Why would you want this? I used to work at RCA. You do NOT want to be using a CRT today. It's a particle accelerator. You have a very real refresh rate on it, which even if you can't see, trust me, your brain can. This is why we used to get headaches staring at these things. Trinitron was a cost reduction process in creating the screen, it works great for monitors because you can align it up with pixels, but it's not an improvement over picture quality. We're engineers, what we've replaced and obsoleted WAS inferior. CRTs are a terrible technology, but given no memory storage, the inability to do transparent circuit layout, etc, it made a blurry image possible. It was fine, for 1980. Consider where we are today. In 2000 years, image and video fidelity will NOT be better than what we have today. It might be different, maybe 70 Hz, maybe 50, maybe 700, but we won't have a significant difference in quality. Whatever civilization is there, will be able to see what our life was like. You REALLY want to go back to CRTs and videotapes?

@@fuzzywzhe The idea is to use them with older computers like Apple IIGS or Amiga. Screens made for these units are getting rare and expensive, this is an inexpensive way to get decent video quality on them. Yeah you can use LCD screens, but they simply don't look right.

@@danaeckel5523 You just don't want to use a CRT at all. You really don't even want to use an old computer. A rasbperry pi (when they are available) cost $35. With a 128 GB SD card, you can easily simulate (at the instruction level) an Amiga or C=64. That will use, at maximum 20 watts, including the screen. You can put any filter you want on the display. I simply don't understand the obsession with old hardware. They were space heaters, they are RF pollutants as well. The CRTs caused eye strain, they were terribly inefficient, why would you want to go back to that? I remember seeing full motion video on an Amiga back in the late 1980's. I saw the first attempts at raytracing. The frustration of working with these early, primitive machines - what's the point? I can render an old style computer monitor from 1990 on a 4K television. Why do anything with the old systems? Nobody can answer that. It was cutting edge technology at the time, but why bother with it? Babbage machines are an interesting machine, however, you wouldn't want to use one in lieu of a calculator or even a phone - you don't even want to use a calculator today.

@@fuzzywzhe Why are you even here if you don't like retro computers?

@@PG-gs5vb I'm an engineer. It's not that I don't appreciate what was created before me, or even stuff I worked on, it's that we have superior solutions to old problems. I used to do optimization with real time operating systems to make, frankly, awful hardware work within limitations by converting to assembly. That job is entirely obsolete, a typical optimizer can do a better job than I can. We fixed SO MANY problems. I could understand this if the previous solutions used less power, or were better in SOME way, but they aren't. I can run a simulator of an Amiga in a web-browser, and not only does it use less power, it's faster than the machine I had 35 years ago. There's NO WAY that earlier solutions are superior. Building blocks from these old systems still exist, but there's no reason to use the old hardware. Understand where we're at. You can store more books than you can read in a lifetime on a $12 SD Card. It DEMOLISHES the Library of Alexandria, you can probably have the entire NYC library system on such device, and you can lose it between your couch cushions. Your PHONE can do nuclear bomb simulation. You can EASILY handle the emails and communications of 1000 people on it. We are at the point a TOY machine can handle the communication and storage needs of a company. Welcome to the future dude. You ask me why I don't like retro-computing, that's not the case. Why don't you like modernity? I'm not kidding, every book you've ever read, ever will read, every book everybody know has read, fits on an $11 device. You can literally carry around the knowledge of civilization in your pocket.

It is not just a regular crt tv as they use Aperture Grille while other just use typical shadow mask

Came here to say exactly this!

Came here to say almost this, one tip is to make starter/pilot holes with solder-iron to all 4 corners, then drill them with little bit larger like 4mm (5/32inch)

I have had luck making precise holes in plastic by drilling a starter hole and then use a dremel with a "grout cleaning bit" running at a low/medium speed. This bit resembles a round file and as long as you keep the speed low enough, it won't melt the plastic but you retain decent control over the material carved off the edge. If the setup allows it, attach a plunge router head over the end of the dremel to give you something to lean against and keep the tip from running.

