Luke, see the power of the dark side....

[JonMarsh]

Uh, well, I guess decided I want to see the power of the dark side again...


Though considering picking up and tweaking a low end CRT RPTV for my viewing pleasure, my buddy ThomasW gently reminded me (those bruises still hurt!) that for a few sheckels more, I could get back to my roots. My CRT roots.

Forward to the past.

Back to the Future.

Whatever....


Drove about 500 miles today, to pick up an NEC 9PG+ with less than 700 hours on the CRTs... :T

I've got a full tank of gas, Tinman and Feathers physical setup guide, all the NEC manauals, a brand new full function NEC 6051 projector remote, and it's a hundred miles to Chicago....

Oops, wrong movie.

Uh, hmmm, kind of hungry, though. Maybe I'll go out for Mexican first. :B

~Jon

[ThomasW]

The new mantra.

Black IS back....... :T

[JonMarsh]

And color.... color fidelity, that is. I love the color reproduction on my NEC XM29 presentation monitor in my bedroom; it uses a Toshiba microfilter tube with individual phosphor filters on each phosphor dot.

The PG series and the XG series use color filtering to improve the primary accuracy on the RGB tubes; some say they're at the top of their class for color fidelity, though it does cut light output just a skosh.

Once you go black, you can never go back

[Bam!]

John! Congrats! :T

Ever since I have seen that Runco in HD....I must say :E :E :E

The picture is unreal. His Runco is actually for sale since he sold his house and moved into an app downtown.......

She`s a beaut.

Question though....have you seen a new three chip DLP like the JVC in action ?

Anyway! I totally understand your thrill to CRT`s !

But....what a mammoth!

[JonMarsh]

I haven't seen a three chip DLP yet. The JVC's aren't DLP, anyway, they're LCOS, which is a type of reflective, instead of transmissive, LCD.

Marantz is introducing a 3 chip "consumer" DLP. I'd hope that with those they could do away with the temporal dithering artifacts in low light areas. Of course, a three chip will eliminate rainbows completely, that other main bane of DLP. The only major disapointment (besides the hideous price) of "consumer" three chip DLP is the limiation to 1280X720. I've helped a friend SMART calibrate a Sony 1366X768 projector, and I think I'd like higher resolution even than that, especially for $30k.

Now, if they just had the xHD3 chips ready, and were willing to release them to FPTV, instead of only RPTV for the first year or two. But then, I'm wondering what subtle artifacts those chips will have, being just a little over 1 millioni pixels and using some special tricks to get 1920X1080P. I know it involves mirrors; I just don't know if smoke is involved, too! :E

This little baby was a steal, though, at well under $2K, for a projector that cost $22K new. Pretty competitive bang for the buck, but then it's a totally different learning curve for setup compared with a Sanyo Z2, or Sony HS20, obviously.

Since I've put two Heathkit CRT projectors together, and done a lot of tweaking on these beasts, I'm no too worried, especially with the excellent technical resources I've got on hand. We even managed to find a copy of the NEC projector control package that runs on a PC, so I could plug the projector into one of my computers to do the electrical setup, instead of the handheld remote. You should see this remote, it's huge, but then it's the setup and calibration version, not the user version.



This PG9 is a relative "baby" as CRT's go; only about 125 lb, and compact enough to snuggle up in the back seat of my Z28. It's tiny compared with the 8" and 9" rigs. OTOH, no one will accuse it of being a portable presentation projector!

I expect the setup to take a while; today I'm calculating what kind of table height I'm going to need to work with my screen, then will probably go table hunting this weekend; if I can't find something I like, I can always go to the orange box store and buy som maple and power up the table saw. I don't wan't to do EVERYTHING DIY though, because there just aren't enough hours in the week!

Gotta get a binder for all the manual pages I've printed out, too. Love that Samsung 1650 Laser printer....

~Jon

[aud19]

I know it involves mirrors; I just don't know if smoke is involved, too!

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

Jason

[Dean McManis]

Have fun, and the best of luck with your setup Jon. I'm not sure if I could ever go back to CRT FPTVs again. 8O
I've gotten used to just pressing the "on" button of the remote to watch movies on the big screen. :wink:

The initial setup is the hardest part, but after that it's nice. 8)

I am eager to read about your progress for this bold adventure.
And maybe even see the results when you are done. :T

-Dean.

