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

However does anyone have an idea why the OSD keeps locking on the Artisan? I have to load WinDas and close out to unlock it. Then I unhook everything and it will randomly lock itself.
 
danny_discus said:
However does anyone have an idea why the OSD keeps locking on the Artisan? I have to load WinDas and close out to unlock it. Then I unhook everything and it will randomly lock itself.
Click to expand...

Choose Procedure from the Adjustment menu in WinDAS, and choose final setting. Click OK when it asks: "Do you set the final values?".
 
danny_discus said:
Was finally able to get everything up and running. So far so good with this one but I haven't had time to tweak anything as of yet as I've been busy playing carpenter and painter the past week. Thanks again Contrabass and a pleasure to meet you.
Click to expand...

Understood. Nice meeting you, as well.

danny_discus is a class-act everyone! He even paid me more than I was asking...


"May your guns beam brightly and your focus pots stay true!"
Old German cathode ray tube blessing
 
thoughts on the kd-30xs955? does it native scan 720p or just upscan to 1080i? native scan of 480P as well? I found more info in the sony kvhr36 then the XS955.
 
I'm afraid I can't help about that, I don't know much about TVs. :oops:

Other than that:

1°) Any news about the awesome Analogix converters ?

2°) After the electronic restoration, the software one. The FW900 I'm working on is a bit weird with resolutions, the preset resolutions/timings seem quite few and the screen likes very much to switch to 2304x1440@80hz when I ask for something else (or at least, that's what it says in the OSD). I'm wondering if the previous guy didn't mess this up as well. Could someone be kind enough to send me a save of his settings with Windas so that I have a look ? ;)
 
Strat_84 said:
I'm afraid I can't help about that, I don't know much about TVs. :oops:

Other than that:

1°) Any news about the awesome Analogix converters ?

2°) After the electronic restoration, the software one. The FW900 I'm working on is a bit weird with resolutions, the preset resolutions/timings seem quite few and the screen likes very much to switch to 2304x1440@80hz when I ask for something else (or at least, that's what it says in the OSD). I'm wondering if the previous guy didn't mess this up as well. Could someone be kind enough to send me a save of his settings with Windas so that I have a look ? ;)
Click to expand...
Here's mine from a while back: fw900calibrated.dat (14.29KB) - SendSpace.com It should be the right one, but it's been a while...
 
Well, it's finally happened, I have gone digital. Maybe my loss is someone's gain, though. What's the best way to move an old CRT on to its next life? My old monitor is a Nokia Multigraph 445xpro that happily does 1920x1440 if it gets an analog input. Do people just throw them on Craigslist? Put it in the for sale / trade section here? How do you put a price on it? I'm assuming it'll go to someone else in the NYC area, since it would be a bear and a half to ship.
 
I would try something local such as Craigslist. The cost to ship and hope that it gets to its destination in one piece does not make it worthwhile unless the other person wants it that bad.

HoppyChris said:
Well, it's finally happened, I have gone digital. Maybe my loss is someone's gain, though. What's the best way to move an old CRT on to its next life? My old monitor is a Nokia Multigraph 445xpro that happily does 1920x1440 if it gets an analog input. Do people just throw them on Craigslist? Put it in the for sale / trade section here? How do you put a price on it? I'm assuming it'll go to someone else in the NYC area, since it would be a bear and a half to ship.
Click to expand...
 
Mumble said:
thoughts on the kd-30xs955? does it native scan 720p or just upscan to 1080i? native scan of 480P as well? I found more info in the sony kvhr36 then the XS955.
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The tube itself only scans at ~33.75khz, which means 1080i or 540p. 720p is downscaled to 1080i, 480p is more complicated. It is windowboxed inside a 540p frame to maintain 1:1 pixel ratio, then H and V size are increased to eliminate underscan.

The neat thing is that there is a little bit of wiggle room, and you can actually program a custom resolution on your PC that runs at 72hz vertical and 33.75 horzontal for 21:9 movies. You can also make it a lag-free 480p set by setting big front and back porches until you have 33.75khz horizontal, then just use the XBR's service menu to get rid of underscan. But that makes 1080i/540p unusable without readjusting the service menu..
 
Nice. It would be great if they have a 10 or higher bit depth DAC, and can therefore take advantage of the newer 10 bit nvidia cards.
 
