View Full Version : The worst color tv?


matt_s78mn
12-03-2009, 11:38 AM
I'm sure most everyone who frequents these forums agrees that the solid-state horizontal chassis Zenith Chromacolors were the best vintage color TVs. What vintage color TVs were the worst design, worst quality, hardest to repair, etc.?? Let's hear your thoughts.

freakaftr8
12-03-2009, 12:12 PM
Well, I did some work on a 1976 Quasar (panasonic)? 25" console that had nothing but flyback and HOT trouble, I used to work at a TV repair here in Sacramento. We had 3 of these all with the same issues. Mine seemed to be consistant.
As for current CRT sets, im not knocking down Sony, but the 2000 to 03 series KV36XBR450 seems troublesome in the standby circuit and flyback cold solder taking out the HOT and general bad board soldering plauges that set too. Iv'e repaired mine roughly 10 times now.

Zenith26kc20
12-03-2009, 03:20 PM
I can't remember the model but a Phillips 36 inch CRT set made around 2000 would lose it's flyback and around 30 other parts. The automatic brightness control line was tied into the jungle IC and when the flyback went, it tore the chassis up. I fixed a couple and wouldn't take any more in.
That was about the worst I remember. I'll probably think of others later.:thumbsdn:

wa2ise
12-03-2009, 04:09 PM
Back around 1981, RCA had the CTC101 chassis with the infamous integrated flyback transformer. The concept of having the high voltage rectifier diodes in the same casing with the flyback was new then, And they split up the high voltage winding into 6 segments, and there were to be 6 diodes, but they cheaped out and used only 3. Problem was that the dynamic AC voltage around pairs of joined windings got too great, and caused the plastic to break down, frying the flyback and the HOT. ouch.

ctc17
12-03-2009, 04:55 PM
Every time I pull a sams folder I see all these random brands, Coronado, Starlite, Supre-Macy on and on. I never see any of these sets anywhere. Is that because they were all junk?
Also never seem to see many Packer Bell or Curtis Mathis style sets.

On the newer stuff...once Thompson got ahold of RCA the quality went south.

matt_s78mn
12-03-2009, 05:31 PM
Every time I pull a sams folder I see all these random brands, Coronado, Starlite, Supre-Macy on and on. I never see any of these sets anywhere. Is that because they were all junk?
Also never seem to see many Packer Bell or Curtis Mathis style sets.

On the newer stuff...once Thompson got ahold of RCA the quality went south.

Coronado was the store brand for Gambles-Skogmo. The town where I grew up in Nebraska had a Gambles store, so there were lots of Coronado TVs and appliances to be found around the area. I don't remember who actually OEMed the TVs, ...they weren't terrible... but just average quality I would say.

nasadowsk
12-03-2009, 05:33 PM
Easy - ask yourself how many vintage GE color sets you see these days. They sold more than just the Porta-Color....

radiotvnut
12-03-2009, 05:34 PM
As far as older sets; GE made some junk. Mainly the YM, EM, and EC sets. The YM sets always had bad flybacks and the EM/EC chassis sets were a pain to work on and were full of those "griplets" that gave so much trouble. Really, the first solid state GE color chassis that was decent was the "PC" chassis. I wasn't too crazy about their tube type color sets, either. The main ones I remember, besides the porta-color's, were the C1 and KD chassis sets.

As far as newer sets, the one with the lousiest picture that I've seen was a 19" Chinese made Durabrand set from Wal-Mart. I've seen several of these and the picture was always muddy and washed out. I don't care for the newer RCA and Philips TV's. These are very cheap made and the RCA's eat flybacks more often than the old tube type CTC38's. I think I'd take a Funai or Orion over a modern RCA.

radiotvnut
12-03-2009, 05:35 PM
Coronado was the store brand for Gambles-Skogmo. The town where I grew up in Nebraska had a Gambles store, so there were lots of Coronado TVs and appliances to be found around the area. I don't remember who actually OEMed the TVs, ...they weren't terrible... but just average quality I would say.

