Who Actually had the Best Picture?
 

Hi Guys
My wife and I had been talking about a Plasma tv, but having read about all the problems with them, we decided to hold off for a bit. Right now, I am running a close to 15 year old, 25inch Sharp, but it has gotten some washed out areas on occasion, so I am thinking it will not last. What I figured I would do is get an older, slightly larger tv (30ish inches) for a couple of years, and seeing how the technology progresses.
Anyhow, so I started checking in the usual places for used tv's (CL, etc) and wondering what is safe to buy, and what actually will look good. I remember having saved a monstrous old Zenith (26"?) that was heavy as hell, in a shiny silver metal case, that was butt ugly looking, but boy did it have a great picture. I so remember how incredibly vivid the colours were. Everything else seemed so bland and muted by comparison.
So, what is a pretty safe bet to buy, that should be reliable, will be maybe a couple inches bigger than what I had, but will have an awesome picture.
Any thoughts?
Erik

I'm fairly happy with my WEGA. I bought it used (about 2 years old) for under 300 bucks. Nice clear picture, sharp, not not looking like a computer image, andvery vivid color.

If your looking for something older, look at some of the older 36" mitsubushi CRTs. They too had a really nice pic, just didn't have a flat screen like the sony did. They are fairly inexpensive if you can find one made in the early to mid 90s.

Avoid Toshiba because they don't make TVs any more. All Toshiba CRT TVs are made by Orion (Emerson).

Panasonic is a good bet. The recent ones I've seen inside were well made. I've always thought Sanyo was a good value for money brand.

I personally would avoid a used Mitsubishi because they had too many problems with leaking capacitors.

Yep agree on the sets you mention.If you get the Panasonic get a good surge protector and unplug it at the 1st rumble of thunder you hear.Panasonics don't take lightning well.It often goes right to the jugular(microprocessor)But parts aren't terribly expensive like JVC parts are.

Early 90s Mitsubishis are like timebombs.When they fail you'll often find many electrolytic capacitors leaking and corroded traces.My record is 80 caps on one tv.The picture is good though.
Sony Wegas have a good picture but they do like to eat flybacks.Though I've never had a flyback Sony back for a repeat replacement.

Sanyos are a good value for a cheap set.The crts are fairly good and they're easy and inexpensive to repair when they break down.

I agree with all the other guys... Best picture probably the WEGA, and reliability is OK. At least you can get parts for a several-years-old WEGA, but probably NOT for a Mitsubishi. And the Panasonics are nice, but please don't ask ME to troubleshoot those power supplies :sigh:

Charles

Would you be looking to purchase an HD capable set? 4x3 or 16x9 ratio? If standard set,then you have a lot of choices in a direct view CRTs.
If you could find a Sony KV-32XBR100,jump on it.One of the best sets ever as far as picture quality is concerned,but it's not HD.
I bought my sister and brother in law a 30" Sony WEGA HD set in 2003 and it is stunning.It has been very reliable.
One of the problems I have had with Sony's in recent years is their reproduction of reds.They look a bit orange.I also wish Sony would have ditched that cheap silver plastic looking cabinet.A good black surround makes the image jump out a bit more.

I owned an expensive Proton set years ago and they were marvelous looking sets,image wise.But the company had problems and I finally decided on a widescreen RP.Sold the Proton.

Ok, just to clarify, cheap would be good too, so a 16X9 is probably not going to happen. Would probably remove me from the HD race too. The thought in the back of my mind is trying find a quality tv that someone is getting rid of as they are upgrading (?) to Plasma or LCD.
As an aside to all of this, did older tv's really used to have better, more vivid colours? I am certain that build quality was higher.
Thanks for answering so many questions from a TV newbie!
Erik

If you have a Sony outlet near you you can get away pretty cheap. 40% off all CRTs 30" and larger 'til Labor Day means a 34" Trinitron XBR with HD tuner and Memory Stick slot for about $500.

