First off, I'm not really attached to this TV. My flea market friend brought it by for me to fix. I just thought I'd post it for those who may be interested.

This is a '91 19" Zenith color TV that still uses a regular rotary volume/power switch. Even though the tuner is electronic, it is not cable ready. It has a red LED display and will tune standard broadcast channels. This set is dead with a blown fuse; but, the HOT checks good. I'm going to check the rectifier diodes and regulator and if those parts are good, I'm going to put a fuse in it and see if it will fire up. Of course, I don't expect the CRT to be very good.

I also suspect this is one of the last Zenith's that had the controls to the right of the CRT. It seems that the '92 and later models had the controls under the screen. And, I wonder if there was a rotary tuned version of this set built in '91. I did have a similar looking rotary tuned Zenith from '88 that was in a woodgrain cabinet that used the same main chassis as this one. And, I wonder when the last year was for the single knob varactor tuner in Zenith sets? I think around '84-'85 was the newest I've seen; but, that does not mean anything.

http://i538.photobucket.com/albums/ff341/radiotvnut/2011_0217zenith0003.jpg

http://i538.photobucket.com/albums/ff341/radiotvnut/2011_0217zenith0004.jpg

It's hard to believe that set wont tune cable channels. What does it say next to the antenna jack? My non remote Zenith has VHF-UHF-CATV printed next the jack, and will tune cable freqs. The cover under the keypad should have different settings inside.

It looks like this set will be bound for file 13. I thought I might get off light when I found a blown fuse and two out of the four diodes in the bridge rectifier network were shorted; which, usually indicates lightning / power surge damage. After replacing those parts, it came up with a greenish raster with vertical foldover. Then, the CRT arced. When fed with a signal, there was audio; but, no video. I didn't feel like digging into the video and vertical circuits, since the CRT is no good. So, out it goes.

This TV will indeed not tune cable channels. All it will handle are channels 2-83 and there is no way to select between CATV and OTA. On the keypad, there are buttons for 0-9, enter, and a skip button. The picture controls are of the rotary type and are located behind a door above the keypad.

Over the years, it seems like the non-cable ready digitally tuned Zenith TV's had red LED displays and the cable ready TV's had green LED displays. Until now, the newest non-cable ready digitally tuned Zenith that I've seen was from the mid '80's. And, they did make both a 12" and 19" B&W set with such a tuner. I also saw one oddball 13" Zenith from the mid '80's that had a continuous tuner, similar to what's on most 5" portables.

There were definitely Zenith sets later than that with controls on the right... I saw them in use at a hospital in 2008. IIRC, it was a control panel very similar to thoses used on "monitor" sets, just located on the right side. I'd guess circa 2000.

A have a Zenith console bought new in '96-97 with the controls on the right.

The zenith H20H52DT hospital set was in their catalogue until very recently, and can still be found new old stock online. I was considering buying one as a replacement for my old tube zenith at one point.

That's an institutional set, but not hospital. I remember when Madonna bought 500 of those at her own expense for the Los Angeles County Jail, so that Sean Penn could have a TV in the cell block he was in. There was a big hub-bub about it at the time, and favoritism for celebrities, etc. I remember laughing to myself, knowing that in a week or two, half of those sets would be blown.

Charles

In 1995 when I bought my Zenith Sentry 2 television (which I still use) I remember seeing another Zenith same size 19" CRT and the controls were off to the side. I remember I wanted that one more (I liked the design better) but for whatever reason it was more expensive than the Sentry 2 so I didnt get it.

So as late as '95 the controls could still be found off to the side.

I had the 19" version of that exact institutionalized case style, id say from the early/mid 90s.

that thing played great until a couple years ago the the CRT finally took a shit.

i still have a few regulars that use these sets.
mostly motels.the bad crt's shook out in the first few years.the newest issues are bad blue nichicon caps that leak.and an occasional saw filter.
the crt is a common 19v90 coty.

I saw a couple Zenith "Healthview" TV at the local Thrift recently, they had excellent pictures on them.
They were newer models than this, probably more like this one:
http://salestores.com/zenith06.html