[ThomasW]

Jon's just SO competitive.................. :wink:

He was all set to buy a 16X9 Panny RPTV. When he went to Costco get one they were sold out.

Then he put his thinking cap on. He realized that for the same amount of money and the same weight penality, he could have a 9PG+ ...... :B

[JonMarsh]

Thanks for the encouragement, Dean. I'm hoping I haven't bit off more than I can chew, but I'm an EE, understand the electronics and physics involved in CRT projectors (did ham TV in my teens), and have past experience with CRT from the ground up, so hopefully this will be a grand little adventure with a happy resolution! :W

I'll document my trials and travails on this thread as I go along, so no other dang fools will be too encouraged to try this path! And I'll invite you up when I get it running and am satisfied with the results... Note I said "when", not "if"? A sure sign of over confidence... :lol:

I ordered a Key Digital component to VGA transcoder this AM, and I got lucky and found what may be just the configuration of table I need- heavy tempered glass top, 24" X 34" top surface, and about 19" high- should be just about right height wise to match up with my current "roll around" 72" diagonal 16X9 screen holder.


It was expensive, though; $79 at Office Max. 8) Who'd a thought...
Designed for putting conventional large direct view TV's on it, so should handle the weight just fine. It was expensive because I saw a new computer table I'd like, and since I was planning on re-doing the workstation area and getting a new carpet protector, well, it's going to be a busy weekend!

Best regards,

Jon

[Dean McManis]

but I'm an EE, understand the electronics and physics involved in CRT projectors (did ham TV in my teens), and have past experience with CRT from the ground up, so hopefully this will be a grand little adventure with a happy resolution!

I have a similar EE background, and that's exactly what I thought going into CRT FPTVs the first time (that I'd have an advantage). And overall it was a correct assumption. None of the work and research was truly overwhelming, but it certainly isn't something that I'd recommend for someone without any understanding of electronics (mom, wife, etc..).

As I mentioned, it's real work to get everything right, but it's also a real reward when it's all dialed in correctly. It's rare to see such a great looking picture as you do with a well setup CRT FPTV. 8)

-Dean.

[JonMarsh]

As I mentioned, it's real work to get everything right, but it's also a real reward when it's all dialed in correctly. It's rare to see such a great looking picture as you do with a well setup CRT FPTV. 8)

-Dean.

Yes, that's pretty much what I'm hoping for! I visited one of the former contributors/reviewers of WSR a few years ago while on a business trip back east; we had a nice dinner together with his wife, and discussed teean aged kids, projectors, HTPC's, and many other interesting topics. His 7" tube Electrohome delivered a very good picture on both HD and DVD sources. I'm hoping to come pretty close to that with the NEC PG9+, as it has a reputation for learning curve in setup, but capable of very good results.

Can't wait to see what some good "outer space" Sci Fi movies look like on this rig when it's dialed in- I've been saving up my Star Trek and Star Wars disks for this. Actually, I've got a substantial backlog of title's I haven't seen at the movies or watched at home- many classic movies, plus more recent popular titles like "Saving Private Ryan".

Should be fun...


~Jon

[George Bellefontaine]

I will be following this thread with great interest, Jon.

[Energeezer]

"His 7" tube Electrohome delivered a very good picture on both HD and DVD sources. I'm hoping to come pretty close to that with the NEC PG9+, as it has a reputation for learning curve in setup, but capable of very good results."

Don't worry. Since the Electrohome had 7" tubes that would make it (at best) an ECP series. The 9PG will easily outperform that unit.
NEC is a bear to set up even by CRT standards but the reward is a better image (usually)
Nothing can beat NEC for color balance and since you have a 9PG+ it will be plenty bright in a darkened room.
Be sure you maximize the phosfur area of the tubes. NEC is notorius for having the throw distance (as per the manual ) to long and wasting usable phosfur.
I'm sure you already have the links to the best info and experts on NEC setup.

