I still have my 19" Samsung CRT from 10 years ago but I would never get another. I'm just waiting for a good reason to upgrade my main desktop's LCDs and then there will be a hand me down available and I will dump the CRT most likely.

Ok just checking. Some older monitors can do funky resolutions that newer ones can't. I wanted to make sure that I wasn't throwing out something special.

Tempest

LCDs are tricky. Some have awful scaling, but you can often switch over to GPU scaling instead with modern graphics cards.

It's also better to get for example a 1920x1200 screen than a 1680x1050 one because the x1200 height is very compatible with various common 4:3 resolutions.

Personally, I always stick with a CRT for 'retro' type machines, and will continue to do so for the forseeable future. Don't get me wrong, LCDs have greatly improved over the years, and I don't think I would go back to a CRT for my primary 'modern' machine, but I've just never been particularly satisfied with the way LCDs handle the old DOS graphics. Some of 'em can do a passable job at it, but IMO it's still noticeably inferior to a good quality CRT... and part of that is because of the fixed-resolution nature of LCDs and the inherent limitations that brings.

But, that doesn't mean that any old CRT is necessarily worth saving... I'd recommend, if you go with a CRT, don't settle for anything less than a good Trinitron screen. Browse through the junkpile you have, you may run across one... there were a couple pretty good Dell-branded ones in the 14-18" size range. (They can quickly be differentiated from the lower-end screens by the fact that they say "Trinitron" on the top left of the front bezel.) If you don't see one of those, I probably wouldn't bother with any of the rest.

CRTs are great for Retro PCs.

LCDs work really well when using DOSBox, simply because it has excellent scaling options, regardless of resolution or aspect ratio.

swaaye wrote:

I still have my 19" Samsung CRT from 10 years ago but I would never get another. I'm just waiting for a good reason to upgrade my main desktop's LCDs and then there will be a hand me down available and I will dump the CRT most likely.

Kinda the same here.
I got I think 4 or5 CRT's of varying sizes, from a 2001-build 14in, 'flat' 15in, 2x 17in and one 19in. The 2 smaller ones are in my attic, mostly because their small sizes makes them fit more easily without taking up much space.
One 17in is in my bedroom (the desk isn't large enough for the 19in, otherwise I would've used that one instead).
The other 17in and 19in are in reserve.

I have no intention of dumping any of them, until they break, at which time I reckon it'll be not worth the efford to find CRT replacements.
I also got a couple more "modern" flat screens, a 17in, an old 18in which seems to have some problems and a large 32in widescreen TV.
One more 15in flatscreen is in reserve. It's too small to be of any practical use but I just can't let go of it. It's image quality is pretty darn good! It's just that it's screen size is so small.

I used to have a 14.5in CRT (given away to a friend) and one 15in (lend indefinitely, it's screen quality seems to started degrading...maybe because of that little accident with that glass of wine it had years ago). The screen went all dancy for a couple seconds before I pulled the power cord, 🤣!

I like CRT's with older systems since they seem to support nearly any resolution which the older flatscreens have a lot of trouble with displaying properly (it becomes all pixely).

And about AT boards and PS/2, in my experience virtually all Pentium boards have PS/2 connectors while most 486 boards do not.
If the board is Socket 7, chances of it having a PS/2 port are pretty darn good.
I'm not sure about the availability of the PS/2 cables. Since I got plenty (pulled apart a LOT of AT systems years back and kept all the cables) I never bothered to look for more.
many boards made since, say, 1998 also have USB ports (may be non-standard in some cases) which should support any modern USB mouse, give or take if Windows drivers work properly.

Had some interesting finds today.

1. Found another Dell GXPro and this one is in perfect working condition (minus a dead HD). I'm going to keep this one for my mid-low DOS gaming due to the speed adjust feature it has.

2. I found an IBM XT hidden in the back corner of the room with a IBM Personal Compute Color Display. The XT fires right up and the HD works! It has DOS 3.3 on it.

3. The IBM AT is giving me issues. It works, but I can't get it to display on the IBM Personal Compute Color Display. I can see something displaying, but it's not syncing up properly. If I take out the video card and put in the CGA card from the XT it works. The HD may be dead though because it says that there's no OS and then dumps me into BASIC.

I suspect that the AT video card isn't working because it's an EGA card and I'm trying to use it on a CGA monitor. That's just a wild guess though. The video card has no manufacturer markings as far as I can tell, it has a video port and two RCA jacks on the back (composite?). It also has what appears to be some sort of memory card piggybacked upside down on the top. It's a very strange looking card.

Here's my dilemma. I can't keep everything. As much as I want to, I just don't have the room. Even though the XT works, I can't see much use for it so I may steal the HD and controller out of it and try and use it with my PCjr (but that's another project).

The AT is marginally more useful, but since I already have the PCjr for low end stuff and the slowed down GXPro for 386/486 stuff, it's really not all that useful. not to mention I don't have a monitor that seems to work with it. It also has two very nice looking 5.25" drives in it (a 360K and 1.2M drive) that I was thinking about stealing and slapping in the GXPro. I'm not sure if they're physically compatible or not though.

Tempest

Tempest, if you have any color VGA monitors in the 9" - 12" size (like point-of-sale type), let me know. I'd like to keep a small CRT around just to spot check games and make sure the AR is correct.

There are a few in the back room I think (old IBM ones), but it will be a bit before we get back there.