CRT Technology Collector Here... AMA

Everything about displays and monitors. 120Hz, 144Hz, 240Hz, 4K, 1440p, input lag, display shopping, monitor purchase decisions, compare, versus, debate, and more. Questions? Just ask!
Naveronasis
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CRT Technology Collector Here... AMA

Post by Naveronasis » 04 Jun 2021, 04:30

I have over 100 CRT's from Black and White 1950's to small 5" color tubes, to large 40" HD sets, 36" SD sets, Projectors, an indextron, PVM's, Hybrid Presentation Monitors, PC Monitors, including new in box stuff. So if there is any kind of image or test you would like me to run, I know how to take pictures properly to produce very clear images. One thing that might be interesting to consider is making a UFO test rom for Genesis/SNES, but I can get PC onto any of these displays in any resolution imaginable, so long as the device supports it.

I rent a room out to a friend who has a Viewsonic Elite, but it's the 144hz 2k one, not the 1080p blur-busters approved one and I can say, while it is nice, it doesn't come near CRT levels of motion clarity. There is "ghosting" on some CRT's in area's of high contrast where the phosphor decay is slower than the framerate. I can probably capture this phenomenon if anyone wants to see it. There are also sometimes Internal refraction issues, particularly in monitors with thick glass, like the Samsung 1100DF.

I used to have some plasmas but the input lag was too high on the ones I had to keep them around, they are living happy lives with some movie buffs I donated them to. I have a spreadsheet with *most* of what I have but it's 530am and I need to sleep, so for now just post what kind of display you would like to see, and ill let you know what I have on hand.

milojr21
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Re: CRT Technology Collector Here... AMA

Post by milojr21 » 04 Jun 2021, 06:00

Best way to connect a crt without input lag to modern video cards? Best PC monitor that isn't a fw900?

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Re: CRT Technology Collector Here... AMA

Post by Chief Blur Buster » 04 Jun 2021, 11:34

Naveronasis wrote:
04 Jun 2021, 04:30
I rent a room out to a friend who has a Viewsonic Elite, but it's the 144hz 2k one, not the 1080p blur-busters approved one and I can say, while it is nice, it doesn't come near CRT levels of motion clarity
Welcome to this thread!
I’ll have some more questions later, but wanted to introduce CRT-topics info:

CRT users can read Area 51 at www.blurbusters.com/area51 to find the rare 1% LCDs that canget closer to CRT, if a use case makes a lighter/smaller/bigger display required than a beautiful FW900.

Refresh rate headroom is required to zero out double image ghosting on strobed LCDs, I recommend a 240 Hz panel for mostly double-image-free 120Hz strobing. 50% headroom makes it easier to cram LCD GtG into the VBI (blanking interval), refreshing 120Hz refresh cycles in 1/240sec, leaving a 4ms VBI to hide most of 1ms GtG from human eyes in total darkness between strobe flashes.

My first question: Have any bug-time CRT fans here yet tested the LCD motion resolution gold standard (Quest 2 VR LCD) yet, and compared to CRT?
Have you tried an Oculus Quest 2 VR headset yet, the most CRT-resolution-matching LCD currently invented to date? True real world measured 0.3ms MPRT and a near 100% perfect hide of GtG with a perfect ghost-free status (no double images, blur trails, or ghost trails, even for top/center/bottom edges). Not yet locally dimmed so grey blacks, but better motion clarity than most CRTs unlike most LCDs. Even some people here wear Quest 2 to view an IMAX sized 60 Hz CRT simulation watching 60 fps YouTube videos.

Be noted the two pixel response benchmarks, GtG and MPRT, are different (See FAQ)

Also, see CRT Nirvana Guide for Disappointed CRT to LCD Upgraders

This info is supplemental for CRT lovers trying to figure out which of 10,000+ different panels of backwater dregs of LCDs to purchase, that may get closer to a few (even if not all) specific attributes of CRT.

In my experience, less than 0.1% to 1% of LCDs currently on market as of 2020-2021 can beat CRT motion resolution of an average CRT without visible artifacts — once configured to a cherrypicked mode (with refresh rate headroom), while strobed in a low persistence mode, combined with unusually superlatively perfect overdrive lookup table (LUT) tuning, etc. For the rare (for LCD) perfect zero-trailing-ghost and zero-double-image motion clarity.

Even all the plasma-motion-resplution-beating Blur Busters Approved strobe backlit panels has difficulty reaching an Oculus Quest 2 VR headset in Oculus’ big-money LCD motion clarity work.

