OK, Time for Many Admiral 30A1 Questions

[UberVacTuber]

Originally Posted by Electronic M

If the Retrace lines consist of dashes come and go in the top to the screen and they don't run the full distance from side to side that it is porbably the copy protection signal from the tape or DVD that you are seeing. You can buy devices that will remove the offending copy protect signal if you want.

Yep, I've seen a small black bar at the top of the screen with those little dashes that come and go and move around. However, these are thin white lines that are on a slant and are spaced about an inch apart. I took a photo of what I'm talking about (On the screen is a shot of LeMans with Steve McQueen. It's in widescreen, so the aspect ratio is supposed to be off):



You can see the little dashes at the top. The diagonal lines can be made to jitter with the Vertical Hold adjuster. Even when you turn the Contrast all the way down, those lines are still there, just superimposed on a gray screen.

[zenith2134]

...the copy-protection is quite visible during retrace/vertical blanking on all my sets when you look at the scope, but is only visible 'on screen' on some of them. (btw, is this Macrovision on dvd or something else.)
I think a lot depends on the set's video output circuitry, many old tv's tend to blank this out along with the rest in the VBI but others have obnoxious lines at the top.

[earlyfilm]

Originally Posted by UberVacTuber

However, these are thin white lines that are on a slant and are spaced about an inch apart.

Your picture shows two problems.

First is the copy protection that has been mentioned.

The other problem is retrace showing.

Before you do the mentioned added capacitor, check the grid coupling capacitors on your video output tube for leakage. Check either by substitution with a known capacitor, or with a battery (at least 15 volts, better higher) in series with the suspected capacitor. The voltmeter reading should drop to zero in a few seconds if the cap is good. Bad ones go to almost zero, but never to zero.

It usually is not the first video, but it does no harm to check that one the same way while doing the other.

James