best tv to use

moonlighting

what tvs do you guys use for retro gaming.
at the moment i have a few old crt tvs,
some dont work 100% as they should and the other one
the remote is missing, all i can use is av.
am i missing out by not having a flatscreen.
was thinking of getting a 32" lg flatscreen lcd.

Retr0gamer

You'd be missing out if you did use a flat screen. Retro games consoles are designed for use of CRTs. They'll look terrible on an LCD. The colours will be all washed out and without the natural anti aliasing and scan lines of a CRT it will look blocky and ugly. If you really must get a flatscreen then get a plasma screen but again the scan lines will be missing.

Also if you aren't outputting your consoles in RGB scart then you are missing out big time on a huge jump in visual quality.

Myrddin

A 28" 4:3 (non widescreen) CRT is the sweet spot for everything up to 32bit (N64/Jag included however).

PS2 onwards, lcd begins to show its worth.

Retr0gamer

I've actually noticed LCD lag playing NES games and it can be annoying especially when you are trying to time jumps and recently trying to hop up walls in ninja gaiden which is nigh on impossible.

What's your view on widescreen TVs that let you resize to 4:3 Enternow? I had a great philips 32 inch that resized to 4:3 and I saw no reduction in visual quality.

moonlighting

must fix up the old tvs then if thats the case

Myrddin

Retr0gamer wrote: »

What's your view on widescreen TVs that let you resize to 4:3 Enternow? I had a great philips 32 inch that resized to 4:3 and I saw no reduction in visual quality.

Quality wise I've found them as good as any crt, its just I find the sidebars distracting when the screen is resized. You can also expand the image to fill the screen, but you then lose some of the top and bottom.

4:3 seems like the perfect compromise provided the space is there, as nobody uses them for tv these days surely?

80s Synth Pop

A standard Sony Trinitron in normal 4:3 is generally seen as the best. (if you are a game nerd... they take RGB inputs and also support colour NTSC over the standard Yellow White Red RCA inputs too.. just in case you ever get a USA NES). It will let you use light guns too.

Next option is to get the Super Scaler and SLG3000 kit to allow you run your (RGB only) consoles on your big flat screen. Down side is that your consoles must output in the RGB signal but that's not a bad thing as RGB is the best quality signal you are going to get out of those old consoles anyway - just that not all consoles support RGB (like NES). No light gun game support though.

If there is any lag on your flat sceen TV, check the manual to see if there is an option for "game mode" that turns off all picture processing and cuts out the lag.

CiDeRmAn

Retr0gamer wrote: »

I've actually noticed LCD lag playing someone else's NES games and it can be annoying especially when you are trying to time jumps and recently trying to hop up walls in ninja gaiden which is nigh on impossible.

What's your view on widescreen TVs that let you resize to 4:3 Enternow? I had a great philips 32 inch that resized to 4:3 and I saw no reduction in visual quality.

Fixed it for ya!


And the Sony Trinitron 29", 4:8 ratio is the best I've used so far, there was one going for something like 30 euro in the Balbriggan Mkt there a couple of weeks ago.
At this stage the best range of CRT tvs is likely to be in the recycle centre, no joking, those things just don't break down, unless dropped, and I'd say they all still work just fine and will continue to do so long after the LCD/Plasma that replaced them packs it in.

Myrddin

CiDeRmAn wrote: »

Fixed it for ya!


And the Sony Trinitron 29", 4:8 ratio is the best I've used so far

Must be one strange lookin' picture dude

CiDeRmAn

For shame on me, a mere slip of the finger (wa-hey!), 4:3 of course.

I keep the 4:8 around in case my mates from the 5th Dimension turn up for a games night!
Oddly enough they only arrive when I have the house to myself and am completely stoned, hmm, go figure......

Retr0gamer

EnterNow wrote: »

Quality wise I've found them as good as any crt, its just I find the sidebars distracting when the screen is resized. You can also expand the image to fill the screen, but you then lose some of the top and bottom.

4:3 seems like the perfect compromise provided the space is there, as nobody uses them for tv these days surely?

Well I can live with the side bars. I kind of like having widescreen since some Sega Saturn games support it and then into the PS2 era a lot of those games support widescreen which looks great.

Myrddin

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Well I can live with the side bars. I kind of like having widescreen since some Sega Saturn games support it and then into the PS2 era a lot of those games support widescreen which looks great.

True, but your getting away from CRT once you hit the PS2 I find. The Saturn one is true though. All in all its best to have a 28" 4:3 CRT AND a 16:9 lcd...but thats an ideal situation really. For everyday situations where space is a concern, I'd say go with Retr0's idea of a 32" CRT, this way you'll get the benefit of both, with a tiny compromise (the borders).

Havn't shown this in a while, but here's my own setup (I had the 29" Sony CRT mentioned above, but it simply was too big/heavy for me. So back to a quaint 21" but its a nice little RGB model & does the job)

moonlighting

thats a nice clean setup you get there
decided to hold on the old crts. was looking forward to getting a new tv but i cant really justify the cost of a new tv for now as i mostly play everything built before ps1.