Main > Monitor/Video Forum
HDMI to Old CRT
buttersoft:
--- Quote from: Zebidee on September 10, 2023, 09:03:42 pm ---Not wanting to disagree with Butters, but I've found that some later model sunset-era (~ late 1990s or 2000+) CRT TVs use large 64-pin jungles with no RGB inputs, and the OSD (on-screen display) functions fully integrated.
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Yeah, that's a point. I have encountered a TV like that, but only one. That said, i'm poor so i have to live in Tasmania, and maybe fewer of those fancy TV's were imported from Victoria ;)
Zebidee:
--- Quote from: buttersoft on September 11, 2023, 01:35:49 am ---Yeah, that's a point. I have encountered a TV like that, but only one. That said, i'm poor so i have to live in Tasmania, and maybe fewer of those fancy TV's were imported from Victoria ;)
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May have mostly been for the Asian or developing country market, where the CRT sunset phase lasted a little longer. Most notably the "China TV" chassis and I've also seen similar PCB layouts in other local brands like Toshiba, TCL, Samsung TVs. I've see them a lot in Phillipines, Malaysia, Thailand, Laos, Indonesia, India... to name a few. Often flat screens, but not always.
I can imagine, not many managed to get to Tassie.
Haven't been to all those places on a CRT tour, some I guess, but I have watched an awful lot of repair YT videos for these in Tagalog, Bahasa, Hindi, Thai etc. I do speak Thai/Lao of course, but for the other languages is a lot of guesswork. Tagalog & Bahasa are not too hard to guess at. Almost nothing in English, and when it is the accent is usually so bad I prefer the Tagalog. Fortunately electronics is all the same language, lots of diagrams, pictures and pointing at things helps.
These all-in-one jungles were used in name-brand TVs originally, think Toshiba is the main IC manufacturer but used in sunset Sony, Samsung etc too. From what I've seen.
Anyway, by rolling the OSD (and maybe some other functions) into the one jungle they saved a few dollars. It is essentially a little CPU and the BIOS is stored on a smaller EEPROM chip nearby. You can even re-program the BIOS if you want (I hacked mine to float "GREENANTZ" across the screen instead of the TV brand name) and the service mode is very useful. The chassis's are relatively simple. I think it all came down to reducing costs. In the case of the "China TV" chassis, they are often used with donor tubes to save costs even more. Where do you think all our electronic recycling was going when were shipping it all to China for decades? You can still buy back "new" CRT TVs with a truly new "China TV" chassis and a refurbished tube on Alibaba.com. If you're really lucky the tube might have originally come from your Grandad's old TV.
Anyways, all a bit off-topic, @Abstract's early 1990's Sony appears to have RGB injection via OSD available.
abstract3000:
Thanks Zebidee for all that info, If nothing else it gives me a Place to Start and a couple individuals who might be able to assist along the way. I did however notice the Service doc you posted I don't think applies to my TV, I have a 27R-S100 & that manual covers a 25R-S100 ? (maybe they are the same...) I will have to disconnect and dust the PCB off an take a look. I did however see a couple YT videos describing the theory in graphical representation that helped a bit, but we will see How it goes. I tried searching to see if there were any modders providing the service that I could pack the PCB up and ship it too, but that appeared to be a no go, maybe not searching hard enough.
In the meantime from a few different threads from the last couple years I saw and no response from my email, it appears the Jrok adapters are no longer being made. I found what appears to be similar to a clone in Australia https://www.converters.tv/cga_to_pal/RGB-to-Video-Converter/68.html
If it is, and I can get my hands on it then I could simply use it in conjunction with an Asus AMD Radeon HD 6450 (VGA -> Converter Board -> S-Video), So I will see if that option is available. If it turns out to be another dead end, I will go with my original plan for the meantime with the HD 4890. I will continue to pursue the CRT Mod option so any GPU with a VGA will give me the ability as it would make the CRT Future proof as well and overall better option as finding a 27" Wells Gardner would be slim to none in my neck of the woods. Though if for any reason I can't get the CRT mod done, I'm not going to just let the Cabinet sit around with nothing in it for another 10 years, I need some sort of usability out of it, and even if it isn't the best looking, I never complained or saw anything that bugged me previously when it was set up that way.
abstract3000:
Ok so change of plans... I reached out to an old Friend who I haven't spoke to in years, who used to be a coin op back in the 80's and owned an Electronics Repair shop before retiring, I asked him if he knew anything about modding CRT, he had in fact done it and was able to pull the schematics for my Model and stated he would be willing to do the work. So in the meantime I will be having the TV RGB Modded, but was curious most people are wiring into a SCART plug, (I'm in the U.S, not sure if you are aware but that type of connector simply is non existent here) there is also the female terminals we are used to seeing, what would be the better option for overall compatibility going into the future? I guess his thoughts after speaking more to him was to add a CGA D9 plug apparently this is what Most arcade Monitors have
Zebidee:
There can't be much difference between schematics for the 25" and 27" models, and definitely the same jungle. Even when you have the schematic there, you need to look over the TV chassis itself because there are often manufacturing differences.
Glad you've found a local friend to help with the RGB mod.
That converter you linked looks interesting - note that you'd need to provide a power supply ~12v. An old power brick should do the job, or a standard arcade DC power supply. You can solder/connect the supplied cable+plug to it. Seems well suited for use in an arcade cab.
SCART is the RGB standard input for CRT TVs in Europe, that's why many people use that connection. However, there is no need for you to copy. I (and many others) prefer to use a VGA D15 for RGB. That way you can use a plain old VGA cable to connect with your computer. The connector is also more secure, I've always found the SCART clunky. The VGA jacks are both cheaper and smaller, and easy to screw onto the back/side of a TV case.
I like the HD6450 cards - I have about five or six, couple of different brands but very similar. CRT_emulator installation is very straightforward. I was also able to use ATOM-15 on all of them to mod their video BIOS so that they are 15khz from boot. So, for example, you can access the computer BIOS and boot options using your TV.