Some HDTVs are pretty affordable (under $500). Sanyo makes a wide screen and a 4:3 HDTV for around that price. If you get a non-HD set, go for one that calls itself an "SDTV". These have built in ATSC tuners and will display HDTV signals at NTSC resolution. If it has a QAM tuner, you should be able to receive any unencrypted digital cable channels with it.

I just bought a Sanyo 30 inch wide screen HDTV for $479 and am really happy with it. After years of nursing used tv sets only for them to last only short periods i finally bit the bullit and bought a new one. I wanted a crt set as the plasma/lcd sets are still too new for me to trust yet. I did get the extended warranty just in case since it was only $20 . I have friends who own plasma and LCD sets and mine beats the picture that those display hands down once i adjusted the picture controls to my liking as the defaults were too harsh.

i have been working on tv,s for over 23 years. panasonic hell no, sanyo is still a darn good tv. sony has picture tube problems. rca has gone to crap and zenith is just plain crap. my choice sanyo or hitachi steve

Does Hitachi even make tube sets anymore? I haven't seen any for the last few years, save for their CRT projectors.

I think Panasonic has actually improved a lot in the last few years. A lot of their sets from the 80's and 90's were not that great. They used cheap boards that got too hot and they were hard to work on. Their CRTs weren't that long lasting either. The few I've seen from the 2000's were easy to work on and looked well made overall.

If you're prepared to do your own repairs a 16:9 CRT set is probably within your price range. Around here a load of dead ones are starting to hit the junk market. I've seen them sell for between $20 and $50. Sometimes less for those Vestel/Teac 66cm sets (not the nicest thing around, but if they share their basic design with the 4:3 sets they're easy to work on).

I've yet to try my luck with one, partly due to lack of space, partly as 16:9 just doesn't really excite me that much at the moment. It would also break my $2 TV rule which I can easily stick to with 4:3 sets. :)

Hitachi has no crt sets in the line.
I would buy a used JVC from a shop that services them. It was very common to have vertical circuit failures that were cheap to fix, but customers abandoned the sets anyway.
Look at the Pioneer PD4214 at costco. This is a Chinese set, but backed by Pioneer. You will not have problems with a Pioneer plasma.

What made the Sony 32XBR100 great?
 

I have owned a Sony 32XBR100 for approximately 6 years. I purchased this set, new in a sealed box, in Fall 2000 at a Sony Outlet for $900. In 1990, I found many "rave" reviews about the 32XBR100.

I have been pleased with this set, although it did need to be services in the third year of ownership.

Can anyone provide any insights as to what made the 32XBR100 such a desirable TV? :scratch2:

There is no mention here of Samsung.

For good reason, they only make junk.

Search up "slimfit," for example, and you'll find hordes of threads complaining about the geometry problems of these sets.

Not to mention their famous "blue label" monitor CRTs. They were famous for having their emission fall to zero after only a couple of years. They were worse than Zenith's CRTs and they made them for at least 5 years.

How about their VCRs which were flimsy junk even in the 80's when everyone was making solid VCRs?

I recently gave them another chance with a Samsung HD upconverting DVD player. It would have been great except that it skipped ahead a full 30 seconds when going from fast search to play (if you hit play when you saw the show come back, it started playing 30 seconds into the show). This made it useless for skipping the commercials on DVDs from my DVD recorder.

Boy did I get a shock today. I had been following this thread to see what everyone thought of the newer sets. I saw a post by Andy that said to avoid Toshiba's as they don't make their own sets anymore, and have HORRIBLE Orion tubes. I thought "Nah... that can't be" I bought a new set in early 2004. At the time I lived in a small apartment and was limited for space. I bought a 24" Sony Wega. That set had a HORRIBLE picture, and after I bought it I went on eopinions and saw many many many complaints. I then looked online for a comparable set, and saw decent reviews for the comparable Toshiba. I wanted the 24" flat-screen with good audio. I then had the store pick up the Sony and deliver the Toshiba. The quality and picture was better than the Sony, and I have been bragging up the Tosiba and telling people to get one when they ask my opinion on a new set. I was cleaning today and as I was cleaning my Toshiba (manufactured in November 2003) I could see the tube label thru the vents. YEP.... an Orion tube. No wonder my 1975 Zenith Chromacolor has a better picture. Altho the Toshiba isn't too bad, I'm shocked that they were "on the cheap" in 2003 I wonder how long that Orion tube is gonna last?

look for an older mitsubishi. i've had one for years and only had one service call on it. look for one built in the 80's...

