Number Of Hours On Broadcast Monitors?

[Ronin]

Hello! I'm pretty new to the RGB scene and am looking for a broadcast monitor like the Sony pvm and bvm series. I know that most of these monitors were left on all of the time and have a lot of hours on them. Most of the ones I have seen online range from 70,000 to 100,000 hours or more. Although I saw one that only has about 13,000 hours on it and another that supposedly only has about 2,000 hours on it!

So, my question is, about how many hours should I expect to have on a monitor like these? Is there an amount that is too much? Can these monitors get "worn out" from too many hours of usage?

Also, is anyone familiar with the differences between various pvms and bvms? For example, what is the difference between a PVM-20M2U and a PVM-20M4U?

Any help would be much appreciated! Thank you!

[Xan]

Yes they can wear out. A monitor with too many hours on it might have issues such as a dull picture requiring to run very high contrast to get decent light output.

The M4 has a finer grille pitch and broadcast grade phosphors on its tube, and also reduced magnetic field emission according to Sony's catalog.

[viletim]

Pro monitors often are designed to run 24/7 and often were. The picture tubes would tend to fail first because the electronics is built to a higher standard than consumer gear. The tubes were replaced during normal service life so the hours may not be a good indicator if it has been replaced already. I'd say it's more useful to know the time since the last service than total operating time.

I wouldn't buy a CRT monitor without looking at the picture first.