24" Widescreen CRT (FW900) From Ebay arrived,Comments.

innocenceisdeath, where is your dot on the monitor? Mine is slightly off-center :( but fortunately it's hard to notice on anything but light backgrounds, and only close up at that.

Also, I've found that when the monitor first turns on, it really looks kinda horrible, but after a half hour or so it looks gorgeous.

I had a thought....can geometry problems be fixed with the service menu/windas thing?
 
Last edited:
dusty_fox said:
innocenceisdeath, where is your dot on the monitor? Mine is slightly off-center :( but fortunately it's hard to notice on anything but light backgrounds, and only close up at that.
Click to expand...

My dot is a little below the centre. I know other people have the dot in the same position as well. It's odd.
 
Should my next monitor purchase be a sony fw900? Saw one on craigslist for 275, is that a good price? I think its a little inflated. Im pretty sure I have enough room for it cus it will kinda sit in a corner of the wall and my desk is pretty solid to support it. Im tired of shitty 1400 by 900. Either the sony or what lcd?
Also will 8800gts sli be enough for games at high res? Got an extra one just in case.
 
If it's a mint condition FW900, i'd pay 275 for it. If it isn't (it won't be, most likely), then 150$ is more in line with what i've seen. 8800GTS SLI will be enough for some games at high res, but not for others. Depends on the game and the detail settings. I'm pretty sure you'd see better performance from a 150$ GTX260 than from an 8800gts SLI setup.
 
Ok, thanks, sent the guy an email asking for pictures. Hope fully he will sell for 200 so I can buy a new 5850 or maybe a i5 setup, or should I just buy a 9550 quad right now from someone on Hardforums with my sig rig?
 
lillimon04 said:
Ok, thanks, sent the guy an email asking for pictures. Hope fully he will sell for 200 so I can buy a new 5850 or maybe a i5 setup, or should I just buy a 9550 quad right now from someone on Hardforums with my sig rig?
Click to expand...
I hope you don't live in phoenix/mesa, because I already bought the $275 one there for $200.
 
Last edited:
when i select some resolutions like 1680x1050 and 1280x800 the monitor itself still displays 2304x1400 (via the OSD), this leaves me with a small image on the screen and unable to increase it to fill the screen because i reach the limit of verticle and horizonal stretch. the ASC button does not work for this.

the only resolution that works fine is 1920x1200@80hz

anyone have any clue how i can fix this, this just started not to long ago, i have no idea what i did that changed it. i have installed the new nvidia 191 drivers and still get the problem.
 
lillimon04 said:
Haha Its fine you didnt know. Hows the picture on it though?
Click to expand...
Well coming from a TN LCD the color is amazing. Once it warms up the contrast is good and text is sharp enough to read without eyestrain @ 1920x1200. There's a tiny black dot slightly off-center (as I've mentioned above) and the left side of the screen (for about 1/2") has slight geometry problems that I can't fix, so I shrunk the image a tad and moved it over. The anti-glare coating isn't perfect either. Also, I think someone may have spilled a soft drink into the back of it at one point in its lifetime :eek:

All-in-all I think I probably paid about $25-$50 too much for it, but it works well enough. Gaming on it is a dream.

I'd still keep an eye out for fw900's if you can, but even if you can't find one of those you should still look into getting other large, high end CRT's that pop up for sale. If you want accurate color, have the desk space, and play FPS's there's really no other alternative.

(side note: My first LCD was a Dell 2405 which was pretty good but had low response time, then I used my 42" tv (Westinghouse LVM-42w2), and right before getting this monitor used an ASUS VH266H - cheap and good resolution, but colors are ugly as hell)
 
Last edited:
Thank you very much, yeah all I play is FPSs. What are other top end crts I should look for? I really want a 24" screen or bigger though. :(
 
lillimon04 said:
Thank you very much, yeah all I play is FPSs. What are other top end crts I should look for? I really want a 24" screen or bigger though. :(
Click to expand...
Well for 24" you'll have to get either an fw900 or it's HP (A7217A) equivalent. I think there's another similar Sony CRT called the w900 that is not quite as good as the fw900, somehow. Other than that handful of 24" wide monitors I think all CRT's were 4:3 instead of 16:10. Also, keep in mind that a CRT monitor like the fw900 is advertised as being 24", but the actual viewable area is around 22.5".

I don't know very much about specific high end CRT's, but NEC/Mitsubishi monitors seem to be agreed upon as the best ones out there (Viewsonic and some Sonys aren't too bad either). I think most of the time the 22" CRT's made by anyone tended to be high end ones, but I could be wrong. I'm sure there's people here that know a lot more about it than I do. One thing though, if you find one that can do 1920x1440 really well you could run it at 1920x1200 for playing games, if you want the wide aspect.