I think Wells-Gardner made a good many Coronado TV's.

marty59
12-03-2009, 05:59 PM
The later model tube Magnavox (before they went completely SS) sets were just horrible for solder joint issues and physical design. Especially the portables...

MRX37
12-03-2009, 07:08 PM
1993-97 Zenith 27 inch TV's.

2001 and newer JVC 27" TV's.

Dave A
12-03-2009, 07:41 PM
Apex CRT sets. N'uf said.

Adam
12-03-2009, 09:20 PM
When I think of every color tv I ever had (even curb finds I only held onto for a few days):

1991 RCA
1988 Goldstar
1988 Goldstar
1988 Hiatchi
1988 Sony
1988 Toshiba
1986 Zenith
1985 RCA
1984 Zenith
1983 Supre-Macy
1983 Zenith
1982 Zenith
1981 RCA
1980 Zenith
1978 RCA
1978 Sony
1976 Sharp
1976 Hitachi
1975 RCA
1975 RCA
1975 Zenith
1975 Zenith
1972 GE
1971 Curtis-Mathes
1971 Zenith
1968 GE
1968 Viking
1968 Zenith
1967 Magnavox
1967 Zenith
1965 Magnavox
1965 RCA
1965 Zenith
1963 Philco
1960 RCA

The only ones that stand out as consistently having problems are the tube Magnavoxes (both had bad flybacks).

bgadow
12-03-2009, 09:21 PM
Old ones: GE CE/C2 chassis. This was their 18-19" hybrid. Nearly impossible to work on, cheap cheap cheap. I have seen a watchable picture on one of these, but it took some work. You can judge a lot about a set by pulling the Sams and seeing what shape it is in. I have one Photofact in particular that is ripped, taped, worn, coffee stained, and covered with all sorts of notations. It is for this GE chassis.

Among modern sets, I think of the TV in the local pizza place. They had some BPC from the 90s but when NTSC went away they replaced it with this SPC Wally World special. Worst color I've seen since the last time I turned on an old GE...

I think most of the reason those minor names don't show up these days is because they never sold well to begin with. They might have done well in a certain local area. There were plenty of small towns where one of the only places to buy a TV might have been a Western Auto or a Sears catalog store, something like that. But in the nation as a whole, it was the big names that sold big.

Don Lindsly
12-03-2009, 09:37 PM
The absolute worst color TV was the Olympic 910, 19 inch TV, of the mid 60s. It was unreliable, unrepairable and worked terrible out of the box. Three of three. It produced a pathetic pale picture and had so little gain that when the antenna was removed, it had no snow or noise. The dull grey image looked like someone removed the IF tubes. The printed circuit would evaporate if you tried to replace a part. It came with a bag of parts to make it work, but that didn't help either. It probably put color back 3 years. I doubt any exist today.
Anyone who had ever seen an Olympic 910 would not need to contemplate the worst color TV. It is the hands down champion; or as we are told, the debate is over.

Bill R
12-03-2009, 09:44 PM
My vote goes to the GE Hybrid sets.

freakaftr8
12-03-2009, 09:50 PM
Remember the old GE roundie a few years back that sucked the nails outta the walls of a house??

matt_s78mn
12-03-2009, 09:52 PM
Let's keep this discussion to tube type or early solid state if we can... I think we can all agree on a lot of modern sets being junk, but I primarily wanted to know what everyone thought about the worst VINTAGE color sets. There's been quite a few responses about vintage GE sets being junk... which I would tend to agree with. I've only really dealt with one tube type GE color console, which was full of compactrons and brittle circuit boards. And I do recall a lot of the GE sets from the '80's full of cold solder joints. Anyway, good responses, let's keep em coming. :)

wa2ise
12-03-2009, 10:17 PM
The absolute worst color TV was the Olympic 910, 19 inch TV, of the mid 60s... It produced a pathetic pale picture and had so little gain that when the antenna was removed, it had no snow or noise. The dull grey image looked like someone removed the IF tubes.

