Summary
- Finding a decent CRT TV can be challenging, as they are becoming rare and not always high-quality.
- CRTs are heavy and impractical, requiring sturdy furniture, strength, and effort to set up.
- Despite the challenges, the CRT experience remains magical for retro gaming, providing exceptional visuals.
The last CRTs were manufactured in the mid- to late-2000s, and today barely anyone uses them, but to a certain hardcore media and gaming crowd, CRTs still have many attributes that make them desirable.
The Hunt for a CRT Was Long and Hard
How easy it is to get your hands on a decent CRT TV depends a lot on where you are. I live in a part of the world where, seemingly, everyone’s already dumped their CRTs years ago. So I’ve been keeping an eye on the classifieds and casting a wide net up to three hours’ drive from where I live.
Almost every time I’ve seen a CRT TV that looks interesting, the seller is either unresponsive or they’ve already sold it and (annoyingly) never took it down. The rest of the time, the only CRTs that people are trying to offload would be no-name low-quality TVs that were unlikely to offer any sort of experience I would want.
Then, finally, I was able to find a real lead. A few messages back-and-forth, and a few days later I arrived home with this in my poor KIA Sportage’s back.
I Found Something Just a Little Bit Special
Say hello to the Sony Trinitron KV-L34MF-1. This is a 170-pound, 34-inch monster that, as far as I can tell, hails from the late 90s to the early 2000s. It’s surprisingly hard to find information about this TV, and I think it’s a model from Australia, but I could be wrong.
There’s sadly no RGB, component, or SCART to be found here, but there are two S-Video inputs, and that’s plenty for my needs. This TV also has an amazing stereo speaker system that clips to the sides of the unit. The seller told me what the original purchase price was for this set two decades ago, and, doing the math, it would be almost $3000 today! While I can’t confirm this number and have to take their word for it, I still feel like I got a great deal—I only paid $75!
Yes, I Hurt My Back
I’d definitely forgotten how heavy CRTs are, or at least I’ve never had to lift one of this size. My last CRT was a 27-inch flatscreen model, and my parents never went over 29 inches with their TVs.
Lifting it from the back of my car with the help of another person (I’m not that daft) I felt and heard a loud pop from my back. I was this close to dropping the TV, but managed to keep my composure. Either way, almost a week later, my back still hurts! I hope it was worth it.
Cleaning off the old dust and hooking it up to my PlayStation 2 to test the TV (for all I knew it no longer worked), it dawned on me just how enormous it is. It’s absolutely dominating my kitchen.
This Thing Is Just Not Practical
Getting this up the stairs took half a day, as we huffed and puffed it into my office bit by bit. I had an old TV stand that I naively thought would be up to the job of holding this beast, but setting it down on that poor stand it was clear that I was asking for trouble. So, as a temporary solution, I put the TV on two old animal airline flight cases from when we moved down to the seaside with our cats.
I’ve ordered a steel-frame desk with a sturdy wooden top that cost the same as I paid for the TV, but as of this writing it hasn’t arrived yet, and even when it does, I’ll have to wait until my back recovers before making the move!
The CRT Magic Is Still Real, Though
So far, it’s been a pretty harrowing ride, but my doubts certainly melted away when I popped in my first few retro games. Classic 8-bit and 16-bit games look phenomenal, and the same goes for my beloved PS1 and PS2 titles. I had to wait a day or two for an S-Video cable for my PlayStation 2, but it was absolutely worth the jump in clarity.
Somehow, this is only my second PlayStation 2—I sold mine far too early back in the day and missed out on some phenomenal games that (so far) haven’t been remastered or ported to other platforms. My CRT is here, and it’s here to stay. Because, quite frankly, I don’t think anyone could move it.