I recently pulled up a chroma subsampling test image on my FW900, and to my surprise it showed as being 4:2:2. Is that the expected result? My gut reaction is that something's wrong on the software/driver level, but it'd be good to confirm that before jumping into troubleshooting.
 
That's exactly the image I used. Both sets of numbers are visible to some degree, but 4:2:2 stands out brighter than the background while 4:4:4 is only very slightly darker than the background. Move the window to my other monitor and the roles reverse, with 4:2:2 all but blending in and 4:4:4 being substantially darker than the background.
 
I think the idea is that if you don't have 4:4:4 then the "4:4:4" text will be invisible. It's supposed to be very low color contrast. Not sure why it's reversed on your other monitor. Might be just that they have different gamma/color calibration. But if you can see both texts on both monitors, then they're both 4:4:4 as far as I understand.
 
That image probably just doesn't work well as a test on an analog display, I wouldn't expect there to be anything wrong.
It's a VGA CRT so it's accepting and displaying and RGB signal directly. Unless you have something in-between your GPU and the display that is converting to YCC and subsampling chroma, it will be full resolution.
 
spacediver said:
I think the idea is that if you don't have 4:4:4 then the "4:4:4" text will be invisible.
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That's not how I've understood it to work. From 6233638 on Doom9:

4:4:4 display - the "4:4:4" text is darker than the background, and "4:2:2" should barely be visible.
4:2:2 display - the "4:2:2" text should be brighter than the background, and the "4:4:4" text should almost blend into the background. There should be a bright border around the edge of the image.
4:2:0 display - none of the text is clearly visible (it may be faintly visible) and the center of the image should be dark, with a bright border around the edge of the screen.

The description of a 4:2:2 is a dead ringer for what I see on my FW900.

zone74 said:
That image probably just doesn't work well as a test on an analog display
Click to expand...
That had crossed my mind, which is why I asked here. If others are having the same results, then it could be that it's just some quirk of the technology. I'm not confident that's the case, though. I've heard of the image being used for plasmas and projectors, so it's not LCD-only or anything.
 
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coalfrito said:
That's not how I've understood it to work. From 6233638 on Doom9:

4:4:4 display - the "4:4:4" text is darker than the background, and "4:2:2" should barely be visible.
4:2:2 display - the "4:2:2" text should be brighter than the background, and the "4:4:4" text should almost blend into the background. There should be a bright border around the edge of the image.
4:2:0 display - none of the text is clearly visible (it may be faintly visible) and the center of the image should be dark, with a bright border around the edge of the screen.

The description of a 4:2:2 is a dead ringer for what I see on my FW900.
Click to expand...

Based on that description, I fit the 4:2:2 display. Thing is, I don't understand how having a 4:4:4 display would make the 4:2:2 barely visible. If there is no chroma subsampling going on, then color contrast should be at a maximum, since the color of neighbouring pixels are not blended together. It's been a while since I've delved into this, so I might be missing something.
 
spacediver said:
Based on that description, I fit the 4:2:2 display.
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Good to know. What graphics card are you running? I'm curious if the vendor and/or generation of card could be a factor. On a 980 Ti right now, but I vaguely remember this not being an issue way back on my old 6670. Maybe I'll dig it up and check sometime.
spacediver said:
Thing is, I don't understand how having a 4:4:4 display would make the 4:2:2 barely visible. If there is no chroma subsampling going on, then color contrast should be at a maximum, since the color of neighbouring pixels are not blended together.
Click to expand...
Here's how I think it works: the majority of the image is a checkerboard of blue and red pixels. The border is a true magenta. "4:2:2" is made with alternating horizontal lines of blue and red, and "4:4:4" is a solid shade of purple. Without any subsampling, both the checkerboard of the background and the lines in the 4:2:2 appear to the eye (if you're not looking closely) as magenta for the same reason the pure magenta border does. It's just using full pixels rather than subpixels. So the 4:2:2 blends in while the purple of the 4:4:4 stands out. Switch over to a subsampled display and something odd happens. While the subsampling leaves the horizontal lines alone (or it might make some magenta, can't quite tell), for reasons I don't understand the checkerboard of red and blue pixels is changed to a shade of purple much closer to that in the "4:4:4" text than the magenta. So now the magenta 4:2:2 (and the border of the image) stand out from the purple background. So pretty much while the actual color contrast between the red and blue pixels has been reduced like you said, the visual contrast between elements of the image is increased.
 