Did Olympic source those sets from Muntz? :D

Findm-Keepm
12-04-2009, 01:14 AM
ANY Sears/Warwick Chassis ! Early tube Sears Color sets had only two IF stages that easily overloaded with cable TV - what a PITA. The solid state sets with the 4-lead safety caps - Sears sourced the replacements from the same date code lots as the originals!

From a parts seller standpoint, the mid-80's Solid-State modular Magnavoxes with the 703744 regulator modules that crapped out if you either:

A. Plugged in the set
B. Looked at the set in a funny way
=or=
C. Owned such a set.

We sold tons of the rebuilt Maggie modules in the 80's, along with lots of GE flybacks for MA/MB sets.

Me personally, I hated the Admiral color sets of the late 70's/early 80s, and disliked the Philco modular sets of the same era.

Cheers,

Sandy G
12-04-2009, 05:19 AM
My vote as a "Layperson"-IE, non-repairman type, would go to the Sears mini-consoles of the mid-60s. Ours had a 19" screen, & was, IIRC, the 1st "rectangular" color set sold in America. I think it was a Toshiba, & it was obviuosly made LONG before the Japanese had heard of Quality Control...It would sometimes "crap out" before the repairman got back to the Sears store...

Zenith26kc20
12-04-2009, 09:25 AM
Sylvania hybrid color portable! 15 inch if I remember. Sold by the rental companies.
Just pitiful sets!
Delmonico B/W 12 inch (IIRC) that had to have a fan on it to keep it from rolling after even a few minutes because it was shoehorned into it's case.

kx250rider
12-04-2009, 09:55 AM
Worst picture: A tie between the 25" Sharp from the late 80s, and GE PORTACOLOR

Worst reliability: Emerson (Orion-built) from the 80s & 90s

Toughest to work on: Zenith Digital System III (1988-ish)

Worst tuner: A tie between the RCA G-2000 (1968) and the Magnavox Star System (aka Bird Cage)

Worst flyback: RCA CTC-101

Worst CRT: Zenith A68ACT00X (27" SquareFlat 1990s)

Charles

ctc17
12-04-2009, 12:09 PM
Looks like GE is winning.
Is this why later GE sets had the service info in that little box on the back??

I will add my port a color h-3 chassis has the auto-drift feature. Good thing all the controls are easy access on the front because it requires adjustment every 5 minutes. The color and contrast are just not that good for a small tv and an image that has a lot of green it turns brown. A few green trees its fine but if its a lawn or ball field it automatically kills the grass.

Zenith26kc20
12-04-2009, 12:20 PM
Original Panasonic Prism. Hated them!
Mitsubishi 36 inchers with drooling caps and shutdown circuits gone arwy!
GE console with KE chassis!
Don't turn the lights out, I'm going to have nightmares tonight after reading these posts;)

radiotvnut
12-04-2009, 12:45 PM
And what about those Panasonic/Quasar/GE 25" sets from the mid '80's that used the TLF14421 flyback? Every one of those that came my way had a bad flyback/HOT, bad CRT, a baked PC board full of loose connections, or any combination of the above.

Speaking of Mitsubishi's, I just tossed a 26" set with drooling caps. I actually got the set to work; but, didn't want to change all those caps. If another Mitsubishi comes over here from that vintage, it's not even coming off the truck.

I had one of those Magnavox sets with the failure prone regulator module. I actually got several years out of it; but, it eventually started giving trouble all the time and it was always the power supply. The last time it died, I just calmly unplugged it and tossed it in a dumpster.

wa2ise
12-04-2009, 03:07 PM
Worst flyback: RCA CTC-101



And my CTC101 's flyback died. Had a replacement, but I couldn't find it before my brother tossed the set... :thumbsdn: Loved the comb filtered picture, though.

rca2000
12-04-2009, 09:54 PM
I personally feel that these are the WORST crt's ever made. They beat the Sony 26" 710AB22/A670XXX and even the Zenith 91-98 tubes in poor quality!!