Except, perhaps, when using humongous 0.75/60sec = 13 millisecond VBI (60 Hz mode with a VSYNC 3x larger than visible resolution!) to hide LCD GtG fully from human eyes (4x refresh rate headroom scanning 60Hz refresh cycles in 1/240sec, via a giant Vertical Total 4500 in video signal). Then the ViewSonic XG2431 VT4500 60Hz single strobe mode manages to go completely crosstalk free top/center/bottom like a Quest 2, after calibration with the upcoming ViewSonic Strobe Utility (screenshot at bottom of press release). Most strobed LCDs tend to at least have superfaint crosstalk due to LCD GtG incomplete in dark cycle between strobes. Not an out-of-box experience but very hard to factory-include due to minor LCD panel variances (temperature, lottery) so the Utility self calibration is useful to zero-out the double image ghosts.

Now if you want resolution flexibility AND blacks AND color AND motion clarity.... We still have to keep waiting. CRT, baby.

All current LCDs beating CRT in motion clarity (perfect zero ghost like Quest 2) all currently have poor blacks.

Still waiting for 100,000-LED MicroLED FALD local dimming backlights utilizing wide gamut Nanosys Quantum Dots for CRT color and CRT blacks, without giving up the strobe. Most FALD backlights and wide-gamut panels don’t strobe as flawlessly zero-ghost yet.

OLED and direct view MicroLED are also contenders, but they are more costly than even Apple’s brand new impressive 2560-zone locally dimmed iPad Pro (bigger model) that has better contrast, blacks and color than many average models of CRTs. Fawn, fawn. BUT.... poorer motion resolution than ALL of the CRTs. If only that baby had the superlative strobe tuning of an Oculus Quest 2. Boo!

I view thousands of LCDs so I can say this — from a fellow “viewed tons of CRTs” to “viewed tons of LCDs”. CRT still wins big in the “I must have good colors, blacks AND motion resolution” combo. LCD is still only a line-item CRT beater (and only recently, and only for cherrypicked panels, at right Hz-headroom settings).

I started Blur Busters ten years ago because many disbelieved LCD could ever match or beat CRT in motion resolution, and I knew there were ways. Achievement Unlocked!

However, still a long way for jack-of-all-trades.

But jack-of-all-trades, all blacks/colors/motion line items simultaneously, like a CRT?

If only we could marry:
...iPad MiniLED backlight (+colors, +blacks)
...Throw in more zones to make bloom much smaller than bloom around CRT electron beam dot (preferably 100,000 zone local dimming backlight, still cheaper to build than an 24-million-LED MicroLED direct view)
...And with the Quest 2 better-than-CRT motion handling (+motion).

Merge the champs.

In time, in time!

So close, but no cigar for LCD. Yet....!
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blurfreeCRTGimp
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Re: CRT Technology Collector Here... AMA

Post by blurfreeCRTGimp » 04 Jun 2021, 14:02

Hey chief, one thing CRT has going for it more than black level, color, and motion, is the fact that it is not fixed pixel.

I'm looking to buy a new old stock CRT for this very reason. These high hz LCD's are getting better, but hitting the refresh rate=hz while vsync is going, in the current GPU market is kinda difficult.

Some of these LCDs have the death by a thousand cuts approach to reaching motion clarity, when it seems like back in the day they had it figured out in a far easier way.

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Re: CRT Technology Collector Here... AMA

Post by Chief Blur Buster » 04 Jun 2021, 15:37

blurfreeCRTGimp wrote:
04 Jun 2021, 14:02
Hey chief, one thing CRT has going for it more than black level, color, and motion, is the fact that it is not fixed pixel.
Yes, one needs an overkill of digital resolution (Retina) to emulate an analog-like scaling for lower resolutions. Like MAME HLSL for 240p arcade graphics on a 4K OLED. Beautiful. But overkill, indeed.
blurfreeCRTGimp wrote:
04 Jun 2021, 14:02
Some of these LCDs have the death by a thousand cuts approach to reaching motion clarity, when it seems like back in the day they had it figured out in a far easier way.
My perspective is different.

They never knew CRT had good motion clarity.

Motion clarity of a CRT was simply an accident of using overkill lead-glass vaccuum balloons driven by lethal voltages shooting electrons towards you, only to hit a metal shadow mask and phosphor layer to save your life (producing a picture instead of lethal electron beam hitting you).

Blur-free nature of CRT is simply a side effect of having to time-multiplex a single-dot electron beam all over a phosphor, that faded before the next refresh cycle.

