24" Widescreen CRT (FW900) From Ebay arrived,Comments.

Prince Valiant said:
I'd be willing to trade it for another monitor or sell it if I found a decent replacement for cheap enough. It's my only 20" backup.
Click to expand...

I understand. I don't have a monitor to trade, but would buy it for a fair price.

Please keep me in mind if you do find a replacement.

And for anyone else who happens upon this thread, I'm interested in any broken FW900s (with working flyback) or (as a secondary option) a P1110. Or any leads you could share as to where I might find a compatible flyback.

Really appreciate it.
 
So it's either P1100 or FW900 now.
Since SED got cancelled more than a decade back, anyone knows if LPD is still silently being in development?
Screenshot_20231123-064527-492.png
 
jrodefeld said:
I understand. I don't have a monitor to trade, but would buy it for a fair price.

Please keep me in mind if you do find a replacement.

And for anyone else who happens upon this thread, I'm interested in any broken FW900s (with working flyback) or (as a secondary option) a P1110. Or any leads you could share as to where I might find a compatible flyback.

Really appreciate it.
Click to expand...
I'll be sure to post here if it happens and I remember.

Xar said:
So it's either P1100 or FW900 now.
Since SED got cancelled more than a decade back, anyone knows if LPD is still silently being in development?
Click to expand...
Probably not if they can't get the depth down.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Xar
like this
Prince Valiant said:
Pobably not if they can't get the depth down.
Click to expand...
That terribly sucks... LPD & SED are as close as we could get to CRT, not OLEDs as most including me presumably thought.

FW900/P1100 will run out of its lifespan eventually and while having it, we can never get 2160p+, Adaptive-Sync, HDR, and other modern aspects.
 
OLEDs are successor to Plasma, not CRT. Analog techs in the world have all died out and manufacturers won't see any point in going back continuing what have been left off or cancelled in the past due to technical issues or whatever reason. Retro gaming is nostalgia and reminiscence, not the future.
 
Xar said:
That terribly sucks... LPD & SED are as close as we could get to CRT, not OLEDs as most including me presumably thought.

FW900/P1100 will run out of its lifespan eventually and while having it, we can never get 2160p+, Adaptive-Sync, HDR, and other modern aspects.
Click to expand...
Good thing most of us CRT enthusiasts are getting along in years.

Poatan said:
OLEDs are successor to Plasma, not CRT. Analog techs in the world have all died out and manufacturers won't see any point in going back continuing what have been left off or cancelled in the past due to technical issues or whatever reason. Retro gaming is nostalgia and reminiscence, not the future.
Click to expand...
The flawed successor to a flawed alternative :rolleyes:.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: Xar
like this
I have all displays technologies here at home: CRT, LCD, Plasma and OLED. No perfect display technology exists, and while it's sad to see some are gone for good, OLED is actually the one has the least amount of drawbacks compared to all others. And I'm not talking solely about picture quality or features, but factors that consumers value as well, such as size and weight.

Sure, motion resolution isnt nearly as good as Impulse-driven displays, but we've already seen that good BFI implementations are more than capable of making LCD/OLED approach those older displays, anyone who has an LG CX can attest to that. It's just a matter of how much manufacturers are willing to make it work.
 
Xar said:
That terribly sucks... LPD & SED are as close as we could get to CRT, not OLEDs as most including me presumably thought.
Click to expand...
Wrong.

As well-intentioned as that assumption is, based on yesterdays press release hype, it is best not to assume on tech you have not seen. 😉

OLED looks better than the SED prototype that had worse artifacts than LCD.

Digtally-addressing these things often required compromises such as multiscanning, which creates artifacts that sequential scanout does not have. Also some of them had to pulse (ala plasma subfield style), which also creates its own artifacts (noise, christmas lights, contouring).

Also, 1000Hz OLED will be CRT-like with a realtime CRT electron beam simulator (similiar to this proposal), which would look superior to BFI. Basically an ultra-advanced BFI that is rolling-scan with phosphor fadebehind.