Steve

[JonMarsh]

Hello Steve,

Yes, I've heard that NEC overspecs throw distances by about 10%, and for best phosphor utilization, I should move in the CRT to screen distance by about that amount.

I've gotten a passle of info off the web, including full installation and setup manuals in PDF form, which are now printed out in a binder, indexed and titled, etc. As ThomasW put it, real OCD.


Today I ordered a 16X9 screen from Carada, with their brilliant white surface material. They've gotten some good reviews in various locales for a small organization, the build quality seems good, and the price is right.

I expected to have a wait on delivery, due to whatever manufacturing leadtimes are involved (they offer a lot of different sizes), but I received word that it actually shipped out today. I had been considering a DA-LITE wall mount screen due to my prior experience with them, but most of the online retailers don't carry the smaller size that I wanted (72" diagonal), and that size is only available in the somewhat "cheesier" models.

I've still got some re-arranging to do before I can start the setup, and assembling and testing out the table I bought for the 9PG+, but with the projected quicker than expected delivery on the screen (due in Thursday, Friday at the latest), I could be starting the setup phase this weekend, if work doesn't do a number on me! Unfortunately, it has been so far this week- my first conference call of the day was at 7:30 AM, the last one is scheduled for 10:30 PM. Sometimes working for an international company with major offices in Europe and Asia is not very much fun... :

Maybe there's just something about this year- things are pretty wound up at work, and I'm beginning to wonder if that manic attitude hasn't even transfered to my A/V life- on top of the Arvo speaker project, the balanced power unit, and the Aragon Xmod, I've now got this new toy to setup and sort out! Well, at least, life ain't boring!

~Jon

[Dean McManis]

Sounds exciting indeed Jon!

It's good that you have some non-work projects to happily distract you (as time allows).
It is surprising that the screen shipped out so quickly. And so the excitement builds... :T

-Dean.

[Energeezer]

"I've still got some re-arranging to do before I can start the setup, and assembling and testing out the table I bought for the 9PG+, "

This is perfect then for one of the hardest elements of CRT setup. Center the rasters, maximize image size (within safety margin of phosfur edges), turn off blue and red and then move PJ and table forward until you fill the screen with green. Then measure and you SHOULD find ROUGHLY spec minus 10% or so on throw distance.
Believe me it is so much harder to do with a ceiling mount.
Here is another tip.
Do not rush the mech setup (throw, alignment, squarness to the screen etc)
A perfect mech alignment will yield dividends in the final image and allow you to put much less stress on the electronic correction circuits such as keystone, pin, convergence etc. The PJ will last longer and the convergence will have much less drift.
I only had to tweak my XG 1352 (convergence) every 2 or 3 months thanks to this and the adj would only take a couple minutes.
Good luck, take your time and keep us posted.

[JonMarsh]

The bits and pieces are falling in place

Thanks, Steve.

This is a message I've been getting pretty consistently, here and "elsewhere", and which I heartily believe in, based on past experience- the mechanical setup and tune up is critical. I expect to go through it a couple of times, and I'm not in a rush to get this going. The less electronic compensation is used to bring the picture in, the more stable it should be over time, and probably more reliable, too.

The Key Digital transcoder arrived today. :banana: It's a pretty small package for what it cost, but the reviews and comparisons I've read indicate it may be the best performing, better unfortunately, than the Extron CVC 2000, which would have been my first choice, based on past experience with Extron gear. But the experience of others comparing it with the AA and Key Digital led me to this choice. The Key Digital will take care of my immediate connection requirements, as it has an RGBHV input which get's pass through if there isn't a sync signal on the Y component input. So, when the upscaling DVD player is turned off, priority will fall back to the MyHD output from HTPC.

This is gonna be fun, I think..... :yesnod:

Regards,


Jon

[Energeezer]

"This is gonna be fun, I think..... "

If you are patient and you like to tinker I'll give you my personal gurantee it will.

[JonMarsh]

If you are patient and you like to tinker I'll give you my personal gurantee it will.

Hey, I resemble that remark!


Heck, I'm so patient I have speaker and electronics projects started two years ago that aren't finished yet, but are still in progress; priorities change week to week, and sometimes other things float to the top (too often work, lately). But progress still occurs.

