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Comment by kowbell | Hacker News Reader

> CRT displays of the kind we all grew up with are terrific displays, but they come with a price. They are not modern tech and as such they are expensive and difficult to maintain, like classic pinball machines or arcade games. We knew we had to come up with a better, more future proof solution going forwards

Has anyone heard of any attempts to bring back CRT’s? I imagine the manufacturing chain for that would be bigger than any reasonable kickstarter/the demand from retro enthusiasts and the like. I know I’ve been hunting for old TVs for circuit bending/glitch art and it’s tough, thrift stores nearby stopped taking old TVs and everything on Facebook Marketplace only has coax (less ideal than composite.) Ebay works but good deals get snatched up.

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AFAIK there aren't any CRTs being manufactured anywhere on Earth anymore.

It's been kinda wild seeing them go from basically free to sought after in the past few years. Real time supply and demand in action, kids

Sony sold its Trinitron manufacturing line to a plant in India but they were only using it to recycle CRT tubes for the local market a couple of years ago and I think they shut down too since COVID.

Making CRT tubes is art and skill and a lot of the technology would have to be literally redeveloped as there aren't the skilled hands left on the planet to produce the tubes we were producing in the early '00s.

I have a huge desire for this kind of equipment due to my arcade/gaming hobby but it's a long-term losing play to try and maintain this stuff.

So the 21" NEC and Hitachi monitors still cluttering up my home lab might be worth something? I could never bear to dump them because of what they cost me new. They work well when I need a console on my ancient server hosts because they all do VGA.

They likely are worth something. I'm kicking myself for taking most of my VGA monitors to Goodwill back in the early 2010's (mainly for not having them now, not for the windfall I missed).

CRTs went through a phase where you couldn't give them away for the cost of picking up to now where higher quality models are becoming pretty desirable

Have you considered RGB modding some of those coax only tvs? If they have RGB mods available you can get the best picture quality possible out of them. Also where you located? My marketplace in NY has loads of people trying to give their tvs away for free or super cheap. These things are heavy. I guess the smaller sets tend to command some cash (and some famous tiny models go for a lot). Possibly try expanding your search radius if you are willing to drive.

"best picture quality" is kinda subjective. Most consumer CRTs were kind of ass.

There's a reason that what's sought after these days are old broadcast reference monitors that cost $20,000+ when new.

I meant best picture quality that particular TV could produce.

ie. the limitation isn't the video signal anymore once you do the mod.

The limitation is the maintainability of the tube. Cheap tubes go out easily and their repairability is limited. Especially phosphor/beam issues.

Cheap tubes also don't have features that assist you in maintaining them or correcting for picture issues that develop.

What are you even talking about? We are talking about getting the best picture out of an existing TV set that works. RGB Mod > Coaxial

I'm saying most sets aren't worth the effort to keep around. You're talking about putting a pig in a dress.

I have been considering the mod! I’ve watched a video or two about that mod but I don’t want to rush into it with CRTs all having electrical bits on them that can kill me if I do something wrong. I’m entirely new to electrical tinkering but eager to learn for this circuit bending stuff.

I’m east coast but not near NY… maybe I can justify it by renting a U-Haul van and filling it with TVs ;)

making a CRT factory today would be extremely challenging. Only the retro video game market wants these things, and the lead requirements for the glass are considerable.

not worth the hassle. probably not even possible within a 1st world nation because of the environmental impact.

Is that lead as in time to wait before you get it, or lead, as in the metal?

lead the metal. CRTs are made of leaded glass to reduce x-ray emissions.

Lead is only used for the funnel of the CRT, not the front. The front is barium-strontium glass. Lead glass has a tendency to turn yellow/brown with use, giving an ugly picture if used for the front.

You actually don’t even need to make the funnel out of glass at all, since it doesn’t need to be transparent. Tektronix famously made a lot of CRTs out of ceramics [1], with barium-strontium glass used only for the front. This also let them produce a CRT with a completely flat and rectangular front.

[1] https://vintagetek.org/ceramic-strips/

Yes that's true, but good luck making large CRTs using that method. Those ceramic-walled tubes were fine when the screen is 5" diagonal, but for a 29" arcade monitor, that won't do.

CRTs will never again be made in the quantities required to make it feasible economically.

Lead is still allowed in applications where there's no suitable replacement. For example lead-acid batteries are still being sold for UPS and alarm systems. I don't think leaded glass in CRTs would be problem because it exists to protect the user from radiation.

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