Fudoh's ode to old display technology

[Fudoh]

The only reason why they tell you to start from the right is that you have to be careful not to damage the "grounding fins" on the back of the card (right at the edge, top to bottom). If you won't have another card sitting directly on the left of your new card, don't bother....

[Michael Ikonomidis]

I think this is probably my first post here after lurking around for a while and reading up on CRT displays. I've wanted to get a decent screen for ages, but they're incredibly difficult - if not impossible - to come by where I live (small island state off the mainland). A screen popped up on eBay recently, however, and after convincing the seller to send it via courier for a considerable cost, I bid on it and won. It'll hopefully arrived in a few days, shipped via pallet to avoid it bouncing around on a conveyor belt with whatever else is being sent too.

So, after all that mucking about I will soon (barring some kind of disaster) be the proud owner of a Sony BVM-A20F1M. From looking at the images it's in really good condition - two scratches on the top of the chassis are about all I can see. Some people may baulk at the idea of buying one without seeing it in person, but really, I have no other options, and it seemed too good to pass up. I love my old games - Nintendo stuff in particular - and this'll be a very welcome addition to my games room.

Image gallery for anyone interested: http://imgur.com/a/Su2gO

I believe the BVM A series requires the almost impossible to find BKM-68X input card, to support 240p consoles via RGB. Did your monitor come with this card, or will you be trying to find one?

[Fudoh]

I believe the BVM A series requires the almost impossible to find BKM-68X input card, to support 240p consoles via RGB. Did your monitor come with this card, or will you be trying to find one?

the pictures he posted of his purchase how that a RGBs card is installed, so he's all good. Very nice purchase (if he didn't overpay). @Chomolonzo: care to disclose what you paid ?

[mikejmoffitt]

I got a PVM 20L5 for $100. It looks like it needs a degauss, and has a slightly tilted raster. I suspect the yoke got knocked a bit loose, and I'll have to just put it back in place.

[Thamiel]

I got a PVM 20L5 for $100. It looks like it needs a degauss, and has a slightly tilted raster. I suspect the yoke got knocked a bit loose, and I'll have to just put it back in place.

I've had 3 20l5s across the years, every damn one of them had the tilt. Was never game enough to try a yoke tweak.

Sent from my C6603 using Tapatalk

[Michael Ikonomidis]

I believe the BVM A series requires the almost impossible to find BKM-68X input card, to support 240p consoles via RGB. Did your monitor come with this card, or will you be trying to find one?

the pictures he posted of his purchase how that a RGBs card is installed, so he's all good. Very nice purchase (if he didn't overpay). @Chomolonzo: care to disclose what you paid ?

I see that now, thank you. And yes very nice, looks like new and low hours. I too am curious how much was paid.

[xga]

I believe the BVM A series requires the almost impossible to find BKM-68X input card, to support 240p consoles via RGB. Did your monitor come with this card, or will you be trying to find one?

the pictures he posted of his purchase how that a RGBs card is installed, so he's all good. Very nice purchase (if he didn't overpay). @Chomolonzo: care to disclose what you paid ?

I see that now, thank you. And yes very nice, looks like new and low hours. I too am curious how much was paid.

Looks like this might be the one - http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Sony-BVM-A20 ... true&rt=nc

AUD $960 / USD $715. Pretty decent price considering it came with a BKM-68X.

[mikejmoffitt]

I picked up an HDM-14E5U on the cheap for 480p content. It looked really g reat, but after ten minutes the screen went dark and hasn't shown an image since. The deflection is still working, the power supply is fine (doesn't say Overload on the front panel). The buttons for the menus and stuff still work, and when I shut it off I can see the brief white flash, which tells me 1) the deflection is working, 2) the heater filament is working (and I can see the neck glow), and 3) the HV supply is working. Anyone dealt with one of these?

[Chomolonzo]

I believe the BVM A series requires the almost impossible to find BKM-68X input card, to support 240p consoles via RGB. Did your monitor come with this card, or will you be trying to find one?

the pictures he posted of his purchase how that a RGBs card is installed, so he's all good. Very nice purchase (if he didn't overpay). @Chomolonzo: care to disclose what you paid ?