Sometimes that's a good thing, because new info and techniques are picked up that get incorporated.

Heck, I'm such a glutton for punishment that I got the service manual for my Toshiba RPTV and went totally through it top to bottom- it had a razor sharp picture (considering the hardware) when I was done, and my daughter is enjoying it immensely since I gave it to here last fall.

Screen should be delivered tomorrow; table going together after work tomorrow.

~Jon

[JonMarsh]

More goodies...

Carada Screen arrived this AM. Too bad I'm so swamped with work. I was working until almost 8 last night on the computer, CAD layout; started at 6AM yesterday. Don't think I'll go that long today.

Pretty big box, even though it's a relatively small screen; Airborne/DHL has handled it pretty nice; looks like it's just been around the block, not all the way from Alabama. BTW, Carado provides there purchases with a signup account and addtional support access; overall the packaging and service appears to be quite good, especially considering the very reasonable price.

As expected, the 1"X2" box sections for the frame are qutie stout, a definite step up from the low end DA-LITE which this competes against on price.

I'm jazzed. Heck, I may even be blue grassed, but only Sonnie Parker would probably really understand that.

~Jon

[Energeezer]

Hey, I resemble that remark!



Heck, I'm such a glutton for punishment that I got the service manual for my Toshiba RPTV and went totally through it top to bottom- it had a razor sharp picture (considering the hardware) when I was done, and my daughter is enjoying it immensely since I gave it to here last fall.


~Jon

LOL
Me Too
Had a Tosh 56H80 and did it all including Herman TLV. Results were astounding and i sold the TV for the same I paid after owning it for 8 months. (switched to CRT FP) Every person who came to see the TV was amazed at the diff between mine and any others they had seen.
Steve

[JonMarsh]

Back to making a little progress this weekend. Saturday afternoon I assembled the cute little table for 40" direct view TV's; it's a pretty ideal one for the NEC from a height and size viewpoint, and the shelf underneath holds the HTPC, Zenith DVD-318 upscaling DVD player, and transoder with room to spare.



I expected to get the basic phsical configuration changes completed and an initial alignment, but my duaghter called up with some minor electrical problems in her car that needed attention, so Dad's early evening got co-opted.

So we'll see what progress I make today- film at 11. :W


~Jon

[Dean McManis]

That's a great little table Jon. 8) It's well matched to the projector and it looks clean and uncluttered. :T
And with an open design, you can get to all of the adjustment bits easily (although once it's setup, you will likely only be using the remote).
Thanks for the pic. Looking forward to hearing about your progress with the new toy. :B

-Dean.

[JonMarsh]

Configuration and Initial Setup

Yeah, Dean, I got lucky coming across that table when I was shopping for a computer workstation table. I had a few other ideas, but none that would have worked as well, I think. Ended up buying a computer table of the same brand; it's got a tempered glass top and accessory shelf, too. Same color.

This was a "training" day setup, just to get the configuration changes done, and take a pass through the alignment and convergence and get some feel for the process.





Mechanical configuration/Setup
This projector was originally used in a ceiling mount mode with a 100” diagonal 4:3 screen (factory default), so I had a bit of re-configuration to do to get it ready for table mount with a 70” 16:9 diagonal screen. This consists of both mechanical adjustments and changes in the electrical configuration.





The 9PG+ is very easy to get into – loosen two screws, and the clam shell top flips up like an old Jaguar or a new Corvette. First stop is the deflection board, the one with the big heatsink. Here I had to pull out and turn 180 degrees the deflection connectors for the horizontal and vertical scan.






Here you can see where the red/blue wire connectors and yellow/brown cables plug into the deflection board. This changes the sweep pattern for the new orientation.

Next, the screws holding the rear of the deflection board down have to be loosed, so that we can flip it up and out of the way, to get to the asig/focus connectors for each board, which have to be flipped 180 degrees in the same way. Note the de-gauss coil on the back of the defection board.





The cables I had to flip the connectors on are the same color as the deflection cables just done- they plug into the board which sits in the center near the green CRT. Then the deflection board is lowered back into place, and I turned my attention to the CRT mechanical focus and aim. These have to be updated for the difference in throw distance between the default setup any my own.