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coalfrito said:
Here's how I think it works: the majority of the image is a checkerboard of blue and red pixels. The border is a true magenta. "4:2:2" is made with alternating horizontal lines of blue and red, and "4:4:4" is a solid shade of purple.
Click to expand...

Kind of. The checkerboard contains full luminance red and blues. Both the 4:4:4 and the border are true magentas. The border is a brighter magenta than the 4:4:4 magenta, and neither are full luminance magentas.

Here's a zoomed in image:

sq401k.png


coalfrito said:
Switch over to a subsampled display and something odd happens. While the subsampling leaves the horizontal lines alone (or it might make some magenta, can't quite tell), for reasons I don't understand the checkerboard of red and blue pixels is changed to a shade of purple much closer to that in the "4:4:4" text than the magenta. So now the magenta 4:2:2 (and the border of the image) stand out from the purple background. So pretty much while the actual color contrast between the red and blue pixels has been reduced like you said, the visual contrast between elements of the image is increased.
Click to expand...

Ah, this makes good sense. Nice explanation, thanks :)

And yes, 4:2:2 should leave the horizontal lines in the 4:2:2 completely alone, with the exception of some pixels on the vertical borders.


coalfrito said:
Good to know. What graphics card are you running? I'm curious if the vendor and/or generation of card could be a factor. On a 980 Ti right now, but I vaguely remember this not being an issue way back on my old 6670. Maybe I'll dig it up and check sometime.
Click to expand...

I'm on a Nvidia GTX 660

I highly doubt there's any chroma subsampling going on.I think the reason that the test is failing might have something to do with increased veiling glare due to more contiguous pixels of the same color in the horizontal lines of the 4:2:2 pattern. Ideally, with no subsampling, the 4:2:2 and background patches should have identical luminances (when averaging over many pixels), but clearly the 4:2:2 is brighter. I checked with my loupe, and the red and blue phosphor strips are definitely brighter in the 4:2:2 patch. If I have time later this week, I may set up my macro equipment to image the test pattern.
 
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Hi everyone,

I'm not a regular contributor to this thread, but I've been using an FW900 for a couple years now and I plan on sticking with it probably until an affordable OLED PC monitor becomes available.

Anyway, I was wondering if using a better quality power cable and/or a power conditioner would have an effect on picture quality for this monitor?

This is the only CRT monitor I've used in more than a decade, but given that it's an analog display I'm thinking that all this things could have more of an effect than they would on a new digital display.

I understand the argument for protecting your gear with a UPS, but I'm just curious if there are any performance benefits to this.

Do you all use thicker power cables or power conditioners on your crt monitors?
 
I think I can confirm that you're right in that there's no subsampling is going on. Correct me if I'm wrong: a red/blue checkerboard of single pixels would be a solid block of color after 4:2:2 subsampling, right? I threw together a 1920x1200 image of that, and there's a distinct moire pattern when viewing it. That certainly wouldn't come from displaying a solid block of color, so unless I'm missing something it's indeed 4:4:4, and it's some other factor causing the suspiciously similar symptoms.
 
I thought that is what the original background was. And why would you expect red and blue to be averaged into black?

The Cb and Cr components of red (255,0,0) are 166, and 240. (Y' is 81)

The Cb and Cr components of blue (0,0,255) are 240 and 110 (Y' is 41)

If you subsample these two components of two adjacent red and blue pixels (assuming you take the mean), you get Cb = 203, and Cr = 175.

Converting these two pixels back into RGB (preserving the Y' for each pixel), we get:

Red pixel: (151,167,227)
Blue pixel: (104,121,180)

That's hardly black. Am I misunderstanding you?