You just have to combine software based CRT simulators combined with brute-Hz on a fantastic tech (OLED) to make it truly CRT clarity. But for now, we are stuck with cheap BFI. And most OLEDs don't have that.

Also, are you aware of my work on Retrotink 4K to do "BFI in the middle"? It can add BFI to any 240Hz OLED too, producing CRT-clarity Sonic Hedgehog from your actual original genuine retro machine (or MiSTeR). It's coming out soon, as a workaround.

So you can work-around it, for sure.

I helped teach Retrotink 4K about variable-persistence BFI where you can use extra Hz

120Hz BFI = 50% blur reduction for 60Hz
180Hz BFI = 66% blur reduction for 60Hz
240Hz BFI = 75% blur reduction for 60Hz
And so on.
TL;DR: More Hz the merrier for emulating 60Hz CRT FTW

If you have a 240Hz display, view TestUFO Variable Persistence Demo For 240Hz Monitors
**** IMPORTANT SCIENCE/PHYSICS NOTICE -- BFI IS NOT NEEDED FOR CRT; THIS TESTUFO DEMO REQUIRES SAMPLE-AND-HOLD 240HZ TO LOOK ADEQUATELY EDUCATIONAL ****

And you can brighten BFI by converting SDR to HDR and nit-boosting it, to compensate. And yes, you can combine CRT filters with BFI, for any retro device attached to Composite / Component / VGA / etc inputs.

Digital Foundry verified and confirmed my work was working correctly to turn OLED more CRT-like:
1701032324584.png

TL;DR: The Digital Foundry people -- the one who tooted the Sony FW900 CRT and drove up demand, helped price it out of many people -- now extolling on OLED CRT clarity? Brains = skills to apply algorithm to OLED = turn it more CRT motion clarity. That's a now-feasible route today.

(Monkey shakes fist. I was also trying to buy a FW900 for keeps in my lab, but they're priced out locally, or too far to ship)

I would say, though, that the motion clarity is not quite perfect (120Hz+BFI) will still fail to fully blur-reduce Sonic Hedgehog scrolling speeds. But I think the upcoming 480 Hz OLED will do a perfect Sonic Hedgehog with box-in-the-middle CRT emulator filter (rolling BFI with phosphor fadebehind).

The panel makers have done "take it or leave it", it's time to put things in our hands -- even if we have to attach an external video coprocessor box between video source and the OLED display. But I'm impressed how much "CRT-like" I can successfully pull out of an OLED, with the right kind of processing (even software-based processing!)

BTW, tomorrow BFI will be better; this is not your grandma's yesteryear monolithic BFI planned. It is anticipated that future BFI will likely be rolling + have phosphor fadebehind.

Based on an actual hardware device (that I helped with), I now think by 2030, we'll have very faithful simulations of CRT, using external boxes connected to tomorrow's 1000Hz+ OLEDs, allowing actual human perceived 60Hz-85Hz persistence to compete with yesteryear tubes, in a box that concurrently does spatial processing (add CRT filters) AND temporal processing (add rolling BFI with phosphor fadebehind).
 
Last edited:
tongshadow said:
Sure, motion resolution isnt nearly as good as Impulse-driven displays, but we've already seen that good BFI implementations are more than capable of making LCD/OLED approach those older displays, anyone who has an LG CX can attest to that. It's just a matter of how much manufacturers are willing to make it work.
Click to expand...
My Retrotink 4K prototype here, as a box-in-middle BFI, can now even out-BFI even the LG firmware BFI.

I get a brighter BFI picture on my OLED than the firmware LG BFI because of the SDR->HDR converter + nitbooster trick!