The comb filter for one.Made for a smoother looking picture.I believe this set used the same phosphers as their professional sets,which produced better colors,especially reds.The set just had a presentation that no other consumer set had at the time.The Proton TVs were very close.

I bought an RCA CTC-185 19" TV in 1999. Today, almost seven years later, it still works as well as when it was new. This TV has also had only one repair--the RF port on the tuner PC board. Set still has its original CRT. Say what you will about late '80s-'90s RCA/Thomson sets, but once you get past the tuner grounding problems in the earlier ones, these sets are like Eveready Energizer batteries--they just keep going and going; at least mine has so far. RCA has also seemingly gotten around the problems they had with the CRTs in some of the same sets with the tuner problems. The picture on mine is as good as a good photograph, both with on-air signals from cable and my VCR and DVD player. I have a friend whose parents had a 25" RCA Guide Plus TV, 1990s vintage; the CRT failed after only two years, but I think that was just a case of a tube with a design flaw--I have heard that if you get an RCA with a good tube, the CRT will work well for years. I expect to be using this TV with an ATSC digital cable box when the broadcasting standards go all digital in 2009. Another set that has given me excellent service, and still has its original CRT and has had absolutely no servicing done on it, is my Zenith Sentry 2 19" TV. I got this set as a birthday present in 1995, used it daily for four years until I moved to my present apartment, and now only use it to back up the RCA. The Zenith still makes an excellent picture after eleven years; it is in line to replace the RCA if and when the latter goes belly-up (after seven years I don't intend to have it repaired again).

I cannot speak for Mitsubishi TVs, but a good friend of mine has no fewer than three Toshiba TVs in his house; every one of them works well on cable, or so he tells me. I did see a 32" Mitsu TV near the trash barrels behind my apartment about six months ago; good AKer I am, I was tempted to grab it, but two things stopped me: one, the set was far too big and heavy to move by myself, and two, I did not know whether or not it was working. Even if I could have horsed that set down to my place, I didn't want to be disappointed if it didn't work or, worse, if it blew a circuit breaker in the basement of the building--or worse yet, if it started smoking or (gasp!) :yikes: caught fire. I figure I'll wait until the large-screen flat-panel sets become reasonable in price (for me that would be well under $500) before I get a TV as big as that Mitsu was. Another problem with the Mitsu was that I don't have anything in my apartment large enough to support a big TV like that. The utility cart I have my RCA set, DVD player, VCR and cable box on is just durable enough for a 19" TV and the aforementioned devices; anything larger would cave it in in five seconds flat. :eek:

i have been in the tv repair business for about 25 years. the toshiba made by orion have a great picture. and i havent found them to be troublesome. i would just as soon have one of those as anythingelse out there. but if i were to go buy a new direct view it would have to be a sanyo. they are still a damn good set. and are made in usa and i sold rca for over 20 years and rca has gone to the dogs pure crap. steve :tears:

and i f i might add rca made me a darn good living for many many years they made some terriffic tv sets. some out there 20 years old and still going strong. thanks again rca you were good at one time. steve

Hey Steve, Thanks for the reassuring advice on my Toshiba. I had just heard such bad stuff about Orion, that I thought I was avoiding that, by shelling out money for what I thought was a "pure Toshiba" set. So very cool you haven't run into any problems. I hope I get alot of use out of it altho I tend to not use it much. I'm always in my "office" where the Chromacolor is. I did buy a new RCA in 2000. I gave it away as it had NO input jacks for anything. However the people I gave it to use it daily and it still has a fantastic picture. It's a CTC-185. I had heard that Thomson sold RCA recently and now they are the worst of the worst of Chinese junk. That is too bad that such a good name is being used and drug down like that. At least LG isn't putting anything out with the Zenith logo on it as far as I know (thank god)

Did anyone mention the Sony Profeel series of the early 80s? Those are one of the best overall pictures that I can think of too... KX-1211, KX-1901 & KX-2501. The CRTs were very hi-res, and they had smoked glass which made for beautiful contrast!

