learn about how to repair them perhaps...? Until there is some ressource, there is possibility to repair. (I have one blown CRT too, which waits my attention).

the very good LCD monitor which is good for my eyes is NEC MultiSync LCD2690WUX (1 VGA and 2 DVI inputs). Its price is, interesting enough, still the same high as 10 years ago.

It's just worn out monitors or *most likely* poorly stored ones before they end up in your hands.
Had the same with 1084 monitor , I repaired several of them until I built my healthy stock. I would keep getting vga monitors they are cheap (at least here) so after 2-3 failures you'll get a good one mate.

I can certainly do recaps, i have done them to several of my motherboards with good results.

With CRT's i can do the same, but i wonder if its worth to do the same. If the flyback transformer on a CRT is bad i'm not the right person for a repair. Tubes also get worn so i don't think refurbishing a CRT is as easy as motherboard maintenance.

Vga screens I would not attempt repairs unless it is something simple. Just get more Carlos, that's what I would do...

I had similar experience when I tried getting an "authentic" CRT for my 486 builds. I got burnt with mid 90s stuff on maybe three or four occasions. Then again, I got a perfectly usable late 80s EGA from an actual metal scraper — go figure. So yeah, it boils down to sheer luck.

So in my opinion the definite solution is simply to get a model released after 2000 — like 2003 or 2004. Yeah, they won't look as nice as older models. But they will work and give you a great picture. Currently using a '02 CTX PR711FL — it's a 17 inch Trinitron model I got NOS. Great picture and I have no issues. Prior to that my main screen was a used '04 Samsung 757DFX — also no issues.

I'm not ao fussed about getting period era correct stuff. Even with a cheapo CRT + MCE2VGA the picture is beautiful, and going back to a LCD just males me wanna cry. What is the technical reason for TN panels to screw low resolutions so bad anyway?

Finding a RGBi TTL screen here is kind of difficult, the only option being the Commodore 1084s. But these are expensive and not always found in the best condition, generally tubes worn out.

So yeah, i'll try to keep my eyes on another VGA CRT, i saw an ad for a Samtron 56E. 15" is just good enough for the old stuff. BTW, Samtrons are easy to find here, find them in droves, they were reasonable and cheap back in the day. Sony's are harder to find. I wish i could find a diamondtron in 15" or so but those are rare

carlostex wrote:

What is the technical reason for TN panels to screw low resolutions so bad anyway?

LCD screens have a fixed number of pixels on screen that also have fixed size, the so called native resolution and you can't change that. Let's say you send 640x480 image to a display that has a 1920x1080 native resolution (1920 pixels wide, 1080 pixels high). Since you can't change the size of those pixels or their number on that 1920x1080 display, in order to draw that 640x480 image the screens scaler has to GUESS what colour should all those extra pixels have using a mathematical algorithm. The end result depends on the quality that algorithm, at best it's good enough and horrible blurry mess at worst. You can also use 1:1 scaling if the display/gpu supports that, meaning the screen draws only that 640x480 area on the screen resulting in sharp but tiny picture.

CRT doesn't have fixed resolution, it can modify the number and size of the pixels it draws.

Or you can just pixel double the 640x480 picture, giving you a perfectly sharp 1280x960 picture on a 1920x1080 monitor, which is almost fullscreen.

When you see that picture you'll probably complain it's too blocky though, the problem isn't technical limitations with LCD technology, it's that older games are made around various defects of CRT technology.

That and some software limitations.

I would try to find a QUALITY monitor instead of the usual everyday cheap model everyone bought back then. Samtron was just a basically a cheap version of a Samsung monitor and there sure is a difference in picture and build quality. My current setup has a Samsung 959NF that was used for 8 years in graphics design and it still works perfectly and there are no noticeable flaws with image quality or colors. Try to find one of the large (19" and up) Sony or Samsung models with flat screen (Trinitron, NaturalFlat), they are usually well build and should last a long time. The should also have both VGA and BNC connectors which is great for hooking up to two computers without switch boxes.

I actually have a flat screen Samsung with BNC inputs, but dammit its a huge 19" beast. I don't like higher than 17" for DOS. I could use the 19" Samsung for the later DOS games which are to be played on my Socket 7 or 386 but for my slow machines up to the 286 i would prefer a 15" one.

I'm probably getting bad luck too. My 17" Samtron is on good condition and working very well, despite actually it had moderate use back in the day.

I'll keep my eyes open.

ZellSF wrote:

Or you can just pixel double the 640x480 picture, giving you a perfectly sharp 1280x960 picture on a 1920x1080 monitor, which is almost fullscreen.

When you see that picture you'll probably complain it's too blocky though, the problem isn't technical limitations with LCD technology, it's that older games are made around various defects of CRT technology.

Or it could be 640x480 doubled to 1280x960 and then scaled to 1440x1080 which would give a bit of that blurriness.

But monitor vendors do not care about low resolutions enough to think of better scaling algorithms.

That's why god invented hardware scalers / line doublers.

There's gotta be something out there good for PC use. That being said, I make due with my old 19" Samsung SyncMaster 931a for my retro stuff. It's 1280x1024 native and has a pleasing, IIRC, flourescent tube type of backlight. It was recapped a few years back but hasn't seen much use since, and doesn't get 24/7 use like it did before the caps went. So hopefully it'll last a while. It's got VGA and DVI. In some respects I think it looks better than my 27" ASUS in sRGB mode. and that one is calibrated

Neco wrote:

That's why god invented hardware scalers / line doublers.

Haha, so true. 😁 When LCDs were new, I was so amazed of them and quickly moved over to them, leaving tube monitors behind.
Now, I'm collecting CRTs again (just a little), because they have some "organic" feel to them that can't be replicated yet.
And because I learned to love electron tubes (but not especially x-rays, haha).

Especially old blurry colour TV sets and slow-glowing monochrome monitors have their charme.
Real b/w TV sets are also nice, because they have no visible mask at all (very soft picture, no scan lines visible).
Arcade CRTs can be imitated quite okay by scalers/line doublers already.
Even though they don't take all different mask types into account yet.

Edit: That being said, I'm rather optimistic. While I do try to save CRTs, if possible,
I also have faith into the future - scalers can be improved; if there will be a niche market,
small CRT tubes (new) perhaps can be sourced from China/Russia, etc.
Also maybe, another technology will be appearing in the next years that is more tube-ish.
OLED, laser-based screens, etc. Who knows ? 😉