8" gunz rule .......!

[ThomasW]

Geezers like Jon and I got our first CRT based FPTV HT systems in the late 1980's.

In those days you paid $1500, bought a HeathKit/Zenith CRT projector (5" guns), and went blind soldering the 10,000 PCB parts in their respective holes. Then you spent the rest of your time risking life and limb, putting your hands on the powered up yokes to converge the guns. So when my old Heath/Zenith finally died I swore off CRT projectors, but sure missed the great colors.

Then............

A couple of years back via the 'net' I met a guy (Kevin). In a former life he used to be a pro installer of CRT FPTV projection systems. I helped him design and build a custom center channel speaker. He brought me up to date on the evolution of CRT projectors

One of Kevin's friends got into a little monetary shortage and offered to sell his complete system for less than the cost of a low buck LCD unit. So I pulled the trigger......

To be delivered the end of this month will be a used NEC XG85 (8" guns), 3000 total hrs, (for those that don't know, that's low miles for a CRT projector ), an electric, tab tension Stewart LX100T, a DVDO, and a ceiling mount. When new these items totaled some $25K. 8O

Kevin now lives in one of the suburbs of Denver, and has offered assist me with the install, setup, and calibration.

It's been a long time since I had a CRT based projection sytem. So to say the least I'm pumped ...... arty:

[Pat]

Thomas, sounds like a sweet deal!

I know I still luv my CRT

[Dean McManis]

I owned two CRT front projectors. And Electrohome with 7" tubes, and a Sony with 9" tubes. The picture was great even with the Electrohome, but the CRT learning curve was steep initially.

Eventually I wanted a larger screen (180") and the CRTs couldn't support it, plus the digital FPTV picture quality was becoming comparable to the best CRTs. With the digital units having some advantages (edge focus, uniformity), and the CRTs having better blacks.

So I've moved on to digital, but I still heartily recommend CRT FPTVs for those people who are comfortable with electronics and tweaking, and are looking for a great picture for a good price.

CRT is a WELL developed, mature technology. And most CRT FPTVs were professional/commercial units that have been well built.
It's kind of like owning a used Rolls Royce, even years later the build/materials quality still shows. And as long as you don't need much (costly) maintenance or repairs, they can be a great deal used.

Enjoy your great new toy.
-Dean.

[JonMarsh]

Congrats on the upcoming install! :T As you well know, I'm pretty jealous!

For the size screen(s) you have, I think the XG85 will work quite well.

I'm even begining to seriously pondering going back to a cheapo CRT RPTV to hold me over until the 1080 capable digital projectors are out at a reasonable price point. Yeah, I know, it will be quite a while until we get a Qualia equivalent for less than 15K!

Anyway, I'm looking forward to seeing this monster, and updating your HTPC to do it justice!

Regards,

Jon

[ThomasW]

Thanks guys.............

Given the cost of bulbs and the relatively frail nature of the things I haven't used my Sony 400Q nearly as much as I used the old CRT. I can't totally blackout the room, so it was problematic for daytime viewing even with a high-gain screen.

So the new/old CRT should solve those immediate problems.

Given Kevin's supply connections, and know-how, I might stay with CRT's for quite a while.

Black is Back ...... :T

[aud19]

8O Congrats!

Colour me jealous! :B

Jason

[George Bellefontaine]

Congrats, Thomas. My first FP was a 7" tubed Zenith crt and it gave an amazing picture even though it was only a video grade. Bought it in '91, if I recall correctly. Like Dean said, the learning curve took awhile. I live in a rural area and the dealer's tech wasn't all that great on setting it up. Fortunately my son was a tech working for a commercial broadcast, big screen installer. He got the Zenith manual for me and from it I learned what buttons to turn when doing the convergence, plus the business about the gains, which I really needed to know because the picture was much too blue. But the big old box was just taking up too much room, and because it didn't take a line doubler, I had to catch up with newer technology due to anamorphic dvds, etc. But the ol' Zenith is still tickin'. My son has it now.

If you don't mind learning the ins and outs of crt front projection, the reward for owning one is the best it can get. My NEC dlp comes close to crt, but there is still that gap when it comes to picture smoothness and blacks.

[Steve Goff]

Thomas,

Congratulations, I've had an XG85 (series 2) for a couple of years, and love it! :T It has color primaries that are close to ideal (thanks to color filtering), great color-corrected lenses, and a better chance at getting a good gray scale than almost any other CRT. With my tristimulus sensor and PC software I was able to get a very accurate gray scale. And I was able to achieve near perfect geometry and a very sharp picture. Mine will easily do 960p with a 4:3 aspect ratio, and 768p at 16:9, both with visible scan lines near the screen.