I got it for $960 AUD. 13,000 operation hours, and the only blemishes to it are the two scratches on top of the chassis. Screen and bezels are just fine. I live down in Tasmania, and they never pop up down here - too small a place. Had to get it shipped down to me from interstate. It does indeed come with the BKM-68X, required cables, control unit, plus the little S-Video adaptor.

Yeah it's the one xga posted.

[SamIAm]

I just want to jump in here and say that I recently picked up an Ikegami HTM-2050R2, and it's everything I hoped it would be. The only other mention of it on these forums is from a guy just asking about it, and assuming that it doesn't do 240p. Well, I'm happy to report that it does.

The only problem with it is that it doesn't seem to like composite video as sync, but that's easily worked around.

[h1ghju1ce]

Oh wow, just seen this (no its not me)

Wish I had £700 and somewhere to put it!


Pioneer PDP-V402 40" 4:3 Plasma
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Pioneer-PDP-V ... SwOtdYTSqU

[AndehX]

Oh wow, just seen this (no its not me)

Wish I had £700 and somewhere to put it!


Pioneer PDP-V402 40" 4:3 Plasma
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Pioneer-PDP-V ... SwOtdYTSqU

Hate it when people sell something like this and make a song and dance out of the fact its treasured by retro gamers etc etc, because its basically the same as saying "Hey, I know exactly how sought after these are, and im going to exploit that to the absolute fullest" or "Look at me! I'm a dirty scalper!"

Also evidenced by the fact the guy put "PVM, BVM" in the auction title, even though the display has nothing to do with PVM's and BVM's

[Fudoh]

I agree when the seller has no interest in video games whatsoever and just claims the suitabilty for retro gaming to increase the price, but in this case I think the seller obviously enjoyed the set WITH the right games, so why not present it this way ?

[Xyga]

Note that it shows the more we talk about cool retro games and hardware, extensively and with competence thanks to our quite knowledgeable members, the more we help gold diggers.

Can't be helped.

I too find the presentation of his sale kind of whorish, but the price isn't that much of an issue, because after all it's true that it's a very rare thing at such low hours...

[Einzelherz]

Um, welcome to the world?

[bobrocks95]

Um, welcome to the world?

It's the way things typically go, but that doesn't make it suck any less.

At least as Fudoh pointed out the guy seems to like games himself rather than someone totally outside who found one at a yard sale for $50 and decided to flip it immediately. But if I had to venture a guess, the latter is much more common.

[nem]

I'm sure the seller is a member here.

Shame about the price though. No way did he purchase it for that price (or even half of it).

[Einzelherz]

I'm sure the seller is a member here.

Shame about the price though. No way did he purchase it for that price (or even half of it).

I'm not. Any semi clever eBay seller would google items to estimate what they can get for them.

[AndehX]

If he's a genuine retro gamer, I guess he has the right to sing its praises. I agree though, there's way more people out there that have no interest in retro gaming, but are aware of how sought-after these things are, and completely exploit that. PVM's and BVM's on ebay, are 95% of the time sold by gold diggers and scalpers. Make's me sick to my stomach when I see a 20F1E with 15,000 hours, and its listed BIN for £1500 -_-

[Sid]

A few heads in the clouds in here. If any of us weren't aware or interested in PVMs and such when they were dirt cheap, it's our own fault. Why on Earth should someone have something that is currently of significant value but sell it at unders?

Any people here willing to pay based on what the owner paid? If it's so offensive for someone else to buy cheap and on-sell with a massively increased margin, why is it not offensive for us to buy cheap from someone who paid a small fortune for their displays? I'm know I'm not the only one who's picked up something for free from the original owner, who themselves paid many thousands for it. It's the way of the world. Get over it - or at least make sure you're not a hypocrite in holding someone to ransom via natural supply and demand dynamics, in one sense, but moaning about another doing effectively the same.

[kamiboy]

Nailed it!