And I agree that ANY warwick solid state Sears (the "528" series) are trash. I worked on them in the late 80's at Sears service...and HATED them!!

Those NEC sets(sold by CM and "Rutherford") were trash too!! hot chassis, cheap cheap cheap!!

I HAVE worked on a number of older GE color sets besides the EM/EC and such. I have a GE under the "truetone' brand I think--that is a "QA" chassis, from 1974 or so. This is the one that had that "stick" HV rect in a cage for the flyback on the right side of the chassis.(the JA chassis is just like it). I have a 15" or so YA chassis set. A YM console is in my mom's room, 1979, with digital tuning.9I changed the tube in it about 20 years ago, and it is not too good now) And in the late '80's I worked on and/or sold a LOT of GE sets, YA's YM's MA's MB's MC'S JA's and of course the "AB/AC" "griplet sets" that came before the EM/EC set. I had a KD chassis set about 25 years ago. I too did not like the CA color sets, though I DID fix a few in the 80's early 90's.

radiotvnut
12-04-2009, 10:48 PM
Yeah, those CM branded NEC sets were cheap built - they just didn't have a cheap pricetag. I've had several of those TV/stereo combo units from the late '70's-early '80's and most had weak CRT's along with serious power supply and horizontal deflection issues. AFAIK, NEC made most all of CM's solid state sets.

Jeffhs
12-04-2009, 11:55 PM
My vote for one of the worst 19" table sets of the late 20th century:Emerson, 1988-89 vintage.

I had a 19" Emerson table model TV, 19", that actually worked quite well but had a bad habit of shutting itself off whenever a thunderstorm was active in my area (the storm didn't have to affect the electricity; in fact, the set would shut off while the lights stayed on). I didn't even have to see the lightning; as soon as I heard the thunder, the TV would turn itself off. I think this must have been tied in somehow with a system this set had which would turn the TV off about 15 minutes after the local TV station you were watching went off the air.

Hmmm. :scratch2: I wonder if my Emerson TV might have been made by one of the smaller Pacific Rim importers such as Orion, Funai, or some such. Given the random shutoff problem I just mentioned, and the fact that the set lasted only six years, it wouldn't surprise me if it had been manufactured by one of these firms, or some other no one ever heard of.

Other than that, as I said, this TV worked quite well for me until about 1995; then it quit, I put it out for the trash, and got a new (at the time) Zenith 19" color table set. That one still works well to this day, and has its original CRT. Surprisingly, the one in my set still makes an excellent picture and the TV itself has required no service whatsoever in 14 years, although for the last ten of those years the set has been in my bedroom, being used only for cross-checking in case my cable goes out and as a backup for when my living-room set, an RCA XL-100 CTC185A7 19" table model (now all of ten years old and still going strong, with a fantastic picture; knock on wood), goes belly-up.

radiotvnut
12-05-2009, 12:14 AM
Late '80's Emerson sets were made by Orion. I actually fixed two late '80's emerson's with the side mounted chassis. Both were full of bad solder connections and bad caps in the vertical circuit. I was a little shocked to get two of these in that actually still powered up. I was getting these when they were only a few years old with toasted flybacks, yokes, and shorted HOT's.

DaveWM
12-05-2009, 05:35 AM
I am curious, what makes a bad tv? is it design/assy/parts? esp things like flybacks/crts, are they just poorly designed/overstress/cheap builds.

Seems odd that a process devolves, I have old sets that seem rock solid, it follows that process and procedures should produce better goods (I am not so naive to think that other consideration conspire to reduce quality, just wonder where those consideration hit).

Dude111
12-05-2009, 05:49 AM
What vintage color TVs were the worst designIm not sure which VINTAGE tv was the worst BUT I SURE KNOW WHICH IS THE WORST NOW!!