Unfortunately, I could never get my XG85 to properly integrate with my home theater, so I bought a DLP, the Immersive Virtuoso. I still miss the black level of the CRT, which now sits in the back of the room under the box that I built for it. Had I known you were in the market, I could have sold you mine, with far fewer hours. :? Oh well, I have friends who really want it now.

Make sure you check out Guy Kuo's latest posts on optimizing the white balance, black level, bias, and gamma of the XG, using a multimeter and AVIA. He's distilled the deap service level stuff and made it accessible to everyone. Look here. Also, if you really want to get deep in the innards of the Xg, check out his posts on astigmation. You'll be able to wring out great performance from that beast.

By the way, I don't think that you'll long be happy with 480p, if that is all your DVDO will do. The XG is so sharp that the scan lines will be very visible.

[Energeezer]

Congrats
Another CRTer finally.
I had an XG1352LC until recent financial constraints forced me to go back to a Marquee 8500.
You are gonna love the XG but be prepared for a steep learning curve. The NECs are the hardest to learn of them all but they also yeild the highest reward as far as 8 inchers go IMO.
Steve

[Bam!]

Congrats a rooney!

I knew about CRT projectors....but finally saw one in person in HD.....and I must say 8O ....If I understood the mammoth I`d go for it instead of my DLP....

It is quite an adventure....

Nice duder :T

[ThomasW]

It's HERE and man is it heavy............actually so is the screen. This is the first time I've played with an electric tab tension screen........

Fortunately I'm not a CRT n00bie. In 1988 I built one of the HeathKit/Zenith GR-8000 projectors. It served me well for almost a decade. Never did get comfortable turning the adjusting magnets on the yokes while the unit was powered up though.......... 8O

Unit won't be operational for a couple of weeks. I need to get the screen up and install blocking between the joists to attach the PJ ceiling mount bracket.

Fortunately my friend Kevin went to Runco's school for installers. So one the PJ is up and running, I get to sit back and watch him work his magic dialing in the image.....

Thanks for the links and info guys.... :T

Steve,

The old Iscan is just a temporay fix, it was included in the price.

I've been researching scalers, Iscan-HD, ADC, Crystalio, etc, etc, ........May go with the Immersive Holo3DGraph-II and a PC .... so many choices....any recommendations? Would like to keep it in the sub $2K range.

Black is Back....... 8)

[Dean McManis]

Thomas,

The IScan should hold you over for a short while. It is MUCH better than nothing. I had played with the early IScan scaler, and later model (not HD) with my CRT and the quality was pretty good, but I went with a home theater PC early on.

I currently have the first H3D card and the DCDi Faroudja scaling is very good.
Even though it needs a PC, the computer is almost invisible (I have mine autostart the H3D application on system startup), and it is VERY stable compared to HTPCs whose software has more involvement with Windows and can get corrupted sometimes.

My Sony 1292 was over 200lbs, and a real chore to get down the stairs, into my basement, and hung from the ceiling all by myself. 8O :x But the picture was fantastic after many day and hours of tweaking. You will be VERY thankful for your Runco-trained friend Kevin, as the setup process can be a real bear to get right, and you will want to have an expert to consult. :T

It's gonna be cool!, 8)
-Dean.

[Lex]

So, what your saying is, your going "back to the future"? Congrats Thomas, I am sure setup properly this setup won't disappoint! Key of course is doubling the image. Without a doubler, well, you know... Imagine paying 25K for this, then selling it for peanuts? Ouch.

Lex

[Brandon B]

Check out the lumagen scalers also.

BB

[David Meek]

Thomas, that's a SWEET deal. Congratulations duder (blatant Bam! ripoff)!!! :T

It's not an FP, but I'm still loving my Pioneer Elite 610 RPTV. It's only running 7" guns, but there's something about a nicely set-up 3-gun projected image that you just can't beat - right now, anyway. . . . Enjoy, fella. Enjoy.

Some pictures soon, maybe?

As far as a scaler, you mean you don't have an old Teranex squirrelled away somewhere? :B

[ThomasW]

So, what your saying is, your going "back to the future"?