And I can make my 240Hz OLED 4x clearer in motion for 60fps material too! Blows away the LG CX in clearer fast-scrolls (Sonic Hedgehog speed). The only issue is I have to downrez to 1080p to get 240Hz BFI, but it's pretty neat seeing amazing Sonic Hedgehog on my 240Hz OLED that's more than 2x better than LG CX 120Hz BFI.

Can't wait for 480Hz OLED, for 8x clearer 60fps motion! The current version of Retrotink 4K will have to go down to 720p to do 480Hz (bandwidth limitation), but that will be one of the first things I will test. Only problem is the nit booster might start to fail to adequately brighten 8:1 BFI ratios, though by then I might try rolling BFI for the smaller HDR windows (to help big-nitboost larger BFI ratios). We shall see how much brightness can be milked out of such short pulsetime windows...

Anyway, box-in-middle BFI or CRT emulators are a left-field solution that bypasses the frustrating slog convincing manufacturers to properly implement user-friendly features (e.g. The crosstalk-eliminating QFT tweaks on XG2431 isn't automatic, and requires lots of end-user calibration to get it WAY better than the reviewers got it).

Keep your FW900 babied until 2030 until OLED + box-in-middle CRT emulators. It's still Wright Brothers era for box-in-middle software-based CRT emulators but I now have a high-degree of confidence we'll get there.
 
Last edited:
Chief Blur Buster said:
And I can make my 240Hz OLED 4x clearer in motion for 60fps material too! Blows away the LG CX in clearer fast-scrolls (Sonic Hedgehog speed). The only issue is I have to downrez to 1080p to get 240Hz BFI, but it's pretty neat seeing amazing Sonic Hedgehog on my 240Hz OLED that's more than 2x better than LG CX 120Hz BFI.
Click to expand...

If I recall from the graph in the RTINGs review, the CX in BFI high with its subrefresh rolling scan has a persistence of about 3.33ms. If my interpretation was correct then your solution would be half of that?
 
SH1 said:
If I recall from the graph in the RTINGs review, the CX in BFI high with its subrefresh rolling scan has a persistence of about 3.33ms. If my interpretation was correct then your solution would be half of that?
Click to expand...
Ooops, I quoted the wrong LG model! Yes, I'm talking about the other LG OLED models limited to no less than 8.3ms persistence during 60Hz BFI.

For this specific one, it's likely roughly similar (due to limitations of external BFI injection can not be less than refreshtime), but the bonus card is the HDR nit booster mode -- which helps make it brighter than LG at equivalent pulse widths.
 
Yeah the dimness of the 60Hz BFI mode on the CX might have been its downfall.
 
Chief Blur Buster said:
And I can make my 240Hz OLED 4x clearer in motion for 60fps material too! Blows away the LG CX in clearer fast-scrolls (Sonic Hedgehog speed). The only issue is I have to downrez to 1080p to get 240Hz BFI, but it's pretty neat seeing amazing Sonic Hedgehog on my 240Hz OLED that's more than 2x better than LG CX 120Hz BFI.
Click to expand...
You recommend OLEDs for Software BFI due to the near-instant response, correct? I imagine that software BFI on a slow LCD (Pixel response> 8ms) would introduce artifacts/smearing.
While the 480Hz OLED isnt there, I wonder how the new 540hz PG248QP would fare in this regard...
 
jrodefeld said:
I read that the P1110 has a compatible flyback.

I have the opportunity to acquire a CPD-G520 for a reasonable price.

Does anyone know if I could use the flyback from this unit in the FW900?
Click to expand...

Speaking of flybacks, I read a post a couple weeks ago on Reddit that said sometimes flyback issues in the FW900 are misdiagnosed, and it's actually the electron gun that goes bad?