THIS NEW FLAT SCREEN GARBAGE!! -- I much prefer the classic TV i have always watched and love :) (And in analogue if possible)

jstout66
12-05-2009, 09:16 AM
Reading this post sure has brought back some memories. I worked in my Uncles TV sales/service shop in the late 70's early 80's in a small town in Nebraska. We sold Zenith, and for a time he carried a secondary brand as well, so as not to lose a sale to the people who couldn't afford a Zenith. (they were expensive). I remember when the recalls hit the CC2's for the safety cap, and we even had a Zenith that the cap failed and blew out the picture tube. To Zenith's credit they did replace the tube altho the set was out of warranty. We were busy with service calls replacing that cap on every affected set we sold.
For worst sets on our service route a few stand out, and I can still hear him bitch when we had to go out yet again to that service address.

1) RCA CTC-38's were one of the few sets RCA put out where they went "on the cheap" Like clockwork, EVERY summer (once the heat and humidity came up) the calls came in for "no picture and a bad smell" Those sets ate up flybacks like there was no tomorrow. Coupled with color alignment problems (which you never saw on any other RCA chassis) also the majority of 6GH8's that were sure to be bad made that chassis a POS in my opinion, altho it was a money maker from a repair standpoint.

2) Any Motorola. Tube color sets the worst, followed by the solid state "works in a drawer", with the 4 tube hybrid behind, which interestingly followed the solid state set in production. Those sets always were glitchy and had a LOUSY picture.

3) Magnavox tube sets

4) ANY Admiral

We also had a Western Auto and Gambles in town, so we got stuck doing a repairs on those. Trutone was the WORST. (Wells Gardner and rebadged GE's).
Gambles by the mid to late 70's were mostly rebadged Toshiba Blackstripes. I have a 77 13" Coronado that is one such set.

Finally, I remember for a bit my Uncle sold GE sets as a secondary in 80-81. Not sure of the chassis, but they were the sets with the VIR color correction. They were the only set I was aware of that managed to blow up ON the sales floor. IIRC it was a Yoke issue, and they had LOUSY pictures to boot.
I'm sure more will come to mind, but the ones I listed seem to stand out the most.

kx250rider
12-05-2009, 09:50 AM
I personally feel that these are the WORST crt's ever made. They beat the Sony 26" 710AB22/A670XXX

I respectfully debate... The only issue with the 26" Sony tube was that they went flat after a few years, but at least they didn't short and blow the power supply without warning, like the Zeniths did. Maybe I'm prejudiced in favor of the 26" Sony because I got to sell a lot of those upgraded replacement tubes, and they're a piece of cake to install and align. The whole installation I had down to 20 minutes with perfect purity and convergence. Touchy on obeying the setup procedure though. If you didn't use a scope to set the G2 voltages and left them high, you'd kill the new tube by overdriving the G2 in short order. I did it correctly, and typically would get 10 years out of the new tube, and the customer would be so happy that I actually replaced some of them for a third life of the TV.

Charles

Adam
12-05-2009, 11:27 AM
I stand by my vote that the Magnavoxes are worse than the GEs, my portacolors never gave me much trouble even though the picture wasn't that great, one Magnavox I had actually had a flyback catch fire, stunk up my place for days. Then again, I never had a GE console.

Now I'll say something more controversial, while I really think the flat chassis Zeniths are 100% deserving of the reputation they have here, I really don't think the same of the chromacolor II era sets. While I'm not at all nominating them for worst color set, as they do indeed produce a great picture, the two I've had had all these intermittent faults, some were due to bad solder joints, loose connections where the modules plug in, or that stinking chromatic button which always seems to get gummed up. On either set I had I never managed to track all of the minor intermittent issues they had down. Great sets when they work, but they didn't hold up nearly as well over the years as their flat chassis counterparts.