​@@petergriffin6126 Thanks, good tip Peter. Now here's a _tip_ tip for you. Melting plastic instantly contaminates and eventually ruins soldering iron tips! I always change to a dedicated spare sacrificial tip to isolate that damage. I purchased an inexpensive 240 vac "wood burner" iron to use on 120 vac exclusively for poking holes in plastic, but never got around to see if that works. It might require a lose Aluminum foil wrap to get temp up a bit. IDK. In any case, I don't think those (Palestine, OH-like) fumes are healthy for you or your liver, so be careful.

​@@FindLiberty My tip for the tip is check before you zip....😉

That's so considerate

I wonder if it could be used to 'tame' the extra 'hot' output from the Atari, without having to adjust the levels in the service menu? Add a second switch to the back...

The chip seems to be made for JP21 specifications, which has RGB 0.7 Vp-p, sync 1 ohm p-p, Ys 1V+ and Ym 1V H (the exact same values in the sheet). Ym in that specification is described as "Switches RGB to half-brightness, for video overlay."

Interesting 👍

General in europe. In Germany too.

But having a scart input does not mean RGB will be working as it may be that only composite input is implemented. But you are right that normally, having a scart plug almost guarantees RGB compatibility.

@@eldontyrellcorp All serious brands had RGB input. Because it was mandatory for the French market. I've yet to come across a TV that doesn't do RGB. What is hit-and-miss is 60Hz support. That became more common in the nineties.

Is that something like a pulldown resistor?

I thought about adding 75 ohm to ground -- I may do that in the future as it can easily be added it to the PCB. The RGBP being set to about 50 of the range doesn't seem like a problem though. There would be no reason to want this setting to have to run at the maximum all the time.

@@CollinBaillie yes video is normalised at 75 ohms , the reistor in parallel with the circuit will terminate the line for the computer at 75 just like a regular monitor does

America had EIA Multiport aka SCART.

@Gareth Fairclough insert joke about Ireland/Scotland/Wales here! lol, sorry, but am I wrong? 😜

​@Gareth Fairclough you probably grew up with older TVs around you, RF only sets were common in the mid 80s and I've seen people using the same TV for like 25 years. My family only upgraded to an LCD TV in 2013, we went from a 90s 32" CRT to a 50" LCD and the size difference was hard to get used to.

@garethfairclough8715 They were only common in tvs made from early 90's onwards and since they cost so much new back then people bought used sets, I did see it on a tv around 1994 but knew nothing that used it, I did get a Saturn in 1997 but had to plug it into a video recorder I had which had Scart and then that to tv via RF, when I got some money from relatives in 1999 I bought a new tv that had scart on it and never went back, component I only began seeing around 2003 when consoles like the PS2 supported it.

lcd tv's always have been awful to game on with the slow response rate ,resolution doesn't match your console, input lag. yucky shiny black plastic. even a pc gaming led monitor is better than a hd tv it still has pixel trailing.

heat up the punch with a hot air gun and press through the plastic!

bro you really took the time to write all that?

This is not exclusive to 80s American crt TVs.

A little electricity never hurt anyone.

​​@@chitlitlah Somewhat true for the US, with 110V only being dangerous in conjunction with moisture, like in a bathroom, which also seems to be the only place where you'll find GFCI/RCDs in the US. Unfortunately, it's a lot more than just 110V inside a TV.

tbf it's not that dangerous, just dont stick your hand in random places with the set on, remember to discharge it before working on it (with a simple screw driver and a cable to ground). also the service manual is your friend, with it you can identify high voltage areas, ie flyback and the psu. also i wear some rubber gloves when i have to touch things around the tube or high voltage areas, say the flyback or convergence rings.

Typical fear mongering by people who at the same time admit they are ignorant of electronics.

I recently saw what looked like a 36" CRT TV the other day -- I couldn't believe how large and heavy it was. Needless to say, I didn't bring it home.

Do you still have the Dreamcast you bought in 1997? It might be very valuable.