The fast phosphor fading was necessary so the electron gun can display the next refresh cycle without ghosting bad like an old airplane radar tube.

Early on, they prioritized CRT brightness which was long-fading phosphor. That ghosted a lot. By that sheer accident of speeding up fade (making CRT flicker more to prevent CRT ghosting), created the zero motion blur of a CRT tube, discovering faster phosphors produced better motion.

Eventually motion blur zeroed out as a side effect of preventing most of those CRT ghost trails, since the peak persistence was often one-hundredth the ghost trail — so even if faint green ghosting for bright white objects on black backgrounds still happens over multiple frames — the peak of CRT picture element persistence was a very tiny fraction of a single Hz (e.g. 1ms or less), in the sharktooth/sawtooth geometric shape of phosphor fade curve.

This blurfree design by iterative evolution/accident to show 50 or 60 interlaced pictures per second (25 or 30 full resolution frames per second, but the temporal resolution was always still 50 or 60 — they were still complete vertically half-resolution pictures temporally spaced apart 1/50 or 1/60 second apart).

It just took humankind so long to figure out what was truly causing the blur-free nature of a CRT while LCDs were unable to do it reliably, especially with a lot of misunderstanding between pixel response (GtG) and pixel persistence (MPRT) and how both often blends into each other in a muddy blur that does not get fixed until both GtG and MPRT are simultaneously low (for subtly different reasons).

Both CRTs and LCDs are death by a thousand cuts. Extremely heavy vaccuum-filled lead-glass balloons just to watch a small image? Man, such overkill. We manufactured those lovingly to get a great picture. CRT required less technology to build, but vaccuum-filled glass balloons are (to a modern generation) in some ways, a lot more Rube Goldberg method of displaying pictures than an LCD in some ways.

In ancient Rome, we drew pictures using mosaic tiles. Ancient pixels! LCDs are just tile mosaics (of tiny tiles), except the screen’s mosiac art being redone 60 times a second for 60 Hz. Yes, the electronics that repaints the art mosaic (LCD GtG) has to do the art really fast. But it’s in some ways, far simpler, for digital computers. Especially since analog broadcasts have ended.

From that point of view, it’s just a matter of perspective, what is more Rube Goldberg than other — thinking back (An alien visits Earth and think... “lead-glass balloons that shoots killer voltages at you!? What the hell were humans thinking?”), it’s funny that perspective can change this.

And also, while analog was nice, it is horribly inefficient because we didn’t have the tech to do better. Alien visiting Earth saying “6 MHz of bandwidth just to broadcast 480 rows of picture elements? And they had to interlace just to get that high vertical resolution? Holy inefficiency!”.

Today, we can broadcast digital 4K H.EVC 3840p/60fps in the very same bandwidth as analog 240p/60 or 480i/60 or 480p/30. And doing that 4K 3840p/60fps in 6 MHz bandwidth budget with no visible compression artifacts (with the new ATSC 3.0 standard). Digital also tends to work better on digital displays, of a mosaic-style tile matrix too, since it’s easier for electronics to interface to that electronics...

Sure, CRTs were technologically simple. But explaining a CRT versus LCD to an ancient Rome worker, the LCD is easier to explain to the ancient Rome artist because of all the tile art metaphors, etc.

An LCD monitor is merely simply just an infinitely fast mosaic artist dealing with super-tiny mosaic tiles.

So one wonders. What’s less Rube Goldberg? What’s less overkill? Easier to explain to an alien who comes to Earth? I think Team LCD will have an easier time.

But I am going to be fair and call it a draw.

It’s all perspective! :D
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Re: CRT Technology Collector Here... AMA

Post by Chief Blur Buster » 04 Jun 2021, 16:10

Naveronasis wrote:
04 Jun 2021, 04:30
I have over 100 CRT's from Black and White 1950's to small 5" color tubes, to large 40" HD sets, 36" SD sets, Projectors, an indextron, PVM's, Hybrid Presentation Monitors, PC Monitors, including new in box stuff.
You have WAY more displays than I do, but I want to share some good loving CRT memories.

Really damn good times indeed!

When I was only 24 years old, I owned an NEC XG135 CRT projector. I bought it B-Stock from AVSCIENCE with the funds of my first business contract in the dot com boom days.