Either way, I guess keep both components until you know for sure what's going on.
 
tongshadow said:
You recommend OLEDs for Software BFI due to the near-instant response, correct? I imagine that software BFI on a slow LCD (Pixel response> 8ms) would introduce artifacts/smearing.
While the 480Hz OLED isnt there, I wonder how the new 540hz PG248QP would fare in this regard...
Click to expand...
Software BFI does work on LCD on the Retrotink 4K. It just works so much better on an HDR-capable OLED, though. The nit-boosting trick for BFI works much better on OLED. But software BFI on a good quantum dot backlit LCD actually looks decent-ish (except for LCD greys), a little bit more colorful than strobing, but more motion blur. There's even an "LCD Saver" setting on the Retrotink 4K that avoids the LCD image retention side effects used with most software BFI.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: Xar
like this
Chief Blur Buster said:
Software BFI does work on LCD on the Retrotink 4K. It just works so much better on an HDR-capable OLED, though. The nit-boosting trick for BFI works much better on OLED. But software BFI on a good quantum dot backlit LCD actually looks decent-ish (except for LCD greys), a little bit more colorful than strobing, but more motion blur. There's even an "LCD Saver" setting on the Retrotink 4K that avoids the LCD image retention side effects used with most software BFI.
Click to expand...
How many nits with booster on/off for fullscreen 100% white?
 
  • Like
Reactions: Xar
like this
Where is the page about replacing the anti-glare film on CRTs? Any info on replacing the AG on a 21” Trinitron 4:3 CRT?
 
rabidz7 said:
Where is the page about replacing the anti-glare film on CRTs? Any info on replacing the AG on a 21” Trinitron 4:3 CRT?
Click to expand...
There should be a tutorial on YouTube.

IBM P201, P260, P275, Samsung 1100DF, Mitsubishi 2070SB, Dell P1130, Hitachi SuperScan CM769U, these are the gems.
 
Good luck "replacing" the AR coating on a P275 or a P1130: it is a metallic coating deposited directly on the glass of the tube. It must be the same for Mitsubishi tubes as far as I know. Only the Sony tubes from the early 2000's and before feature a stuck plastic coating.
 
Strat_84 said:
Good luck "replacing" the AR coating on a P275 or a P1130: it is a metallic coating deposited directly on the glass of the tube. It must be the same for Mitsubishi tubes as far as I know. Only the Sony tubes from the early 2000's and before feature a stuck plastic coating.
Click to expand...
Yeah, my Mitsu tube's AR coating was "baked in".
 
So... last sunday, I turned on my FW900, and it made a very violent static-like noise. I actually jumped back because I was scared something was going to explode. After that, it refused to turn on, and made a weird sound (see video). Not sure if this is salvagable. I do have a working IBM P275 (which is the same as a Sony CPD-G520), so maybe I could transplant the flyback from there if I really wanted to (assuming flyback is the issue).


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LnBgW_goPkI

It had slowly been deteriorating - flashing green upon start -up, focus had deteriorated to the point where I needed to zoom in to read (aging eyes don't help either). And the antiglare was in poor condition. I had been meaning to cycle it out with my 2nd unit, but never got around to it. Also, the 2nd unit doesn't have anti-glare on it.

Well, that forced the issue. I set up the other unit, and BOY I had forgotten how beautiful a well calibrated tube in good condition looks like.

The lack of anti-glare is an issue, as I don't like working with the lights off during the day.

So I've decided I'm going to get a cheap LCD monitor (I already have one, but need two displays + laptop for my work), and only use the FW900 in the evening. That way, the glare isn't an issue, and the tube will last a lot longer. I figure 2 hours per day vs 10 hours a day means the tube will last 5 times as long. It's precious as it's my last FW900, and I want it around long enough to enjoy and showcase to others.
 
Last edited:
spacediver said:
So... last sunday, I turned on my FW900, and it made a very violent static-like noise. I actually jumped back because I was scared something was going to explode. After that, it refused to turn on, and made a weird sound (see video). Not sure if this is salvagable. I do have a working IBM P275 (which is the same as a Sony CPD-G520), so maybe I could transplant the flyback from there if I really wanted to (assuming flyback is the issue).