First, the click stop focus tabs have to be set for the suggested distance and angle- these are in the slots in the metal strut going across the chassis just behind the CRT lens assemblies. First, the mounting screws have to be loosened, then the tabs moved to the numbered positions in the chart. BTW, most of the configuration data is on decals on the inside of the top cover, but I was using a complete setup/configuration manual I found in PDF form. After these tabs are set, then I snugged down the mounting screws.

Next step was to re-aim the CRTs for the required throw distance. There’s two slot heads on each side of the CRT- for the Red and Blue tube these are loosened, then the screw for the 100”, 200”, and 300” preset positions is taken out and put in the continuous adjustment slot- this is the only way to set the aiming for sub 100” throws. This is a bit tricky, because there are marked positions only for 100”; presuming the end of the slot past that is 60”, I guess the best you can do to start off with is try a position midway between. This is an area I’m going to be re-visiting, because I ended up closer to 60” than probably optimum, due to some other electronic adjustments not being completely zero’d out. That’s why I’m calling this the “training” pass.


Signal Entry and Alignment

Next step was to connect my Zenith and the transcoder, pop in a dvd to have a signal source, and fire it up. It’s was quite a bit of a thrill to me to see this light up, and then adjust the center focus and edge focus and see an image of sorts for the first time!

At this point I went into the menus and turned down contrast to about 30%, to be sure I wouldn’t burn the phosphor with static images (i.e., test patterns), and then went to signal entry to verify I was receiving the right scan rate, and setup a new named entry. In doing this, I must have copied over a lot of values from one of the previous entries, which I didn’t intend to do. (Training day, remember?) So something’s which I thought would have been zeroed out weren’t. In most cases this wasn’t a problem, but it affected my aiming of the tubes, and this I’ll revisit next time.

Bringing up the coarse then fine dot test patterns, and running through the electrical focus (having just done the mechanical focus), I was getting very nice small focused dot size, which confirmed my decision (for now) to not go in at this point and do a yoke astigmatism adjustment. If was planning on higher resolutions vertically, that might be worthwhile, but I decided to give it a go as delivered, as things looked good on the test patterns.

Without going into a lot of detail, lets just say I spent about 1-1/2 hours going through the alignment menus, convergence and point convergence- and wound up with an excellent fine grid white pattern, though I was close to pushing the point grid adjustments in a few places. How anyone really gets a 6PG fully dialed in without the point convergence board (optional on the 6PG+, standard on the 9PG+ is beyond me- the point convergence allows you to bring the red and blue grid lines exactly on the money with the green grid.



Setup was the Zenith DVB318 set in 1080i upscaling mode, component output to CTAC3 Key Digital transcoder (component to RGB, HDTV colorimetry) to the RGBHV input on the 9PG+. No visible interlacing artifacts with either film or video source material.


My Sony camera takes poor screen shots, so this doesn't convey well the results I was getting; great contrast and sense of depth; shadow detail; oh, did I mention, good blacks? Ummmm, no, make that great blacks! And when I put "Fifth Element" up, of course, that's when the battery flaked out...














This was a "training" day setup, just to get the configuration changes done, and take a pass through the alignment and convergence and get some feel for the process. Nonetheless, the result turned out quite good, probably about an 85% (B? not quite B+) of what it's capable of- but the results visually were stellar, especially the naturalness of color and image depth, particularly on people-

Plus the Zenith passed with flying colors playing back the last episode of Season 2 of "Smallville", handling very dark to very bright scenes with aplomb, and giving remarkable reproduction of facial depth and skin tone - a lot of dimensionality and depth to the image. And none of the video artifacts on poorly flagged mixed video/film material that even NVDVD 3 experiences with the Smallville series! :T


Learned a lot yesterday, now that I have it basically up, I can schedule some time in the future to go through this again more thoroughly after I get caught up at work... probably August at this rate!

I'm jazzed!

~Jon

[JonMarsh]

Re-calibrated "Room"....

Sunday I started "re-calibration", but with a twist-- I gave up on my roll around screen stand, and rotated my whole room setup by 90 degrees, speakers, seating, projector, etc. Just a little bit to keep me occupied Sunday evening.