Charles

I walked into a Radio Shack yesterday and saw LCD HDTV's with pictures so pasty and bland, I wouldn't pay $100 for the set. I don't know if they were not adjusted correctly or not, but if that is the best they can do, my 25", 1982 Zenith System 3 could eat those sets for lunch.

That's news to me. I didn't know Thomson had washed its hands of RCA. All the more reason for me to keep my own CTC-185; like yours did and aparently still does for its new owners, mine has a very good picture, as I mentioned in my last post. My set has the on-board tuner (as did all CTC-185 and earlier sets), but once the grounds around it are soldered properly, the TV will go on working well for years. As I said, mine has almost seven years on it and still makes a very good picture on cable (Time-Warner digital). I'm not interested in high-definition, so when all television goes to digital standards in 2009 I intend to be using this set with a box, as I am now, as long as it still works.

As to LG no longer using the Zenith lightning bolt logo on its (LG's) televisions, I agree with you; it's just as well. From what I've heard about LG TV sets, they were and are not anywhere nearly as good as the genuine Zenith sets were. I think, liking Zenith TV as much as I do (I've owned several Zenith TVs and still have a 1995 Sentry 2), that LG's use of the Zenith logo, under license though it probably was, was misleading the public into believing they were buying a genuine Zenith TV just because LG's first flat-panel sets had the Z logo at the base of the screen. I can only guess how many of these people got a very rude surprise the first time their new "Zenith" flat-panel TV burst into flames, leaked coolant solution all over the PC boards (the latter was the subject of a recall of certain Zenith flat-panel projection TVs of early-mid-1990s vintage because of a tear in a gasket) or developed other problems, some of which were not covered under the warranty. These folks may have heard about Zenith's 80+-year reputation for quality, and fully expected the new set to live up to it; when their new set did not live up to it, well, that soured them on Zenith forevermore. Now it seems as if RCA is headed down the same road. Zenith faded into oblivion when it was bought out by Gold Star; now that the latter has ceased using the Z logo on its TVs, we can finally say RIP Zenith--for good, as that logo was the last vestige of the company as we formerly knew it. Now that Thomson has sold its interests in RCA, the stylized RCA logo will probably be abandoned eventually as well by whomever bought out the company. Too bad, as RCA was the first major manufacturer of TV sets after World War II; this company invented all-electronic television as well. NBC, which was operated by RCA in the 1950s (years before they went down the drain when GE bought them out in 1986--grrr), proudly stated on the test patterns used by its operated stations (WNBC New York, WNBQ-TV Chicago, WNBW Washington, D.C., KNBC Los Angeles and WNBK Cleveland at the time) that they used the RCA television system. Now that GE has the network by the tail, things are starting to get worse. GE has a slogan on its commercials it uses during Meet the Press and other programs that states, "GE. Imagination at work." I don't think so. If the powers-that-be at GE were really that imaginative, the programming put out by NBC wouldn't be nearly as bad as it is, for the most part. One of the worst mistakes GE ever made, IMO, was to put Brian Williams at the NBC Nightly News anchor desk when Tom Brokaw stepped down. Brokaw's departure from NBC News was one major reason I quit watching NBC for news, but that's another story.