[nissling]

Tbh most of these monitors were trashed long ago and the only ones who have any interest in CRTs nowadays are retro gamers. Even if I don't like usury I feel that it's better if a BVM someday may end up at a gamer rather than in the dumpster. Making money is fine to a certain degree IMO.

Although there's one guy in particular at game conventions in Sweden who goes around to buy games from other sellers and then just put it on his own table at four times higher prices. That ruins the market, not someone who picked up a bunch of CRTs from some broadcast company since no one wanted to take care of them.

[Shoryukev]

Picked up a JVC AV-32320 last night for $25. It is replacing a Trinitron of the same size, and I'm honestly shocked at how much better the JVC looks. I knew the line count was higher (700 on the JVC, not sure about the sony), but I never realized how much of a difference that made. It already looks better than my PVM14-N6U and I can't even use RGB on the JVC yet. I ordered a SCART to Component YPbPr converter yesterday, so I'm really excited to see what the JVC looks like once I get to use my SCART cables!

I know converting RGBs to component isn't perfect compared to native RGB, but I'm thinking I will be very happy with the end result once my converter gets here. Here's some pictures of it hooked up to a non-TMSS genesis modded with s-video output.

Spoiler

On a side note, it has nothing to do with the picture quality but for anyone interested in larger consumer CRTs...this is the lightest one I've come across. It is almost half the weight of my previous trinitron, both mine and my brother-in-laws backs were very happy about that LOL

[Blair]

that looks beautiful Shoryukev! I'll have to keep an eye out for some of those late-model JVC's.

personally I was never really impressed with the way 240p content looked on most of the silver Trinitron's (seems like they did a much better job with interlaced content).

[Shoryukev]

Thanks! I wasn't sure how the JVC would compare, but my initial impressions are that it blows my old KV-32S42 out of the water in every way (sharpness, color, geometry, etc.). The stock color setting was a little too oversaturated for me, but once I backed it off a bit things got incredibly sharp (especially for s-video).

I'd definitely search for one, chances are you can pick one up for cheap (if not free) depending on where you live.

[FinalBaton]

That's awesome Kev! I was on the fence about picking up a JVC consumer CRT but now I definitely want to check one out for myself!

There are a couple later JVC sets here with an even higher TVL count, but I hope the colors on them will be as good as on your set... guess I'll have to check both your model and one of those newer sets I'm talking about.

[Einzelherz]

Told you so.

p.s. I hate you.

p.p.s. It's lighter partly because it's a curved tube.

[bobrocks95]

p.p.s. It's lighter partly because it's a curved tube.

Is the lead/glass thicker in a flat set because the vacuum is stronger to allow for the shorter deflection?

[Einzelherz]

p.p.s. It's lighter partly because it's a curved tube.

Is the lead/glass thicker in a flat set because the vacuum is stronger to allow for the shorter deflection?

My understanding is that a flat screen is the same on the inside of the glass as a curved, but they add extra glass to the front to flatten out the edge. I'm sure it's more complicated than that, but it makes sense in my head.

e.g.

curved
<)

flat
<)|

[Shoryukev]

That's awesome Kev! I was on the fence about picking up a JVC consumer CRT but now I definitely want to check one out for myself!
There are a couple later JVC sets here with an even higher TVL count, but I hope the colors on them will be as good as on your set... guess I'll have to check both your model and one of those newer sets I'm talking about.

I was on the fence about it too, but I couldn't pass up the deal and needed a replacement for my mame cab. My eyes have been opened to the whole line count thing, I never realized it made such a difference. I'm going to be very impatient waiting for my scart to component video converter LOL.

Told you so. p.s. I hate you. p.p.s. It's lighter partly because it's a curved tube.

Hahaha I just happened to get lucky and find one locally, totally random. It was an elderly couple throwing it out since their grandson bought them a tablet with netflix on it LOL.

The sony was a curved tube too, not really sure why it was so stinking heavy. I had it apart before so I know it wasn't full of lead or anything LOL. If the newer silver sony's with the flat glass are even heavier I would steer clear, the one I had was already a back breaker (albeit it was a 32")

EDIT: The manual says the KV-32S42 is 143lbs, it's every ounce that heavy LOL. The JVC is 112lbs