I even installed it on the ceiling myself, and calibrated convergence, astig, keystone, pincushion, bow, etc. I could out-calibrate an average ISF-trained technician! It could do 1080p twenty years ago when broadcasts only recently began at 1080i, and no 1080p content exsisted; that was still only a distant dream and 4K was a fairy tale!

Here’s a photo of me approxim when I was half my current age:

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It projected a WIndows 95 image to a size of 92 inches, progressive scan. I later upgraded that to Windows 2000.

Image

That was in the late 1990s (Year 1999 to be exact, I used this CRT projector until year 2001). The last millennium. It was running the 3DFusion, HOLO3DGRAPH, 3dfx Voodoo, Matrox Millennium, Geforce256, all the early cards of high performance fame. And then the great ASUS V7700 Geforce2 GTS 3D Kit — one of the first really good 3D glasses kits to come out for PCs.

Played the Star Wars Episode 1 Pod Racer game at 600mph 4 foot above the ground, in true wall size 3D, since these early GeForce256 CRT glasses worked with CRT projectors. It was the right immersive display to play this game on!
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Re: CRT Technology Collector Here... AMA

Post by Chief Blur Buster » 04 Jun 2021, 16:20

Naveronasis wrote:
04 Jun 2021, 04:30
I have over 100 CRT's from Black and White 1950's to small 5" color tubes, to large 40" HD sets, 36" SD sets, Projectors, an indextron, PVM's, Hybrid Presentation Monitors, PC Monitors, including new in box stuff. So if there is any kind of image or test you would like me to run, I know how to take pictures properly to produce very clear images. One thing that might be interesting to consider is making a UFO test rom for Genesis/SNES, but I can get PC onto any of these displays in any resolution imaginable, so long as the device supports it.
SInce this is your AMA thread...

(Apologies about my walls of text, but that’s to be expected as a part of Blur Busters, ha!)

1. Do you have an famous 1954 RCA CT-100 color TV, the first retail NTSC color television?
If not, what’s your most famous/favourite very-old color tube?

I’ve always wanted to see UFO graphics displayed on that unit, if your unit is still functioning

2. Do you have a Eidophor projector, like the one used at NASA during 1969 moon landing?
If not, what’s your most famous/favorite very-old color projector?

Don’t worry about powering any of this up, I know they are a lot of time to get to working condition and calibrate.

3. Have you ever tried pursuit photography?
Normally it needs to be done with a rail, but there’s a rail-less technique too (handwaved smartphone with a trick):
viewtopic.php?f=23&t=4782

4. Do you know any software development / programming?
I ask because there’s some CRT emulation work I’m interested in seeing done over the next ten years, via using brute refresh rates (360Hz-1000Hz) to emulate a CRT electron beam in 100% software.

I welcome others to ask the OP additional AMA questions, since it’s expressly mentioned to be an AMA thread.
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Naveronasis
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Re: CRT Technology Collector Here... AMA

Post by Naveronasis » 04 Jun 2021, 16:31

milojr21 wrote:
04 Jun 2021, 06:00
Best way to connect a crt without input lag to modern video cards? Best PC monitor that isn't a fw900?
Startech makes a high bandwidth Display Port to VGA that exceeds the VGA standard so you can easily push 2048x1536 at 75hz (if you have a good enough monitor) without artifacts. Sometimes it gets tempermental if it's plugged in and not active though and will constantly reconnect. I would link it but Idk if links are allowed i gotta check the rules.

I have a w900 which is a curved variant of the fw900. Samsung NF monitors are super crisp and Samsung DF monitors are fairly bright. I have a 900NF and 1100DF I had a 700df but I gave it away. Viewsonic monitors tend to be brighter on average but a softer image. Sony are okay... But they tend to be dim. On the + side nost sony monitors use a plastic film to reduce glare that can be peeled off unlike viewsonic which is spray on and needs to be dissolved off.

Also Toshiba made a 26" HD CRT With HDMI that is a very common set that will work in a pinch. Its not as nice as a pc monitor but it has very little input lag, you can use an extron dvs304 to add more resolution support since some games crash if you interlace them. 304A can also remove overscan without having to mess with the service menu. It's also widescreen.

Basically anything 96khz+ will get you 1200p

blurfreeCRTGimp
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Re: CRT Technology Collector Here... AMA

Post by blurfreeCRTGimp » 04 Jun 2021, 17:01

Damn Chief, that was one hell of a projector setup. I enjoyed Episode 1 Racer in the Arcade a lot.

You are right that CRT was also death by 1000 cuts, but the point was, the work was done. We started from scratch for convenience purposes.