This is, however, another example, IMHO, of how the quality of NBC television programming has deteriorated over the 20 years since GE bought out RCA. My point is that it is not just the RCA name and reputation that has lost its luster (in a huge way) during that time, but the network's programming has gone downhill as well. There was speculation, IIRC, some time ago that one of the three major TV networks would go out of business as cable, the Internet, and other alternative video carriers became more and more popular. With on-demand news being so popular (podcasts and Netcasts are streamed over the Internet by all three networks today), the future of the 6:30 p.m. local time network newscast could well be in jeopardy, and not only on NBC. I really don't know which network is most in danger of going dark, if any of them are, but in this age of news-on-demand it wouldn't surprise me if one of them does just that, maybe not tomorrow, next week or next year, but eventually. Even the sports segment of the local TV news in many cities is in danger of being phased out, as I read in a recent edition of the TVSpy daily television industry e-newsletter. (It's available at www.tvspy.com and is free; all you need do is sign up at the site.) It's apparently a fact: When the sports comes on during many local television news programs, viewers simply change the channel or else otherwise ignore it. Again, this is in large part due to the many different sources now available for news (sports news or otherwise); the Internet, newspapers and even your cell phone can deliver more in-depth and, in the case of the Internet and cellular, real-time sports news as it happens, so I am not the least bit surprised that the six- and eleven-p.m. sportscast may be in imminent danger of extinction in major markets.

Orion CRT's / RCA debacle
 

First off, I have firsthand experience with Orion picture tubes from the two sets I owned with them. One was a 1981 Portland, really cheap (rudimentary) for 81, not even having auto color or an electronic tuning scheme. It had a 19 inch Orion tube- I don't recall the number, but that set is still going strong in my aunts basement almost 7 years later. She has it hooked up to a yagi-type rooftop antenna and the pic is actually quite good.

Next I fixed my neighbor's Daewoo 19" set, I would say it was a 1984-5 model, but a very simple design. he says he bought it new and it never gave any trouble until it was hit with a lightning strike. I basically replaced the whole power supply section of the mainboard(it seemed it wheeew) but expected a terrible picture. I saw the set operating around dinner time last thursday. He has it on DTV digital cable and the raster is just as bright and crisp as ever. Maybe Orion has gone downhill now and Toshiba chose them because they are cheaper? Who would have done that back in the 60's-70's....? Eh.

The only piece of ....equipment.... of Rca I own now is a clockradio circa 2004 with blue large Led's. (Gift). The radio makes me ears hurt its so weak and the display is undimmable and buzzes so that no one can sleep near it at night. Gee, i miss my 1978 Colortrak Console!!!!

I know for a fact that some Orion branded CRTs from the 80's were made by Zenith.

I associate Orion with the ghastly Emerson sets of the 80s & early 90s. Never gave it any thought though... Maybe the picture was OK on those sets, but I don't recall ever fixing one that stayed fixed, and I don't remember seeing any still in use that were more than 3 or 4 years old.

Charles

When I was younger & dumberer (ha!) a semi-retired TV repairman sold me a bunch of stuff that included 2 pickup loads of used picture tubes. He saw me coming. At least half of them were Emerson/Orion. This guy did work on LOADS of those sets. I saved those crts for about 10 years before realizing they would never come in handy so out they went-every one of them save for a portacolor crt. The only one I should have saved was a 23V Admiral but it was too heavy for me to lug around so into the dumpster it went, too. (then I found AK & realized it really was okay to save stuff like that-D'oh!)

And now they make Toshiba!

Actual Orion info...
 

Couple of wrong infos regarding Orion...(I have over five years of experience understanding the Toshiba-Orion connection, so you can believe me, although I don't go to this forum too often.)

Your 1981 Portland TV was actually made by Daewoo with Orion tube that was a Korean firm and owned by Daewoo. This is not the same Orion company found in the TVs that are Made in Thailand today, in fact, they are not owned by each other. Back then, Orion Electric Co. Ltd. Japan produced video products for Emerson and TMK (Toyomenka) in Japan until they moved the entire production to Thailand beginning in 1990. The Orion Electric Co. Ltd. Korea has only made CRT picture tubes for televisions and monitors for Daewoo, Funai, Goldstar, Samsung, Sharp, and Zenith.

