note. I was always sending him junk like that! Still got that thing somewhere.

Dewickt, thanks for refreshing my memory, there is info about the EEPROM and reprograming at www.repairfaq.org. There is a lot of info about the solder joints and the eeprom, other valuable info. as well.

I have fixed MANY of the rca TOB sets( tuner -on-board), and I find them FAR better than Zenith sets, at least the "90 to "98 Zenith sets, with Goldstar crt's. those Zeniths tended to lose crt's at an alarming rate, in as little as 2 years( and that was the RULE, not the EXCEPTION), whwre as I have probaly only seen around 10 of the Rca crt's bad in modern sets(1990-2003), and they will produce a GREAT picture(when they work). I admit ,the TOB was NOT a good idea, but, once that issue is resolved, and the connections in the horizontal driver/flyback area are resolved, one has a GOOD set, that will perform for years.

As for the EEprom programming proceedure, do this::

hold down "menu", and while holding it, hit "power", and then"volume". this will bring the service parameters on the screen. ues the volume buttton to run the number on the right side of the screen to "76". this will access to the adjustment menu. use the channel buttons to go up and down the menu, to adjust the items such as greyscale, geometery, etc. (WARNING!!DO NOT ,REPEAT, NOT ALLOW PARAMETER 1, THE HORIZONTAL AFC, TO FALL BELOW VALUE "11",OR THE SET WILL SHUT DOWN, FROM TOO LOW A HORIZ. FREQUENCY!)It should be "13 or so, until the picture is "almost" in sync.

On the ctc 175,177,187,176,the second through fourth parameters are for h-width, and pincushion(27and up size), 5 and 6 are vertical linearty and height, 7through 9 are crt bias, and 10through 12 are crt drive. 13 is the tuner and agc alignment pass code, but do not go to this, unless you have to. To get to the tuner alignment, use value"77" and then ,one can move on, to 14 to 29, and THEN, to get to parameter 100 -on, use "78" for the pass code(BUT, THIS IS THE ACTUAL TUNER ALIGNMENT, AND SHOULD NOT BE ATTEMPTED, WITH OUT A TAGOO1A ALIGNMENT TOOL, OR A "CHEAT SHEET", LIKE THE ONE PUBLISHED BY ES&T MAGAZINE, A FEW YEARS AGO).

By the way, many EEproms are out there,from sources like Dalbani and MCM , with the tuner values pre-programmed( works in 95% of cases), and this makes repair EASY.

Hope this helps someone.

My RCA XL-100 color TV (chassis CTC185A7) was purchased new in 1999. In that time (just under four years), I have had no problems whatsoever with the on-board tuner or the EEPROM programming (in fact, the picture and sound are excellent on Comcast digital cable with a cable box). My question is simply this: If the set has operated this well for this long, will the solder joints around the tuner still eventually crack? I would think that after four years with no tuner-related problems, the answer would be no. If I were to have problems with cracking solder joints around the tuner, however, when should I have expected them?

ctc 185 tuners are reliable. i have not soldered a single one. we have sold rca for 25 years. i have repaired a ton of the ctc175 thru ctc187. but they are still great sets. steve

The info for entering the setup mode and parameter values is on a label inside the back on RCA sets.