jstout66
12-05-2009, 11:47 AM
I unfortuanately would have to agree with Adams opinion concerning CC2 era sets. Hard for me to admit as I unpacked and sold those sets when they were new.
When new, there was NOTHING out there that produced a better picture, and they still beat out most sets today after 30+ years, but they have proved to be glitchy once they had some age on them. In all fairness, it was a design flaw that all modular sets of that era seem to have. From a design point, it was to save time and money on repair. If one component failed you simply replaced that module. However most manufactures that went that route all had the same problem once they aged. RCA XL100's with a vertical chassis is just as bad. Zenith has that damn problem with the Chromacolor control. RCA had problems with the slider controls.
I always keep a "daily watcher" in my home office. Right now, I have a top of the line System 3. Pretty good performer, but the picture tube is starting to show its age. Those tri-focus tubes didn't hold up like the Chromacolor dot matrix tubes did. My other set I use when I swap out the System 3 is a 75 Chromacolor 2. When that set is in use, I always seem to have to replace a module or 2 to get it working perfectly. In all fairness, it IS 35 years old.....

sampson159
12-05-2009, 12:53 PM
those sanyos from the mid 70s.uggggghhh!very nasty little sets.ge,rcas from the 90s,zenith of the same vintage.bad,bad,bad sets.i had a couple of really good wells gardners from the early 70s,(hybrids un the j c penny name).they both had rauland crts and were good performers.one was in a combo that also had a blasting stereo.we could rock the zip code with that monster.solid wood cabinet that i had too move too many times.some of those later sets were junk.i did like the 2 i had.ge s had a nice picture when they were right.those just werent right very long.many stores had name brands that were nightmares too.too many bad ones and not enough good ones to name.

zenith2134
12-05-2009, 02:52 PM
For me it's pretty much the early 90s Daewoo-built 13" with remote and osd the case was brittle and awful and the screwholes stripped their holes after the first back removal. Chassis was a pos single-pcb with the typical undersized flyback and no-name cap's and diodes. I came across 2 or 3 in total and couldnt manage to get any working except 1 which had a weak crt (couldnt get proper greyscale) saw one trashed a few months back and wouldnt even slow down the car to check it out...

Older sets? well all tube sets had problems in the longrun as opposed to a properly executed SS design IMO on the basis of additional ambient heating inside the sets which tended to eat up lytics and resistors more so i cant really decide.

AUdubon5425
12-05-2009, 03:07 PM
Going on personal experience as a consumer (because I'm new to TV repair) the worst sets I remember were a 1987 (maybe '88) RCA ColorTrak 25" remote tabletop Mother bought to replace the CTC-40. It had little chrome tabs for the controls integrated in a feature line that you pushed down, and a flip-down door below for the color/contrast/etc. Besides the short life of the set, at night when a semi would pass it would often turn itself on at full volume - usually around three o'clock in the morning - blasting whatever was on the trucker's CB.

Also the 89/90 Zenith 19" (Sentry II I believe) which had a push on/push off mechanical power switch. Thankfully the button was plastic - Mom went to turn it on one day and there was a loud pop and sparks/smoke shooting out the switch. It was about 4 years old.

kx250rider
12-06-2009, 10:22 AM
Going on personal experience as a consumer (because I'm new to TV repair) the worst sets I remember were a 1987 (maybe '88) RCA ColorTrak 25" remote tabletop Mother bought to replace the CTC-40. It had little chrome tabs for the controls integrated in a feature line that you pushed down, and a flip-down door below for the color/contrast/etc. Besides the short life of the set, at night when a semi would pass it would often turn itself on at full volume - usually around three o'clock in the morning - blasting whatever was on the trucker's CB.

I know that problem VERY well. It's actually an easy fix. Bad solder connections in the system control module, where the plug is soldered to the board to mate it to the tuner. I've fixed literally 1000s of those, all with the same symptoms. People would blame the control buttons, as playing with (or banging) them would knock the system controller back into behaving for a short while.

