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Retro 5″ Black and White TV as a computer monitor – A tale of pointlessness

blog.uchujin.co.uk

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Re: Retro 5″ Black and White TV as a computer monitor – A tale of pointlessness

#11

Post by somethingnot »

deadwing0 wrote: post #4
cm2187 wrote: post #3

Also a good way to damage your eye sight given the low refresh rate. One thing I don't miss from CRT monitors from the 90s.

How does a low refresh rate damage eyes? Got a link? Legit question, not looking for an argument.

Not necessarily lasting physical damage, but flickering CRTs, or for that matter flickering fluorescent or LED lights can cause headaches, nausea, ...

I've certainly noticed it myself, using 75 Hz CRTs made me feel tired after a few hours, unlike 85 Hz.

> In 1989, my colleagues and I compared fluorescent lighting that flickered 100 times a second with lights that appeared the same but didn’t flicker. We found that office workers were half as likely on average to experience headaches under the non-flickering lights.

https://www1.essex.ac.uk/psychology/overlays/1989-82.pdf

Re: Retro 5″ Black and White TV as a computer monitor – A tale of pointlessness

#12

Post by ahje »

katzgrau wrote: post #9

At about the age of 14 I somehow came into ownership of 5" black and white TV. I wasn't allowed to have a TV in my bedroom, but this thing probably looked useless to my parents so they didn't say anything. Little did they know, while they were at work, I went up into the attic and ran a coaxial cable from a splitter down into my room and into the back of the VCR, all neatly tucked behind my desk. I spliced an old mon…

He will. Kids try to find loop-holes in every single rule, and they will deliberately misinterpret everything you say in order to use it against you later on. :)

Re: Retro 5″ Black and White TV as a computer monitor – A tale of pointlessness

#13

Post by dillonmckay »

katzgrau wrote: post #9

At about the age of 14 I somehow came into ownership of 5" black and white TV. I wasn't allowed to have a TV in my bedroom, but this thing probably looked useless to my parents so they didn't say anything. Little did they know, while they were at work, I went up into the attic and ran a coaxial cable from a splitter down into my room and into the back of the VCR, all neatly tucked behind my desk. I spliced an old mon…

Ha.

I did something similar, also to watch late night comedy.

However, I used two 300 to 75 ohm converters and speaker cable to connect with a splitter to the TV.

I remember proving my father and RadioShack salesman wrong about the proper adapter needed to go from 3.5mm mono to the female coax connector.

I recently bought two 5” black and white portable TVs at a flea market for $5 total.

One of them does have a video input.

Re: Retro 5″ Black and White TV as a computer monitor – A tale of pointlessness

#15

Post by simias »

whenchamenia wrote: post #7

I still use a CRT. Works great, no fuss. Its just heavy to move, which I don't do often. People comment on how rich the colors are. 85hz refresh solves the 'flicker' issue.

I reluctantly discarded my last CRT a few years ago. They're not just heavy to move, they also take a lot of room on my desk and they generate a lot of heat.

For a long time LCDs really couldn't compete with CRTs. They had bad resolutions, terrible viewing angles and terrible colors (and especially horrendous blacks).

Resolution is (finally) no longer an issue, colors and viewing angles are still meh but steadily improving. Hopefully we'll get OLED or something similar in the near future that will solve that once and for all. I decided that it was good enough to finally make the switch definitively.

Re: Retro 5″ Black and White TV as a computer monitor – A tale of pointlessness

#17

Post by benj111 »

ahje wrote: post #12
katzgrau wrote: post #9

At about the age of 14 I somehow came into ownership of 5" black and white TV. I wasn't allowed to have a TV in my bedroom, but this thing probably looked useless to my parents so they didn't say anything. Little did they know, while they were at work, I went up into the attic and ran a coaxial cable from a splitter down into my room and into the back of the VCR, all neatly tucked behind my desk. I spliced an old mon…

He will. Kids try to find loop-holes in every single rule, and they will deliberately misinterpret everything you say in order to use it against you later on. :)

I don't know why you've added a smiley, my 2 year old is already displaying the trait grr :(

Re: Retro 5″ Black and White TV as a computer monitor – A tale of pointlessness

#18

Post by madengr »

katzgrau wrote: post #9

At about the age of 14 I somehow came into ownership of 5" black and white TV. I wasn't allowed to have a TV in my bedroom, but this thing probably looked useless to my parents so they didn't say anything. Little did they know, while they were at work, I went up into the attic and ran a coaxial cable from a splitter down into my room and into the back of the VCR, all neatly tucked behind my desk. I spliced an old mon…

In the DC area in the 80’s, there was a system called Super TV that broadcast adult entertainment at ~900 MHz. I believe they removed the vertical sync, in addition to requiring a UHF dish and tuner.

Anyway, as a kid, I found you could take an old B&W set with the fine tuning knob, and set it between channel 87 & 88, then manually get a few seconds of restored sync by twiddling the fine tuning.

Used that same TV on my C64, and few years later, the same TV could be used to eavesdrop on AMPS cell phones. Versatile devices.

Re: Retro 5″ Black and White TV as a computer monitor – A tale of pointlessness

#19

Post by ahje »

benj111 wrote: post #17
ahje wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He will. Kids try to find loop-holes in every single rule, and they will deliberately misinterpret everything you say in order to use it against you later on. :)

I don't know why you've added a smiley, my 2 year old is already displaying the trait grr :(

Simply because I can afford the luxury of looking back at it in the rear-view mirror. :)

Re: Retro 5″ Black and White TV as a computer monitor – A tale of pointlessness

#20

Post by StavrosK »

katzgrau wrote: post #9

At about the age of 14 I somehow came into ownership of 5" black and white TV. I wasn't allowed to have a TV in my bedroom, but this thing probably looked useless to my parents so they didn't say anything. Little did they know, while they were at work, I went up into the attic and ran a coaxial cable from a splitter down into my room and into the back of the VCR, all neatly tucked behind my desk. I spliced an old mon…

And that was back when you couldn't type "antenna to rca" into Google and get all the information you could ever want.
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