Yeap, either that or "forward to the past"........... :T

The PJ was built in 97, initially bought by some corporation, then sold to the guy I bought it from. So my price was 3rd hand. That being said it's only got 3K hrs so pretty low miles. Even if I replace the guns in a few years it's still a good deal. And as long as there are RGBHV inputs/outputs I'm good to go..

Deane,

After my prehistoric Zenith CRT died, JonMarsh hooked me up with one of the HTPC's in existance (Hint anyone remember when a Celeron 300, was a state of the art CPU? :wink: ). Funny thing is that most people don't remember or know that Jon and Mark Rejon basically co-invented HTPCs. As a result I have no issues running them. It's just a matter of deciding if that's the best option for this particular situation.

The drag is that we're in the middle of record heat, almost 30 degrees hotter than 'normal' for this time of year. So accessing the attic is limited to VERY early in the morning.........

Black is back..........

[George Bellefontaine]

adjusting magnets on the yokes

Hey, Thomas your reference to adjusting magnets on the yoke reminded me of my old Zenith. After the local tech botched the setup of my PJ, I had to set mine up on my own and the Zenith had a ring at the yoke neck for adjusting position of the picture within the raster. I got a mild jolt doing that and was happy that I never had to go in there again.

Congrats on receiving the new baby. Here's to many happy hours of movie watching on your Crt FP

[Energeezer]

So, what your saying is, your going "back to the future"? Congrats Thomas, I am sure setup properly this setup won't disappoint! Key of course is doubling the image. Without a doubler, well, you know... Imagine paying 25K for this, then selling it for peanuts? Ouch.

Lex

LOL
Doubling is a good start but that PJ will perform best with tripling (720P) or if you really tweak it out (960P)
The most economical and flexible solution is a HTPC so you can fine tune your resolution. Along with the reolution aspect you'll enjoy all the other benefits of the PC.
At least LEX didn't tell you to "face reality" for getting into CRT.

[Dean McManis]

One thing that I found out tweaking CRT FPTVs and HTPCs was that higher resolution (from scaling) does not always yield a better looing picture.

Projectors seem to have a "sweet spot" in both resolution and scan rates.
And my CRT FPTVs had different ones for each model.

Progressive scanning was almost always better than an interlaced image (except for native 1080i), and when scaling from DVDs it was best to have a scanning multiple of 24Hz to match the 24FPS frame rate of film to avoid judder in panning shots.

Tripling was just a little too much for my FPTV with 7" CRTs, and just right for my FPTV with 9" CRTs (also usually optimal for 8" CRTS too).

Getting everything dialed in just right took a LOT of experimentation, but it was actually fun to tweak it and get a tiny visible improvement in the picture quality here and a bit there.

-Dean.

[Energeezer]

Yes
Quadrupling is too much for this PJ.
Most people with EM focus 8" CRTs settle for 720P.
Refresh rate also is very important as Dean said especially with a PC. If you can deal with the flicker 48Hz will usually give the best results for sharpness and overall depth as well as being less taxing on the PJ. Many people are bothered with the flicker at this rate and the next really usable option (due judder) is around 72Hz.
I know you said u r not a noob but when you set the beast up you will find the optimum (for max phosfur usage) throw distance is roughly 10% less than stated in the manual. NEC is famous for this and that is why you see so many used NECs with a small 4/3 wear area.
Did you pull the lenses and confirm the wear status of your tubes? If there is visible wear you will need to set up your image area inside the old wear. If the wear is light you will not see it. If there is no wear then you can max out the phosfur usage.
Thomas
There is another well known site that has a depth of info far beyond what you will find here. I have been asked not to mention "competing" sites here by our moderators (LOL) so if you are not aware PM me and I'll tell you.
Steve

[ThomasW]

When one doesn't have anyone else around to help, one resorts to drastic measures to hang a 66lb screen. Rube Goldberg would be proud 8O

[Pat]

nice use of available materials

Sorry I'm not closer, or I'd be there to help.

[Dean McManis]

Ah yes, the familiar ladder, orange crate, bungie cord stabilizing technologies. :T

When I mounted my 205lb 8O Sony projector (by myself) I used a 3500lb auto comealong to hoist it up to the ceiling. The interesting/challenging part was to cross-over the support cables so that it slowly rotated and inverted the projector while lifting it, so that it would be in the correct orientation to be secured to the ceiling mounts that I built.

Thanks for the picture. 8)

-Dean.