I had a 36" Widescreen Trinitron years ago. Had to get rid of it because of space. It weighed 96kg or 210 lbs! I now have a 28" Bang & Olufsen 4:3 CRT in my garage.

Dreamcast came out in 1998 in Japan

They are better to film than big screen tv's though for retro game footage. You can see the pixel art more clearly.

Yes, the values in the datasheet are voltage _thresholds_ , not target voltages. VIH of 1.0V means the voltage input on that pin needs to be _minimum_ of 1.0V to be considered logic 'high', and conversely, a VIL of 0.4V means it needs to be _maximum_ of 0.4V to be considered logic 'low'.

I should really grab some old junk plastic and give that a try. I bet if I had looked, I could have found some printable templates online to help with the cutting. :-)

I use an old graphics card backplate as a template, tape it to the plastic, and run the dremel bit around it like a router.

Make that early eighties. France started enforcing it in 1981, and maybe by 1983 it was implemented in most European sets.

@@2kBofFun indeed, and became more common as we progressed through the 80s and into the 90s thankfully.

Oh that's interesting. Luckily a company is making new replacement ones today -- although they aren't as good quality and supper voltage sag, leading to geometry issues.

In Europe, many TVs had RGB input via the SCART connector (aka Peritel) from the mid-80s.

It was probably a cost saving measure, as every TV I owned, unless they were RF only, would have at least one RGB SCART socket, and have never seen a TV with composite input, though you could plug in composite into the SCART socket with an adapter.

I guess by cost reducing. European TV should not have so different circuitry. In regards of SNES, it's funny how the N64 has worse tv signals than its predecessor.

I guess since it works at 25fps with VSMO set to 1, it works ok at 24fps as well? That's pretty cool, I hadn't thought of that.

@@adriansdigitalbasement we were using a frame rate converter made for the movie industry by Schindler, since in film we are using 24 fps the converter would make a NTSC 48i signal., I remember that in the service mode we were playing with another menu V-something (V sweep ???) and we would bring the value to a higher number until we have a picture scroll lock , sometimes when the camera was HD instead of film we had to shoot at 23.98 and set the schindler and tv for that rate, when I was a technician for Willam F White in Canada , who was the largest movie equipement rental house back then, I remember modifying at least 15 KV9 for tuner out (by adding a small homemade board video amp) , soldering the SMT parts that were not on the main board to get a video out too (alll the parts around Q406 that you show in the service manual around 25 minutes) , we were rigging them like this: addon tuner out to an external recorder , recorder out to video in , we tuned the tv to get the NTSC wireless sender of the film cameras and by pushing the input button we could switch between live and recorder for playback on the tv and instant playback

Oh, and on most "hot chassis" TVs, it really does mean the *entire* internal board(s) and most components will be at Mains potential. So they had to isolate any exposed external metal, like on the RF (antenna) connector, where they often used an insulating block with safety capacitors to allow the RF signal to pass, but blocked the high-voltage. That means all of the internal components, heatsinks, tuner shield, everything inside the TV can be dangerous to touch. Most of those TVs are designed with chunky plastic buttons on the outside, so there's no chance of the user directly touching any of the conductive parts that go to the main boards inside. (that's probably another reason why most older sets only had a few inputs like RF and maybe Composite + Audio, because those would have needed full isolation as well.) It's true that in the later part of the 80s, many TVs started using a fully isolated power supply, so they no longer had to insulate the external connectors and other exposed metal parts. But this is "retro" we're talking about here, which means TVs as old as from the 70s or early-80s. So-called "hot chassis" or "live chassis" TVs and monitors were more common in 100-120V land, too... In countries which used a lower mains voltage, it was usually cheaper to design a power supply that just used the rectified mains directly, and a small voltage regulator that ran the flyback and the rest of the set. In 200-240V Countries, a simple linear regulator would have dissipated too much heat (since the B+ rail in most TVs rarely needed to be above about 150 Volts). Or was just harder to design things that way, so TVs with an isolated SMPS tend to be a bit more common in those Countries.

He said 19 minuets after the video was posted

Thanks Vince for the kind words and super thanks!

