RF Generation Message Board

Im sure this has been tossed about numerous times here, but i wanted to see some new input if anyone has any. What do you think is the best TV for gaming? From the information ive been able to gather myself, im seeing a 32 inch sony trinitron wega brought up quite a bit. I plan on buying a new one ASAP.

I'm sure arguments could be made for a few different tv's but I would vote for that trinitron wega. I use a 27" Sony Trinitron, while not the very best crt to ever come out, it is very good considering it's price and availability. Some of the high points are: that it has a flat screen, not many crt's did. It has lots of inputs, very useful if you have many consoles, you can even set it up in some ways to double up on a couple of the inputs. You can still buy replacement remotes for it. I could go on, I really like mine, I plan on buying at least one more.

Some other things to consider:

If you are mainly playing 80's or earlier games, keep in mind that most people didn't have screens larger then 25" and flat screens effectively didn't exist. Game designers made their games for this smaller rounded screen. You might actually think Atari and NES games look better on an even older TV. 27"-32" is the size I would get in addition to what I have now, but I may also get a smaller TV as well, 19" or so. The reason being that once you get up to the 32" size things like scan lines and blockyness really start to show up in old games.

All that being said the 27-32" Sony Trinitron is a great TV, it has my vote.

I've got a 42 inch LG plasma T.V. for most of my gaming and it works great. I also have a 19 inch SHARP CRT T.V. to the right of it. I have a splitter for any system that uses composite cables such as the NES, Genesis, Super Nintendo and many more. I like to keep it retro and play retro games on the CRT every once in a while just to be nostalgic. I can even play them on both T.V.'s at the same time. I've heard some people complain that it retro systems don't look right on big screen T.V.'s but when you have both a modern flat screen and a CRT running the same game at the same time I can honestly tell you it looks just fine on a big screen but it does show up slightly better on the CRT for the older systems given that it's not stretched and remains in its original aspect ratio.

I'd go with the 32 inch Sony CRT T.V. it's a large T.V. and is the definition of classic. As far as classic gaming goes the best is the Commodore monitor. It has a smaller screen but I hear the picture on those old monitors is bar none the best for classic gaming. It only has composite hookups. But good luck finding one of those. I've been looking in the wild forever for that monitor just for the purpose of playing classic games on it.

You just reminded me about this. I have two Commodore monitors. For some reason I never thought about using them on anything but the C64 and TI-99 and other old "computers". I had to go look to see if I had both the 1701 and 1702 models.....alas, they are both 1702's  ;) but I did re-realize I also have a old Zenith crt computer monitor as well, yea me!  :laugh:

Commodore monitors are amazing for consoles like the genesis where the composite output on anything else looks like crap. The genesis and NES look horrible on my Sceptre 30" LCD TV, but the genesis almost looks like it's outputting RGB on the commodore monitor. CRTs are of course preferred for classic consoles, but IMO an exception is the SMS, which looks just as good on a LCD screen as my 1702.

I'd recommend a Sony Trinitron WEGA. I have at 34" widescreen XBR and it is a really fantastic tube. Any of the late Sony high end tubes will make you happy.

I'd go with an LCD TV for everything. Older games supposedly look better on CRT TV's, but I find that not the case in my experience. I think it's mostly nostalgia talking.

it's not just nostalgia talking...the aspect ratios are different, and the resolutions of the older consoles are so small that they look really blurred and/or blocky on a big LCD. also they don't respond as fast to control inputs so you'll occasionally get some lag. i'm not sure why but a lot of my nes games actually had sprites completely disappear on LCD. also light guns just don't work on them.

Sony XBR or Sony Wega

Older games do look much better and esp if you have old games with light guns they only work on CRT.
I have a Sony  flat screen Wega love it
[img width=700 height=525]http://www.rfgeneration.com/images/collections/Ryudo/100_1584.JPG[/img]

I have a 32" Wega CRT here and it is great. I use it with my NES, Super NES, and PSone. The latter two using s-video input. The only complaint I have with any CRT is that the geometry is impossible to get perfect. I have calibrated my as best as possible, but it is not perfect. Horizontal bowing in particular is a given on any flatscreen CRT and there are no controls in the service menu to adjust it (on the non-HD versions, anyway).

This is what my setup looks like (prior to the NES/SNES acquisition)
[img width=480 height=640]http://i27.tinypic.com/730wgz.jpg[/img]

I don't think so, I've noticed that a lot of classic systems (especially Sega stuff for whatever reason) tend to have trouble with modern TVs and they've never looked as good as they do on a *good* CRT. Plus there's also the fact that you can't use light guns on an LCD. It is definitely not nostalgia in my case, they just simply look far better on a CRT, especially something fantastic like a Commodore monitor or Sony PVM (which is what I use).

I run everything on a Sony 26" LCD.  It gets the job done, but I'd like to get a nice Sony CRT one day to play NES and SNES games on.

Sega ran the Master System, Genesis, and Saturn at higher resolutions than NTSC standards. Thats the reason they look sharp on CRT T.V.'s. Ive never really had an issue with those looking degraded on the LCD or Plasma T.v.'s. It really depends on the brand of modern T.V.'s as to how well the older consoles play on screen.

This is an odd suggestion. All of the systems have a maximum vertical resolution of 240 lines, outputting essentially a 240p image. The saturn is the only one you list which had the possibility of 480i output (standard NTSC).

Ive just heard several people that have tried to directly record to T.V. tuners for recording purposes say they have had problems with those systems. I'm not 100% sure why but I've heard people suggests it may have something to do with the resolutions being slightly different. There has to be something slightly different in the way some of those Sega systems output the signal. Never researched it myself but just heard several people say that may be the problem.

Technically, yes, the 240p signal is not truly to NTSC specifications, as it redraws over the same horizontal line repeatedly instead of alternating. All of the old consoles use this method. There are devices (TV or otherwise) that are not compatible.

I like to watch Youtube gaming stuff a lot. I just hear it's a common complaint that recording the Sega consoles prior to the Dreamcast don't work on most T.V. tuners when recording. Any other console seems to work fine, I just remember someone saying the way they output the signals is slightly different. I never got too technical into it.

I use different forms of display for different types of classic gaming:

For ultra-classic gaming (Odyssey, Atari) I have a 40" Zenith CRT. 

I play all of my NES, Genesis, and most of my SNES games on my NEC NP40 projector.  For me this completely fulfills the "gaming in a theater" fantasy introduced to me by the Wizard. 

Sprite-based RPGs on the SNES I play on either a Gateway LCD (great colors and a strong processor) a 24" JVC CRT (really just for Final Fantasy 2 and 3).

I've got an old ALBA 28" 4:3 CRT TV - I do think older games look better with softer picture quality but the main reason I've got it is for light gun games.