(for all these calculations, I used the BT.601 matrices (for 0-255 RGB range and 16-240 Cb Cr, 16-235 Y) listed here

edit: just re-read your post. For some reason I thought you said it would turn into black, whereas you actually said it would turn into a single block of color. But even that's not true. Remember, the luma information is preserved for each pixel, and full intensity blue is much darker than full intensity red.
 
spacediver said:
Remember, the luma information is preserved for each pixel, and full intensity blue is much darker than full intensity red.
Click to expand...
Right. Scratch that idea, then.
spacediver said:
Converting these two pixels back into RGB (preserving the Y' for each pixel), we get:

Red pixel: (151,167,227)
Blue pixel: (104,121,180)
Click to expand...
If those are in RGB, then I'm a bit confused. How does an average of red and blue result in a color with so much green?
 
good question. I think it might be useful to think of the green as being a component of white that is desaturating the color. For example, desaturated magenta (or desaturated red, or desaturated blue) would have a green component in it, because you're "adding white". Does that make sense?
 
spacediver said:
I think it might be useful to think of the green as being a component of white that is desaturating the color. For example, desaturated magenta (or desaturated red, or desaturated blue) would have a green component in it, because you're "adding white".
Click to expand...
I get that. What I don't understand is the proportions in this case. Maybe it would be more clear to say I'm confused by how there's so little red. With it being the smallest component, aren't we left with a desaturated blue-green color? Why does the average of red and blue have a blue-green hue?
 
Yea that's a good point. I just rendered those colors and for sure, there's hardly any red (top row are original blue and red pixels, bottom row are the subsampled versions with the luma of the upper row preserved).

Perhaps I made an error. I'll write some proper code later when I have time and use the jpeg conversion matrices

347jjsy.png
 
jrodefeld said:
Hi everyone,

I'm not a regular contributor to this thread, but I've been using an FW900 for a couple years now and I plan on sticking with it probably until an affordable OLED PC monitor becomes available.

Anyway, I was wondering if using a better quality power cable and/or a power conditioner would have an effect on picture quality for this monitor?

This is the only CRT monitor I've used in more than a decade, but given that it's an analog display I'm thinking that all this things could have more of an effect than they would on a new digital display.

I understand the argument for protecting your gear with a UPS, but I'm just curious if there are any performance benefits to this.

Do you all use thicker power cables or power conditioners on your crt monitors?
Click to expand...

Not sure, I seem to remember some anecdotal reports back earlier in this (epic) thread, but I can't remember. for sure. Might be worth testing.
 
It can't hurt but I doubt this would have any effect unless you're supplied with dirty current and/or the capacitors on the G board are worn out.
 
i only spent 10s reading the previous posts about 4:2:2 vs 4:4:4 so excuse me if i'm misunderstanding the discussion

but what's going on on pc crt monitor's is not chroma subsampling. those test images are not appropriate for crt's because for crt's the electrical signal is slightly blurred due to the finite bandwidth, which means a horizontal modulation like 255,0,255,0,etc... on an actual crt monitor will result in an image that looks like 200,55,200,55,etc.... on an lcd monitor with the same luminance function/gamma

now since the luminance function is nonlinear, the end result is that the avg luminance of the screen is darker than if you have on an lcd monitor.

this doesnt apply to vertical modulations since the timing of each scanline is sufficiently separated that bandwidth doesn't matter.

so checkerboard patterns appropriate for lcds will often screw up for crt's, which respond differently to horizontal and vertical patterns
 
Great explanation flod. You were right on the money despite your 10 seconds of scanning. All this time I was wondering why the 2:2:2 patch is brighter than it should be, when in fact, the 2:2:2 patch is displayed at the "correct" luminance, and the background is darker than it should be.
 
flod said:
. those test images are not appropriate for crt's because for crt's the electrical signal is slightly blurred due to the finite bandwidth...
Click to expand...

But what if you run at a low enough resolution to allow the signal to stabilize between transitions? Something really low like 1024x768@60hz or 800x600?

EDIT: Just tried it at 800x600@60hz and 4:4:4 is very dark and visible as it's supposed to be, but 4:2:2 is also quite visible (brighter than background).

EDIT 2: By the way guys, this QuickRes utility is very handy for selecting resolutions below 1024x768, since I don't think it's easily done in Windows 10. You can even select 320x240 for standard def CRT's, assuming you've programmed it in with CRU.

Welcome to Ultimarc, the Ultimate in Arcade Controls.
 
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Dang I still want one of these monitors so bad. If anyone wants to let go of one in the TN area.... :p
 
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