Should I take this old TV for retro games?

[Howard_Casto]

I thought I posted this last night... maybe I forgot to click the post button or something.  My mom and step dad got a new tv, so all the tvs in their house got rearranged.  One of the tvs was actually using another, ancient tv as a stand.  It's a 25" Zenith, model#  sj7504rk from late 1991.  It has composite in only, not even s-video.  I'd like to mod in a scart connector for rgb, but I don't know how possible that would be considering it's age.  I absolutely don't have room for it... I'd have to store it over at grandma's but I'm thinking about the future. 

So how hard do you guys think it'd be to mod and do you think it'd be worth the hassle of moving it in and storing it or should I hold out for a Trinitron or something?

[opt2not]

I’d say this tv is better suited for arcade cabs than modding for RGB. Those old 25” console TVs have good candidates for tube swapping WG K7000’s. If you have a chance to see what tube is in there, it might be compatible and worth keeping it around. Especially if you have a k7000 with bad burn/failing guns.

Besides, these tubes didn’t have a high density of lines per scan, so even if you RGB modded it, you might not get a better image than a Trinitron.

[bigster]

Unless you have unlimited space or want to use for an arcade cabinet, I would pass.  You can find a better console crt

Sent from my SM-G975U using Tapatalk

[Arroyo]

I’d say this tv is better suited for arcade cabs than modding for RGB. Those old 25” console TVs have good candidates for tube swapping WG K7000’s. If you have a chance to see what tube is in there, it might be compatible and worth keeping it around. Especially if you have a k7000 with bad burn/failing guns.

Besides, these tubes didn’t have a high density of lines per scan, so even if you RGB modded it, you might not get a better image than a Trinitron.

Exactly this ^^^

[Howard_Casto]

We plugged it in.... it's dead... so I'm not even bothering. 

[pbj]

Just a fuse

[opt2not]

Even better reason to use it as a tube swap donor.

[Howard_Casto]

Just a fuse

It might be, but how many years is it going to take for me to actually get around to working on it..... eh, if it had any signs of life I might take it on. 

[pbj]

You should put a smaller, working TV on top of it to recapture the early 90s.

[gamepimp]

You should put a smaller, working TV on top of it to recapture the early 90s.

My wife was just telling me the other day that when she was younger they used to have an old TV in a wood cabinet that died and they used it as a stand for a newer TV. They put a table cloth or something over it so that no one would know it was another TV. Apparently that must have been a common thing. LOL!

[LoraMoser]

I use a rca tube tv thats about 12 years old for most of my systems since I still want to be able to play lightgun games from the 80s & 90s. I have the other half of my systems hooked up to a commodor 1084 computer monitor that has composite hookups on the back and the picture quality on it is just as good as a hd tv, i'm not sure what year the monitor was made.

eventually I might get a hd tv to play my ps3 on since the text is small and blurry on my tube tv but i'll always keep at least 1 tube tv for my retro systems to be able to play light gun games with.

[KenToad]

I recently picked up a local giveaway 32 inch Trinitron. It's a consumer CRT, but it weighs 165 pounds and has Component and S-Video inputs. I've been playing a ton of old light gun games, mostly GunCon 1 and 2 on a PS2 because those guns are amazing and they have an amazing library of games.

Guncon 1

Time Crisis - Still a classic and the Playstation version has a second console-exclusive adventure.
Time Crisis Project Titan - This is a really fun continuation of the original
Gunfighter: The Legend of Jesse James - Ubisoft does wild west Time Crisis and it's pretty great
Elemental Gearbolt - Working Designs localization of a weird Japanese fantasy shooter with okay graphics and good music
Judge Dredd - Arcade conversion with digitized graphics similar to Area 51, but the FMV's are so bad they're good
Point Blank 1, 2, and 3 - Classic mini-games with a sense of humor. I like it, but it doesn't hold my attention for long.

Guncon 2 (Some games are also compatible with GunCon 1 on PS2)

Time Crisis 2 - This is an amazing follow-up and a classic in its own right
Time Crisis 3 - At least as good as 2, maybe even better with a really fun weapon switching system
Time Crisis: Crisis Zone - Full auto Time Crisis, only single player, but still really good
Vampire Night - Sega ridiculousness, must play
Ninja Assault - Decent playing weird game starring ninjas with wooden guns.
Gunfighter II: The Revenge of Jesse James - Upgraded wild west Time Crisis, it's fun, although there is no US version, but look online for NTSC patch if your TV doesn't support PAL.
Gunvari Collection + Time Crisis - Basically the original Playstation version of the Point Blanks and Time Crisis, but playable with GunCon 2, Japanese only, but generally with a minimal language barrier.
Virtua Cop Collection - Japan and Europe only, but the European version may not work on NTSC TV's ... Japanese version has minimal language barrier.
Dino Stalker - Weird game where you use the Guncon 2 d-pad to navigate, rather than being on rails, it's fun, but the awkward controls spoil it somewhat.

[bimm25e]

Just a fuse

It might be, but how many years is it going to take for me to actually get around to working on it..... eh, if it had any signs of life I might take it on.

You can get $100-150 for that tube, maybe even more