I do feel like we could use lasers and Quantum dots to get a modern scanning display that is not fixed pixel.

I was even thinking about that old Nebra Anybeam projector. Nvidia once did a cascaded LCD experiment. The same approach could work with scanning laser projection.

With VR technology, you should be able to cascade two or more of them for a 4x increase in resolution and 2 times the brightness.

Naveronasis
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Re: CRT Technology Collector Here... AMA

Post by Naveronasis » 05 Jun 2021, 00:38

Chief Blur Buster wrote:
04 Jun 2021, 16:20
Naveronasis wrote:
04 Jun 2021, 04:30
I have over 100 CRT's from Black and White 1950's to small 5" color tubes, to large 40" HD sets, 36" SD sets, Projectors, an indextron, PVM's, Hybrid Presentation Monitors, PC Monitors, including new in box stuff. So if there is any kind of image or test you would like me to run, I know how to take pictures properly to produce very clear images. One thing that might be interesting to consider is making a UFO test rom for Genesis/SNES, but I can get PC onto any of these displays in any resolution imaginable, so long as the device supports it.
SInce this is your AMA thread...

(Apologies about my walls of text, but that’s to be expected as a part of Blur Busters, ha!)

1. Do you have an famous 1954 RCA CT-100 color TV, the first retail NTSC color television?
If not, what’s your most famous/favourite very-old color tube?

I’ve always wanted to see UFO graphics displayed on that unit, if your unit is still functioning

2. Do you have a Eidophor projector, like the one used at NASA during 1969 moon landing?
If not, what’s your most famous/favorite very-old color projector?

Don’t worry about powering any of this up, I know they are a lot of time to get to working condition and calibrate.

3. Have you ever tried pursuit photography?
Normally it needs to be done with a rail, but there’s a rail-less technique too (handwaved smartphone with a trick):
viewtopic.php?f=23&t=4782

4. Do you know any software development / programming?
I ask because there’s some CRT emulation work I’m interested in seeing done over the next ten years, via using brute refresh rates (360Hz-1000Hz) to emulate a CRT electron beam in 100% software.

I welcome others to ask the OP additional AMA questions, since it’s expressly mentioned to be an AMA thread.
1: I don't have a CT-100 but I live near enough to the television museum and might be able to convince me to let me put it on theirs.
I don't have many old sets, I have a RGB monitor from 1984, and a Profeel 25 from 1983, but that's about it.

2: Well I don't have a 2 million dollar Ediphor either, but I live near enough to the Large Scale Systems Museum that if they have one I can at least go look at it... They would probably love to have one, but you need to keep the oil pressurized and moving, and they have 8-50hr electron gun life with a swappable system so even if they DO have one... unlikely that it's in working order :( But anyway. I only have 2 CRT Projectors. A Sony Vidimagic Indextron Single CRT Color Projector (very rare) and a Sony Coffee Table projector that was 10,000 new in 1979~1981 while it was made, by custom order only. It works but has glycol cooled tubes that have crystalized, so I need to flush the glycol and dissolve the crystals and re-fill the coolant system before it can output a "good" image. RF only, but I will be RGB modding it at some point. SO The Vidimagic Indextron is my favorite for now image-wise... But The coffee table gets a ton of use as my actual coffee table.

3: Yes, Actually I was the one that sent you hand-captured pursuit footage of a true 1080 plasma on facebook last year.

4: I used to work in the game industry as a Level Deisgner/Lead Level Designer. I can read code, but I am terrible at creating anything from scratch outside of a few select scripting engines like blueprint.

What I know about CRT is that you MAY be able to emulate it somewhat with HDR because when you introduce scanlines, say for 240p you lose a ton of brightness on a LCD panel, but not on a CRT because the phosphors are pushed harder. Beamtime on the phosphor layer is what produces the brightness. So A true 240p image is brighter than a 480p image with fake scanlines on say a PC CRT. Which is why frameieister and whatnot kind of suck on a PC CRT. There has been talk about super-resolution and frame doubling for sync compatibility, but those are tricks for PC CRT, not for LCD. But anyway like I said for LCD your best bet is to emulate the brightness on a LCD with "fake" scanlines by using HDR to push the peak brightness higher since you lose half the pixels to the scanlines... Of course this means running sustained HDR which may not be great for the LCD but at least it's something...

PS: I have a pair of gigantic 37" PC CRT able to do 1280x1024 over RGBHV But they both have a flaw in the blue circuit and some minor burn in :( but once they are fixed up ill post some images.

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