Right? As he was saying that, I was thinking "how about you think about what you're saying, Adrian, I know you don't actually agree with that". The irony is that he understated the danger (if you don't know what you're doing, don't do it... Guess what, plenty of people will erroneously think they know what they're doing).

It is interesting how all later TVs in Europe supported NTSC. This must have been dictated by market demand so people could play back imported media or use imported hardware, but it was never the reverse.

@@adriansdigitalbasement I remember NTSC compatibility being advertised almost as an aspirational/glamour feature of sets, because it implied you'd been to the USA on holiday, or maybe your second home, and either bought media there, or possibly recorded home videos on a US spec camcorder. I also got the idea it was aimed at people who wanted to watch "Directors cut" editions of movies that were only ever released on NTSC VHS or LaserDisc. Of course, if Sony can make one chip for both markets, that saves money, and if they can sell "NTSC compatibility" as a premium feature for something the universal chipset can already do, even better!

​@@adriansdigitalbasement what's odd is that, in the UK at least, I never knew anyone have NTSC equipment. wonder if it was just that they added PAL to the NTSC chip and it was more effort to remove the ntsc functionality.

I remember we also had "PAL-60" available on lots of TVs, particularly in the late 90s and early 00s. This was even, IIRC, supported on the original Xbox, so you'd get the higher resolution of PAL combined with the higher refresh rate of NTSC for the best of both worlds.

​@@adriansdigitalbasement Market demand in Europe with free trade across borders did require that TVs did support both PAL and SECAM. 60Hz PAL did exist in Brasil. If you both PAL and SECAM, and do both 50Hz and 60Hz then adding NTSC is not a big deal either. The feature wasn't useless after all. However it only happen when the chips were sufficiently integrated that it didn't require a lot of additional components.

The original Philips patent is actually from 1980, so yeah, it's old

Indeed -- and in the past, I had a trashpicked TV which I hooked an arduino up to take full control of the TV via I2C. I was able to do some fun things with it on the fly. I thought about trying it with this TV, but interesting is it has 3 or was it 4 I2C busses on it -- instead of one shared bus. Not sure why Sony did it that way.

In the US in the 1980s it was pretty much a choice between an RF-only home television, or a composite/RGB monitor. Many people opted for the former as a cost-saving approach, especially for 8- and even 16-bit consoles. I think a lot of people even opted to buy a smaller secondary RF-only TV for 8-bit computer use because of the versatility, although when VCRs got cheaper you could use their RF tuners and composite outputs to effectively turn a monitor into a TV (my brother and I did this in the 1990s with an old green monochrome composite monitor, which makes me very familiar with color NTSC dot crawl lol).

It was always a massive bugbear of mine whenever I'd buy a new games console and they always packed in those awful composite cables with a SCART adapter. Made for a really ugly picture. I could understand if they shipped with RF(they were aiming for the lowest common denominator) but even my X-Box 360 had those crappy things packed in. It almost felt like a con, 'cause an actual SCART cable would cost at least an extra 20 quid. I've never even seen a TV with composite in, not counting plugging it in via SCART adapter.

They had those cub monitors at our middle school for the BBC micro. They all gave you a terrible shock if you were touching the screen when switching it off!

@@fattomandeibu Composite, also known as RCA. I bet you know what the A stands for. Being from Canada, we also got stuck with that S***! Conversely, I've only ever seen scart once in person -- my friend's family brought their electronics and game consoles back from Germany with them, when they moved back to Canada. At least things started getting component here eventually before HDMI finally took over.

@@HunterZBNS Over here in England, most cheap TVs in the '80s were RF only, too, but composite(which compared to RGB looks horrible) was pretty rare. The only time I ever seen it was when I bought a game console prior to HDMI(even my X-Box 360 from, I think 2008), which would come with composite cables with RGB adapter(you still got the crappy picture) and it annoyed me every time. As I said before, it was almost like they were conning you, I have so many of those dumb adapters, but it's what they packed, and then charged you about US$30-40 for a proper RGB cable.