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LnBgW_goPkI

It had slowly been deteriorating - flashing green upon start -up, losing focus. And the antiglare was in poor condition. I had been meaning to cycle it out with my 2nd unit, but never got around to it. Also, the 2nd unit doesn't have anti-glare on it.

Well, that forced the issue. I set up the other unit, and BOY I had forgotten how beautiful a well calibrated tube in good condition looks like.

The lack of anti-glare is an issue, as I don't like working with the lights off during the day.

So I've decided I'm going to get a cheap LCD monitor (I already have one, but need two displays + laptop for my work), and only use the FW900 in the evening. That way, the glare isn't an issue, and the tube will last a lot longer. I figure 2 hours per day vs 10 hours a day means the tube will last 5 times as long. It's precious as it's my last FW900, and I want it around long enough to enjoy and showcase to others.
Click to expand...


Yeah it is likely the flyback in it died, RIP FW900. If some company started making flybacks for the FW900 again, I wonder how many units could be saved.
 
Mitsubishi Diamondtron tube doesn't get as much hype and attentions as Sony Trinitron. Gurus were testing the former back in the days coupled with their own tweaking making the IQ even crisper than Trinitron.
 
Xar said:
Mitsubishi Diamondtron tube doesn't get as much hype and attentions as Sony Trinitron. Gurus were testing the former back in the days coupled with their own tweaking making the IQ even crisper than Trinitron.
Click to expand...
Yea, while I've never seen one in person, the Mitsubishi's Diamond Pro 2070SB is a bit of a legend in its own right.
 
spacediver said:
Yea, while I've never seen one in person, the Mitsubishi's Diamond Pro 2070SB is a bit of a legend in its own right.
Click to expand...
I feel the same regarding the Mitsubishi. Hitachi's equivalent model is also a dark horse.


Copied from my DM.

"A few unknown 16:9 PC CRTs were made and FW900 is highly overrated. It's not even close to being the best CRT ever made. You can't rule it out using widespread cliche. It's essentially one of the few highend screen with highres 24inch 16:10 wide which makes it so desirable. There's a couple 4:3 monitors that surpass the FW900 in picture quality you've no idea.

Eizo F930, F931 and F980

Nokia 445PRO

Iiyama Vision Master Pro 514

Sony G520 and F520

Mitsubishi Diamond Pro 2070SB (sometimes the LaCie Electron blue 22 IV)"
 
Not overrated. The FW900 is just a fantastic display. The F520 is probably the pinnacle, but the FW900 is essentially the same thing in use. Just bigger. And it comes off as a lot bigger. More than the actual dimensions would suggest.

(After using an F520 for a while, I saw an FW900 at another house, and was stunned by how much larger it looked. Had used an FW900 previously, but hadn't remembered. Leapt at the chance to get another, back when one still relatively easily could. Still have F520s also though.)

Had the NEC branded version of the 2070SB as well for a bit. It didn't seem as refined as the Sonys. You could see an inner curvature, for example, whereas the Sonys look completely flat to me. I probably didn't give it enough of a chance though. Wish I had kept it too.

And yes there are certainly a number of fine CRTs that are not the FW900.
 
spacediver said:
I do have a working IBM P275 (which is the same as a Sony CPD-G520), so maybe I could transplant the flyback from there if I really wanted to (assuming flyback is the issue).
Click to expand...
Nope. As I said previously, even if swapping flybacks between different models were a good idea, the service manuals show the flybacks aren't pin compatible between the FW900/G500 gen and the G520 gen.

There might be some hope with your screen but well, there sure is quite an investigation to perform to find out what really failed and where. Green flashing isn't related to a flyback issue for example, but the focus problem probably points out a failure in the vicinity of the flyback indeed.
 
Strat_84 said:
Nope. As I said previously, even if swapping flybacks between different models were a good idea, the service manuals show the flybacks aren't pin compatible between the FW900/G500 gen and the G520 gen.

