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Originally Posted by tv beta guy
It has an instant on CRT, which I plan on modifying so it isn't.
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I hear ya. I didn't then (in the '70s, when instant-on first appeared in TVs) and do not now like instant-on either. Besides wasting electricity, these sets could create fire hazards if anything shorted in the filament circuits. Personally, I wouldn't want an instant-on TV keeping its tubes warm while I was sleeping or away from the house, but then again that's why most of those sets had a switch somewhere to defeat the instant-on circuit when it wasn't needed or wanted. The other thing I never cared for with instant-on was the habit the instant-on diode across the set's on/off switch had of shorting whenever lightning hit near (or, heaven forbid,
on) the power line the set was connected to. Since this diode was in fact in shunt across the switch, when it shorted it effectively locked the switch on. The only way to turn the set on and off with a shorted instant-on diode was with the AC cord, by plugging it into and pulling it out of the socket, respectively.
One of the best things TV manufacturers ever did, IMO, was to eliminate the instant-on feature once and for all by, IIRC, the late seventies or early eighties (I'm not sure exactly when). One other thing some people did, if they knew how to do it and where to look, was to simply cut the diode completely out of the circuit, even if said diode was still good (certainly if it was shorted). This removed the instant-on feature without disturbing the normal function of the switch (or restored the switch function if the diode was bad). Of course, when TVs went to completely solid-state circuitry as they are today, the sets are practically instant-on (I say practically because of the warm-up time for the CRT filaments, which usually is not too long--my set's picture usually appears in well under a minute after I push the power button), with no need whatsoever for power-wasting instant-on circuitry. Today's sets are never completely off anyhow, even with the power switch off (because of the remote control receiver and probably memory retention circuitry for the tuner and on-screen controls), but there is no problem with fire hazards (and very little added impact on the owner's electric bill as well--the set won't use that much more power than its maximum rating, or perhaps, even likely, the power used by the remote, etc. is figured into the total current draw as shown on the back of the set), since the memory-backup systems and the remote receiver use so little power. I don't know how much off hand, but I think it would have to be well,
well under one volt DC.
BTW: I'll be darned! I thought that little set looked familiar. I remember seeing it in one of Kam's posts a while back (before you bought it from him, of course), with the same color-bar test pattern on the screen as appears in your pic of the set. Hmmm.