[ThomasW]

I was reading a post where a guy talked about using a winch to raise and lower his CRT. That got me thinking; Kevin is going to help me install the PJ, but who'll be around to help if/when it needs service? 8O

So a phone call, a trip to Harbor Freight Tools, and ta-da......... Crude, but effective

[JonMarsh]

Very agricultural looking, and very appropriate for a "Forward to the Past" type of projector!

I expect to see a picture of you next to the projector, with you in a knee length great coat and mutton chops, munching on a piece of lefse.



~Juan

[ThomasW]

uff da' .................

[Energeezer]

Guys
Mounting these things is really not that bad and an XG is one of the more compact units.
I've had roughly 10 different units through here from 3 diff manufactures ranging in weight from about 145-190Lbs and almost allways do it with 3 people. No winches etc, just good prep and planning.
2 guys to lift and 1 to put in the bolts. As long as everything is ready this is not a problem. The only time I had an issue was when we did it after a few uh pops. :W That was a little scarey but it worked out.

[Dean McManis]

Yep, that is very similar to the comealong that I used to raise my CRT projector to the ceiling. I had thought of using a drywall lift, but I couldn't get it downstairs into my basement. So I used the hoist, which was tricky, but worked well.

It gives new meaning to the term "Crank it UP". :B

-Dean.

[ThomasW]

Using the ladder technique shown for the screen, I singlehandedly raised and lowered my old Zenith 8000 projector several times. And I know the XG85 isn't a big deal when there's adequate manpower around. But my situation is such that frequently helpers aren't available. As a result, the $15 for the winch and the little extra time to install it, is a good investment..... :T

[JonMarsh]

uff da' .................

So, do you actually HAVE a lefse stick, or is that something you need to crank out on your Delta Unisaw soon? :rofl:

[Steve Goff]

I've been researching scalers, Iscan-HD, ADC, Crystalio, etc, etc, ........May go with the Immersive Holo3DGraph-II and a PC .... so many choices....any recommendations? Would like to keep it in the sub $2K range.

I have the Immersive HOLO II and HD-Aux, and they work great, especially woth an SDI-modded DVD player. I use a Panasonic RP82, which has a really good decoder chip. The HD-Aux lets you use the Faroudja FLI2300's built in scaling capability, which scales better than any video card I've used. You can also use an add-on RGB board instead of the HD-Aux, if you want to use the scaled analog output of the FLI2300 but don't need the HD-Aux inputs. By the way, the ADC used in the HOLO II is great, preserving all the picture information.

As you suggest, another option is the new Iscan HD, which uses the SIL504 and some proprietary stuff that gets rid of the chroma upsampling error and proprietary scaling. I actually slightly prefer the SIL504 on film-based material, since it recovers faster from bad edits and does not downrez the color channels like the FLI2300 does. On video-based materials, I prefer Faroudja's DCDi processing, by a fair margin. The best of both worlds might be the Iscan HD and a Faroudja-based DVD player, so you can use the SIL504 for film and the Faroudja deinterlacer for video.

Dale Adams has post pictures elsewhere showing that the scaling of the new HD is better than that of the Lumagen and the CS-1. It also provides delay for digital audio inputs, which changes based on the type of deinterlacing and scaling done by the video engine. Very cool, and very useful.

[JonMarsh]

Yeah, there's enough reading material by Dale to take quite a bit of time to go through!

But the iScan HD does look like it may be the best of the moderate price scalers.

That's the only trouble with these great deals on used CRT projectors- you can wind up paying more for the accessories to optimize it in your system than you do for the projector it self! :E

Still, it's a great deal. :B :T

I don't know how much video source material Thomas watches. So whether he'd be better off with the Immersive board scaler or the iScan HD is hard to say-

I've got one of those upscaling Zenith DVD players with dcdi built in, but the issue there is that a lot of video source material is 4:3, and since the projector will want to run full 16X9 with a 1080i source, that might not work- unless the independt zoom horizontal and vertical in the player can zoom out as well as in. Haven't tried that yet.

Regards,

Jon

[Steve Goff]

With the XG series projectors you can store more than one signal entry for each frequency/resolution, so the projector will do 16:9, 4:3, or any other aspect ratio, depending on how it is set up for a given signal entry. Each signal entry saves all of the adjustments that you've done for that set up, including hrozontal and vertical size, color balance, black level, bias, etc. For example, I set up one signal entry for 960p that had a 4:3 aspect ratio and white balance of about 54K, for watching black and white movies. I set up another at 960p with a 4:3 aspect ratio and 65K, for most color 4:3 material, and a 768p set up for color 16:9 material. It is easy to automate changing aspect ratio with a universal remote that does macros. Also, the projector will default to the first entry that fits the signal it is given, so you can also change aspect ratio by changing the output resolution of your scaler. I used 768p or 720p for 16:9 because that is about the resolving poiwer of a well-set-up XG projector, and 960p for 4:3 for the same reason.