Unfortunately the fw900 is as big as they come as far as CRT monitors, as far as I know. That's one advantage LCD's have. I hope OLED monitors make it to the market soon, they're supposed to outperform even CRT's. We'll see though.
 
dusty_fox said:
Well for 24" you'll have to get either an fw900 or it's HP (A7217A) equivalent.
Click to expand...

This monitor was also sold by SGI with the model number GDM-FW9011 (I have this one). And I believe Sun Microsystems also sold them, but I do not know the model number.
 
Last edited:
My FW900 has waves running vertically up the monitor. You can really only notice in black but its still annoying. Any ideas?? thx
 
Hi.
I just got one of these awesome monitors and am looking for some help.
I cant get the monitor to display the resolutions and refresh rates in Windows 7(64-bit) that i can in Windows XP. I managed to unlock all the resolutions in XP but i was trying that many different things that im still not sure how i did it, and i havn't managed to replicate it in Win7. Although by using refresh force/lock ive managed to get the refresh rates up to max but i
havn't unlocked the max resolution 2560x1600 so it doesn't show up in game options like it does in XP.(by the way BATMAN:AA is incredible at 2560x1600 with physX) Currently in XP i can get the following, in the nvidia drivers/display settings and ingame options:
2560x1600 60hz
2304x1440 85hz
2048x1536 75hz
2048x1280 85hz
1920x1440 80hz
1920x1200 95hz
1920x1080 100hz
1680x1050 100hz
1600x1200 95hz
1600x1024 100hz
1600x1000 100hz
1600x900 120hz
1360x768 140hz
1280x1024 100hz
1280x960 100hz
1280x800 140hz
1280x768 140hz
1280x720 140hz
1152x864 120hz
1024x768 140hz
960x600 140hz
848x480 140hz
800x600 140hz
and i use the following for NV_MODES in the registry:
{*}S 640x400x8x16x32 640x480x8x16x32 720x480x8x16x32 720x576x8x16x32 800x600x8x16x32 848x480x8x16x32 960x600x8x16x32 1024x768x8x16x32 1088x612x8x16x32
1280x720x8x16x32 1280x768x8x16x32 1280x800x8x16x32=FF;1152x864x8x16x32 1600x900x8x16x32=7F;1280x960x8x16x32
1280x1024x8x16x32 1600x1000x8x16x32 1600x1024x8x16x32 1680x1050x8x16x32 1920x1080x8x16x32=3F;1600x1200x8x16x32 1920x1200x8x16x32=805F;2048x1280x8x16x32 2304x1440x8x16x32 1600x1200x8x16x32 1920x1200x8x16x32=1F;1920x1440x8x16x32=8050;2048x1536x8x16x32 1920x1440x8x16x32=F;2560x1600x8x16x32=1;

I was wondering it someone could modify the 64bit drivers from page 266 for me so that they support these reolutions as i havn't been able to do it. I think if i could get the monitor drivers to support them then i would just need to cut off the EDID pins on the lead, or rather on my DVI-VGA adapter so that the monitors built in info wouldn't ovveride the driver and they would be available.
From what ive read i believe windows 7 takes the monitor EDID as the absolute limit and ignores anything that says otherwise. Ive tried a few things in Win7 but cant make the desktop bigger than the default 2304x1440 and dont even get me started on the dodgy scaling issues. Ive managed to get round the scaling by basically duplicating every resolution as a custom resolution. If i select it as custom it displays the desktop properly instead of setting the monitor to 2304x1440 and then having the
desktop in the middle at the res ive selected and a massive black border around it as it does just selecting the res from the normal slider.
Could someone alter the Fw900 64-bit driver for me or tell me another way to get Win7 to let select all the resolutions my monitor can actually display.
Thanks
Jamie
 
Just curious about what what settings folks are using for this display. Contrast, brightness, color, etc I just want to get a rough idea. I'm currently using a standard vga cable. Is this best or should I use the other cable, if so what do you recommend?
 
The 64bit Driver pages back was Modded by myself (there was no 64bit driver before that, I modded the 32bit version).

I have not bothered to come here since the guy who sells/fixes these monitors seems to think that means his eyesight it better than everyone else and nobody can see a difference from 85HZ to 96HZ or even 100HZ.

I have already posted how to get any RES+HZ (supported by actual Monitor not saying out of range on its own Menu not the PC's Drivers) if your on a Nvidia GPU.

Works in Vista 64 and Win 7 64 but more a PIA to get working in the later.
 