The Carada screen is now mounted on a wall - the projector is close back to the opposite wall, at about 78" throw distance from the screen to front of the projector. This gives more room for seating to the side, and a better walk through in the living room, also.

I used Guy Kuo's guidelines for setup, and with the contrast turned way down, and the brightness turned up, setup a new signal entry, checked and tweaked the raster size and centering in the CRT faces (contrast down at 30, you can look into the lenses without taking them off), adjusted the edge blanking on all sides for the new settings, and used a light field raster for re-aiming the tubes. Re-did the optical focus, and clearly got a better edge focus on the red and blue tubes than I had before. Also went through the basic alignment process; it's coming out cleaner with the improved mechanical setup. :T

From everything I read, I may wind up doing this process a couple of more times before really "getting" all the inter-relationships and how to optimize. We'll see. If you don't enjoy tweaking and playing with hardware, CRT is NOT for you.

I find it's a bit of a hassle wearing my distance vision glasses and squinting at the setup remote (you wouldn't believe how many buttons that thing has!) I think I may load up the imager control software from NEC in my laptop, and see if I can do the setup/teaks with the laptop instead of the remote.

Hopefully I"ll have a little spare time this weekend to finsih this pass through- unfortunately, there's still a ton of work hanging over my head. No holiday this weekend for moi...



~Jon

[JonMarsh]

It's all coming together...

Spent another hour this evening, one more pass through the alignment menu and a touch up on the mechanical aiming of the CRTs, then the convergence menu and just a little touch up on using the point convergence. Last, I re-tweaked brightness and contrast, and upped the Red bias and gain slightly in the White Balance menu.


Oooooh Mama Mia! That'sa some picture!


Then to reward myself, after a few chapters from some familiar movies, I watched "Paycheck", the just release semi Sci-Fi flick with Uma Thurman and the almost Mr. J-Lo, uh, Ben Affect, or something or other...

It was a good flick to test things out; lots of challenging scenes with dark stuff, some real dark to light strobe kind of stuff, and a lot of pretty good closeups which are very revealing of things like facial color and texture, as well as some other good test material, such as reflective surfaces, etc, that are hard to get right in video, and when they do look good, you know you've got something.

The only thing I can say in retrospective, is I sure wish I'd done this a few years ago...

My daughter has been curious about this, because we used to have some good times watching Laser disk movies when she was young on the old Zenith CRT FPTV. We're planning on having a movie night sometime soon together, just have to decide what the features are going to be. When she was young, her favorites were things like the Back to the Future trilogy, Problem Child, Spaced Invaders, Housesitter, and even the Ninja Turtles movies.

Back to the Future didn't do very well on LCD; too many really dark scenes that needed deep blacks to look natural, and make the brighter parts pop off the screen without any washout. Well, the blacks are back. Even so, I can see how a dark paint scheme would benefit the last bit of black detail and contrast- watching a 2:35 movie like tonight, the only background illumination on the screen is the light reflected back from the room. It's nice not having the area between the 2:35 image and the 1:85 raster lit up, though- no dark shade of gray, just black.

This is the best $1600 I've ever spent on video. What's awesom is that is the same price as I paid for my Heath/Zenith in kit form back in 1988.

Happy Fourth weekend to everyone!

~Jon

[vin_gar]

Xm29

Jon had a posting on XM29 Multisync presentation monitor. Apparently I have one that has some power supply unit issues. I need help!!! Jon or someone in the group familiar with this.

---vin+

[Kevin P]

Hey Jon, seems like I'm resurrecting your old thread...

Anyway, it looks like I'll be grabbing a low hours NEC 9PG Xtra for my HT. Do you have the throw distance charts or formula handy? I'm wondering what the distance would be to a 110" diagonal (96" wide) 16:9 screen.

After reading your thread, it looks like the setup for the NEC is similar to that for the Zenith Pro895X/900. Maybe a little easier since the NEC has multi-point convergence which the Zenith lacks (made convergence a time consuming process of trial and error!) But after setting up 2 Zeniths, I think I might have the hang of it.