The XG852 and XG1352 will also accept component inputs on the BNCs, and you can choose the color matrix (HDTV or NTSC) for the color conversion to RGB.

By the way, Jon, I have all of the manuals in PDF form, if you or Tomas would like me to email them to you.

[ThomasW]

Update time..................

Kevin came over yesterday, we did all the measurements to locate the ceiling mount bracket. Good news is that most of the old blocking I put in for the old Zenith PJ , can be used for the NEC. I added some additional mass to it, as a result all the mounting screws will be driven into 4"X6"s .....

Today my friend Andy came over. We installed the ceiling mount and put up a 7" long piece of 1-5/8" pipe on brackets at the top of the rafters. The center of the pipe is directly over a hole centered in the top plate of the ceiling mount. This pipe will all quick mounting and removal of one of these........





Yeap, decided to be REALLY lazy and go electric.......

Wednesday is 'lifting' and convergence day, I'll shoot some pics of the install as things progress....... :T


Steve,

Thanks for the info. I was able to locate all the manuals and install info on .pdf files.

As it turns out Kevin offered to sell me his Faroudja NRS at a price I couldn't refuse. He just moved to Denver, and won't have his HT up and running for 10-12 months. So I'll try out the NRS and see if it does what I want/need.......... :B

[JonMarsh]

My, that's a very agricultural looking piece of gear.... who'd have thought this would be something of interesti in an AV forum? :E

Makes me apprciate how easy my table setup will be in comparison! :B

~Jon

[Dean McManis]

That's a pretty cool electric hoist! 8)
Are you just planning on using it for the initial mounting, or for raising and lowering the projector for regular use? 8O :B

-Dean.

[ThomasW]

Dean,

Currently the hoist is on sale at Harbor Freight for $60. It's their smallest AC powered unit.

The hoist is designed to be quickly installed and removed. And this can be done by one person. So it will be used anytime the PJ needs attention.

The top plate of the ceiling bracket for the NEC has a hole in the middle, that's just big enough for the stock hook supplied with the winch. I attached an eyelet to the PJ part of the bracket along with a short length of chain. The chain is slightly offset from the centerline hole, so some experimention is in order.

Later today when I'm up in the attic and while we're hanging the PJ I'll shoot and upload some pix. It's an extremely simple setup.

[Dean McManis]

That's a great price.
I look forward to hearing (and seeing ) more. :T

-Dean.

[ThomasW]

Okay we're go for launch...... :T

Instead of loading up HT-Guide's server with pics, HERE's a link to the action!

I'll add more pics as the day progresses..... :B

[ThomasW]

All done ........... :B

Here are individual links to all the pics for those with dial-up

Screw-Eye with galvanized fence loop
Winch set-up on a piece of 1-5/8" fence tubing
Top view of hole for winch cable
Front view of PJ with cable
Rear view of PJ with cable
Ceiling mount with cable
Raised PJ rear view
Raised PJ front view

[Pat]

Very creative :T

[aud19]

Very nice indeed :T

Jason

[ThomasW]

Thanks guys..........

Have pretty much everything set-up except the color balance/cal....... To that end, Jon and I are talking about splitting the cost of one of the Colorvision Monitor Spyder-Pro calibration system. These are getting quite a bit of online chatter from the DIY crowd.

Watched the Stanley Cup game last night, the Faraoudja does a great job scaling a standard cable signal (note that I'm too cheap to pay for digital or HD )

When Kevin was here he used my SuperBit copy of "The Fifth Element" to check the PJ. The scene where Leeloo has just escaped and is standing at the outside opening of the tunnel. Kevin paused the PJ where the cop is asking her "do you speak English"? With the CRT, you can see the cop's eyes behind the tinted visor of of his helmet. I'd never noticed this before..... :T

Over the W/E I'll grab a couple of screen shots and post them.

[Dean McManis]

I look forward to seeing the screenshots Thomas. :T

-Dean.

[ThomasW]

Black is back .................

Here are a few screen shots. They're the first I've ever taken and are actually closeups. The camera was about 7' from the screen. My 1.5 megapixcel camera has trouble with extremely low light, as a result the color balance is off.
5thElement screen shots