I fixed my wife's CTC-120 19" Color Trak about a year ago, and she had been dealing with touchy volume buttons since he ex-husband had it in high school in '83. It would either be too soft or too loud, and would sometimes give sudden bursts of blaring loud volume for a split second. She had no idea that there was even a problem... Thought it was made that way since it had been doing that for 25 years! Probably that's why it's the one thing her ex-husband let her have.


Charles

radiotvnut
12-06-2009, 09:48 PM
There are a couple other GE's that I just thought of that weren't that great. One was a huge projection set from the '70's, the YP chassis, IIRC. It was basically a small screen color TV that was situated so that it's image was projected on a large screen. This thing was huge and very heavy.

Then, there was another big screen that had 3 tubes, probably their first three tube model. The CRT's had large necks and I think the chassis was an ED or EP.

ChrisW6ATV
12-07-2009, 01:31 AM
ANY set with the 23EGP22 CRT sucks!!!
Isn't that the one that one of our members tried the hot-air method of cataract/safety glass removal on, and the CRT blew up in his face? :yikes:

ChrisW6ATV
12-07-2009, 01:36 AM
Every time I pull a sams folder I see all these random brands, Coronado, Starlite, Supre-Macy on and on. I never see any of these sets anywhere. Is that because they were all junk?
I bought a Starlite (made by Randix?) 13" color TV in 1995. It was the first $100-or-less color TV I ever saw. I still have it, and it works like new still. I did have to go through three of them to get a good one at the time, though.

ChrisW6ATV
12-07-2009, 01:39 AM
For the worst color TVs, I would include all sets that lack DC restoration/black-level retention. That includes the Starlite I mentioned above...

freakaftr8
12-12-2009, 02:51 AM
Maybe most sets with a 23EGP22 CRT weren't great but I had a magnavox looked awesome and worked great too.But of course this is after extensive tuning and alignment and tweaking. Wish I had kept it.
And as for DC restoration. That has always driven me nuts. One of the best for DC restoration from the era in my opinion believe it or not is the ctc 17. One of the worst in a 1968 zenith 23XC38 chassis and a few others. Maggies weren't even that bad with DC restoration lack.

andy
12-12-2009, 10:59 AM
...

Bill R
12-12-2009, 09:48 PM
Maybe most sets with a 23EGP22 CRT weren't great but I had a magnavox looked awesome and worked great too.But of course this is after extensive tuning and alignment and tweaking. Wish I had kept it.
.

Just curious, which Magnavox used the 23EGP22. I would have thought that by the time Mag introduced a rectangular set the EGP was old technology. I'm just don't recall working on one with that tube. Maybe a low end table model?

firenzeprima
12-13-2009, 10:29 AM
in Italy in the 70's 80's the worst color TV receivers were: Autovox Brionvega, Dumont Emerson, Hantarex, Indesit, Magnadyne, Naonis, Radiomarelli, Rex, Seleco, Voxon Stern, Zoppas. The models produced by these industries had design problems of the chassis and color images unreal, especially the Hantarex. Others like Emerson and Dumont had the risk of catching fire.

Kiwick
12-15-2009, 05:28 AM
I have a 1989 Magnadyne stereo set and it's not a bad set! after being used as a daily watcher for 20 years, it just needed a partial recap on the PSU module to work again with a great picture!

the sets that really disgust me are the late 70s Nordmende SK2 sets with the thyristor horiontal output stage, and the 80s Thomson stuff--real crap!

i also hate Sony sets especially those made after the mid 80s, bulky heavy lumps of plastic with lots of exotic custom parts, lots of dry joints and bad caps, and short lived CRTs

OvenMaster
12-16-2009, 02:33 AM
My family had a 19" Zenith tube set in 1973. One day after we owned it for six months, I walked past it and heard sound, saw no picture, heard sizzling, and saw a plume of smoke rising from it. I switched it off, unplugged it, and told my parents.

Both Zenith and the local dealer refused to honor the warranty and make any repairs, so we let it get repo'd with the finance company's approval. We bought a Quasar that then lasted 15 years.

That's all I got:)