There might be some hope with your screen but well, there sure is quite an investigation to perform to find out what really failed and where. Green flashing isn't related to a flyback issue for example, but the focus problem probably points out a failure in the vicinity of the flyback indeed.
Click to expand...
I seem to remember someone on this thread saying they successfully used a CPD-G520 flyback in an FW900, but perhaps I mis-remembered.
 
spacediver said:
I figure 2 hours per day vs 10 hours a day means the tube will last 5 times as long.
Click to expand...
You were still using the FW900 as your primary monitor? haha, that's many years of intense usage, so still impressive.

My Diamondtron 2070SB rebadge only gets used a couple hours a day at most, if I happen to want to play something from PC/Switch/other consoles with 480p support or higher. Otherwise, I'm watching/browsing on an OLED

And maybe not all is lost for the FW900. Maybe it was a replaceable VRM or something that blew up
 
Yep, been using FW900 as primary monitor since I first got one! Down to my last working one though, so shit's getting real.

And yes, perhaps not all is lost for the broken one :)
 
  • Like
Reactions: XoR_
like this
spacediver said:
Yep, been using FW900 as primary monitor since I first got one! Down to my last working one though, so shit's getting real.

And yes, perhaps not all is lost for the broken one :)
Click to expand...
Still love the FW900 and F520 for sure. What amazing displays. This year the FW900 is no longer my daily driver, because I needed more screen real estate for work. (The FW900 getting its own set up being a goal of my holiday break.)

I'm now on an LG CX, because along with 4K I badly wanted that subrefresh BFI, which I always have on max. Not as fast as a CRT, but definitely cushioned the blow greatly.

(I think the C1/G1 also retain this advanced BFI, but only for 120Hz and presumably 100Hz...)
 
Enhanced Interrogator said:
You were still using the FW900 as your primary monitor? haha, that's many years of intense usage, so still impressive.

My Diamondtron 2070SB rebadge only gets used a couple hours a day at most, if I happen to want to play something from PC/Switch/other consoles with 480p support or higher. Otherwise, I'm watching/browsing on an OLED

And maybe not all is lost for the FW900. Maybe it was a replaceable VRM or something that blew up
Click to expand...
I'd guess mine is about the same with some give or take on the time. There are times when I'll burn a whole weekend or evening on something and then there will be weeks where it stays off.
 
Strat_84 said:
This is a big NO. The circuit schematic inside the flyback is different between the service manual of the G520 and the one of the FW900, they're not pin compatible.

Also, I think someone reported using another flyback with success in the past and the patch-up job was holding but this is a critical component that shouldn't be replaced by anything else than the original part. Safety reasons. There's absolutely no public information about the technical specs of these flybacks.
Click to expand...
I'm the one that swapped the flyback from a Dell P1110 about two years ago. Works like a charm.
You'll have to readjust (stretch) everything horizontally as P1110 is a 4:3 monitor.
 
jrodefeld said:
If you have a P1110 that you are willing to part with, I am very interested.

To clarify, the P1110 and FW900 have very similar flyback, but the G520 is different.

Obviously, ideally I'd replace the flyback with the same exact part, but realistically I know the odds of finding it are pretty low.

I know there was a member of this forum that swapped flyback between these two units (P1110 and FW900) and it was working really well.

If that's my only option, I'd rather give it a try than giving up on the unit.
Click to expand...
Yep, I'm the one.
 
juanme555 said:
First off, you're an absolute champ, thank you for all of this precious information brother.

Question, the computer for which you'll be using this adapter, what is the CPU and Motherboard?
Click to expand...
I'm in the middle of an upgrade. The card is an RTX 4090 and the CPU is a Core i7 6700k (yeah, I know) :)
 
Sunix DPU3000-D4, Delock 87685 or 600MHz RAMDAC converter is needed getting the maximum out of every CRT in the world with 4090.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top