Looking for some help from anyone on this thread. I've looked through 90% of the pages and still need help. I came across 2 fw900's both in non working condition. One will power on and accept a signal for what seems like 2 or 3 seconds before powering down, while having a strong green tint to image. The other powers on intermitently with the menu although will not display an input. The second one has a strong blue tint. I've gotten a rs232 cable, but havent utilized it yet as i'm in the process of recouping an old pc to display the test image some spoke of. I have a copy of the service manual and am somewhat of a novice to tv repair, but carry some minor repair work. Please advise if anyone has had any similar issues or could send me to a start point. The units were used in a cad cam scenerio so they may carry quite a bit of use, but i have no money to invest in new monitor and i'm hoping to get at least one of these up and going. Any help would be appreciated. Sorry to be long winded, wanted to get as much out as i could, hoping someone will respond. Thanks!
 
How can you get a higher resolution then 2304 x 1440, and is it possible to damage the monitor by doing so?
 
The same way you normally would.

Override (uncheck box) in Display Settings that states "Hide Modes This Monitor Cannot Support".
 
Dark Light said:
So there is no build in limiter, apart from the drivers, ATI, and Windows 7.
Click to expand...

if the monitor wont work with a certain res/refresh then the screen will just go blank and the OSD will tell you its out of range.
 
Is it possible to damage the monitor if you run it too close to the edge, or shorten its life span?
 
Sorry just got back, failed to do that RES there but it was not the Monitors OSD it was Nvidia Drivers that failed it.

I have seen peeps here run it @ 2560x2500@68HZ, possibly on XP where as I'm on Vista 64

I will later on try to override this with different settings but the box I told you to uncheck above is totally shaded out for me because I have modded settings.
 
That argument is what made me forget this site for while.

Obv running higher HZ will be more wear than a lower HZ but my argument was if its in range of the Monitors OSD lock out then Sony must feel it safe and if you wanted to argue the fact 1920x1200@85 will last longer than 1920x1200@96HZ, then run it at 1920x1200@60HZ and make it last even longer.

Some said their fonts got blurry above 85HZ, or/and said their eyes could not see any benefits.

I accept their opinion but they couldn't accept mines in that I see it nicer at the higher RES and have no issue with fonts at 96HZ.

My Desktop is 1600x1000@110HZ, I game at 1920x1200@96HZ.
 
My desktop is at 2304 x 1440 @ 80 Hz, and when I first power it on the fonts are blurry, and I game at 2304 x 1440 @ 80 Hz.
 
This monitor over other CRT I have owned (Mitsubishi's) take far too long to heat up.

Instead of being darker when cold its over bright and the screen size (adjusted size to meet bezel) is all over the place and after it heats it suddenly pops into place.

That's why I took advise from this thread and simply use a blank screen saver set at 20mins instead of letting the monitor power off all day long.
 
I think I should do that, just use a black screen saver. can someone answer my question.

Is it possible to damage, or shorten the life span of, the monitor if you run it too close to the edge?
 
Dark Light said:
I think I should do that, just use a black screen saver. can someone answer my question.

Is it possible to damage, or shorten the life span of, the monitor if you run it too close to the edge?
Click to expand...

I already did in Post # 5352 but I forget to hit the Quote option.
 
The question you might want to ask yourself first is,

is the pixel size at 1920x1200 so large that it bothers you with jaggies? So much so that it is worth nearly doubling the load on your video card? (Going from 2304000 pixels to 4096000 pixels)
 
2560 x 1600 on a 24" Monitor would be sweet... I would prefer an LCD though...

Pixel density is the only reason I got a 30" monitor, was unaware you could run an FW900 at 2560 x 1600 otherwise I probably would have kept mine.

I got a Plasma for watching movies though, and the 3007WFP-HC for Games/Video editing etc.
 
I have some fond... okay, not so fond memories of sitting in a computer lab programming away on a 22" Sony monitor back in college. Nice find.
 
So will setting a higher res significantly decrease the life span of the monitor, or can I try any res I want without it decreasing the life span a noticeable amount.
 
Dark Light said:
So will setting a higher res significantly decrease the life span of the monitor, or can I try any res I want without it decreasing the life span a noticeable amount.
Click to expand...

i dont think a higher resolution is any worse for it. its the refresh rate that affects it the most.
 
Actually, it's resolution combined with refresh rate that increases the load on the electronics. Raising either will, technically, increase load on the monitor and decrease the lifespan. However, the FW900 is designed to run hard, being a high-end professional display. I would recommend using whatever setting you prefer and enjoying it to the fullest. However, if for example, you don't notice a difference between 85 and 100 hertz, you might as well stick with 85.

For the life of the CRT (Picture tube) it will help greatly to use a lower Contrast setting. Pushing the display brighter than necessary will shorten the life of the tube.
 
Threw mine in the trash last night.

Even if it worked flawlessly i could not imagine using this monitor for daily use. LCD tech has finally surpassed the FW900.

This thread needs to die.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top