If you are talking Toshiba, you must be referring to the Orion Electric Co. Ltd. Japan one. Orion did not go downhill, actually. Orion sold the Emerson brand to Funai in 2000 so they can start expanding their facilities and dream of making products for major brands that they can actually sell in stores. Orion sent an invitation to Toshiba way back in 2001 to try outsourcing to them, and Toshiba agreed to join. So, the first Toshiba products to be made by Orion ever were the CRT TVs sized 27" and smaller, some VCRs, and one DVD/VCR combo (model SD-V280). As time goes on, Toshiba starts to be more satisfied with Orion because off its production performance and low-cost, so Toshiba begins to outsource their products to Orion more. Today, Orion makes ALL of Toshiba-branded CRT tube televisions, LCD televisions sized 23" and under, plasma televisions, and DVD/VCR combos. More than 65% of Toshiba TV/video products sold in the market today are made by Orion. It has been predicted that next year, Orion will be making all of Toshiba televisions (CRT, LCD, and Plasma, but not DLP projection), regardless of what price. So, if you see a TV with a Toshiba brand in store, it is made by Orion. Toshiba is the first and only major brand so far to outsource their entire TV/video production to a third-world supplier, including Orion. Nobody is doing this yet. I wonder how long will Toshiba stay in business before the consumers will know that they are getting Orion-made TVs for the premium price they pay? Just to be clear, Orion is NOT owned by Toshiba. Toshiba is a LOYAL Orion customer who fills out a lot of order forms to them waiting for the products to be made. Orion will soon be the world's most powerful OEM maker and will beat Funai in a couple of years. Because Orion has Toshiba, and Toshiba has kindly asked Orion to hide from the public, Orion was forced to discontinue making all of their own off-branded products (Broksonic, Memorex, Orion and Sansui), and they are no longer available at stores, which means consumers will not be aware of the Orion company anymore. Toshiba still refuses to admit the public that the TVs are made by Orion, and they will always lie to their customers saying that the TVs are still made by Toshiba (give me a break). Don't ever try contacting Toshiba's customer support.

Are you sure? My records tell me that the Orion-branded CRT TVs have always been made by Orion and never by anyone else. Maybe they used Zenith picture tubes back then, although I highly doubt they do, but the TVs were definitely not made by Zenith. The first Orion-branded TVs launched in 1993 in the United States as an exclusive Wal-Mart store brand. It's surprising to see the Orion brand came late to the market, but the Orion company has been around for years.

Unless you are referring to the Zenith TVs with Orion CRTs that were made in Korea or the TV/VCR combo one?

The ones I'm thinking of were from the late 80's. The CRTs were branded Orion, but had Zenith's EIA code and a very small Zenith lightning bolt on the label. They also stood out because, unlike most Orion CRTs, they produced an excellent picture.

Hmmm, maybe that's the Daewoo one, but I don't know. Since you work in a TV repair shop, be prepare to see more and more Toshiba TVs (even high-end ones) coming in for repairs beginning next year. Maybe not now since they are all recent purchases (most are under one year old), but this is the perfect time stocking more Orion parts in your shop. Last thing, never forget the famous Orion service menu procedure "turn volume all the way down to 0, then press 9 on the remote for about two seconds." :D

The 25" Emersons of the early 90s were awful. The picture tubes were worse than Zenith and they loved to eat HO transistors and regulator ics when the guns shorted. And the late 80s 19"ones sold by Ames and Roses before Walmart took over loved to eat HO transistors. Lots of bad flybacks but the CRTs were good. Some of them that belonged to the lucky are still going. Usually as a spare tv. All the bad ones are in the landfill by now. I still have tons of carcasses of those sets in my junker chassis. I've thrown quite a few chassis away. Recently a guy was using a 13" from the late 80s as a spare while his big Sony was down. It had a no red and pretty ugly color but I suspect the connections on that little standup board with the AKB circuit on it rather than the CRT. Was pretty common back when they were newer. 13" CRTs of all brands seem to outlast the larger size tubes.