Why do you like old tv sets?

[Sandy G]

I was born & raised in NE Tennessee....This area was pretty destitute..We're talking LBJ/Great Society here.A color set represented what we thought folks in the "real" America had.

[Kevin Kuehn]

Sandy is back. Yeah

[dieseljeep]

Originally Posted by Sandy G

I was born & raised in NE Tennessee....This area was pretty destitute..We're talking LBJ/Great Society here.A color set represented what we thought folks in the "real" America had.

Welcome back!
Glad to see everything is back to normal.

[Electronic M]

Originally Posted by Sandy G

I was born & raised in NE Tennessee....This area was pretty destitute..We're talking LBJ/Great Society here.A color set represented what we thought folks in the "real" America had.

Good to hear from you again! Welcome Back Kotter.

[baursam]

Sandy it's great to see you again 😀

[Bill Cahill]

My love of old TV's started when I was 7 years old. One of the times my mother had the RCA Victor man out for repairs on warranty I sneaked around the back of the set. It was a thrill to see all those orange light bulbs in action. It was just too neat. Today, even seeing the face of the picture tube light up for the first time in many years. The thrill is still there.
Bill Cahill

[Jeffhs]

Originally Posted by Bill Cahill

My love of old TV's started when I was 7 years old. One of the times my mother had the RCA Victor man out for repairs on warranty I sneaked around the back of the set. It was a thrill to see all those orange light bulbs in action. It was just too neat. Today, even seeing the face of the picture tube light up for the first time in many years. The thrill is still there.
Bill Cahill

My dad was an electrical engineer, so I grew up around the technology of the 1960s-'70s including, you guessed it, old TVs. At one time I had half our basement full of old TVs, from every major TV manufacturer of the time except Magnavox. My pride and joy was a 1963 VHF-only Zenith 23" b&w console I rescued in 1969 from a trash pile, with a little help from an old friend (that set was in a heavy walnut cabinet and weighed the proverbial ton, so I couldn't possibly have lugged it down to the basement myself). The set was missing every tube except the CRT and HV rectifier, but when I turned the set on for the first time after installing the last new tube and got a picture from a local Cleveland TV station (I grew up in a Cleveland suburb some 30 miles from the stations' towers), I was thrilled. That great picture (my console Zenith TV had 3 video IF stages) was also what got me interested in Zenith TVs, radios and such.

I was very disappointed when I read decades later of Zenith's demise, but that's material for another thread. I still have a small collection of Zenith radios from the early '50s to 1981, all but two working quite well.

[Popester]

This is a great thread. Our first color set was a Penncrest (J. C. Penny's) tube set made by Panasonic. What a thrill having a color tv was. Not only were sets back then great, but tv shows were funny and wholesome. I watch very little new stuff and find I watch ME tv or Antenna tv mostly now. I love nostalgia. I worked at a tv sales and service shop from age 16 until like was 26. That was back in 1975. We sold and serviced RCA, Zenith, and Sony. We were a factory authorized service provider back then. I just love the style products back then had. Sony's were at their hey day in late '70's up till about '85. I spent a lot of money on Sony electronics. I liked Zenith slightly better than RCA, but now it's sad America has no manufacturer of tv anymore, except in name. I have a RCA roundie CTC 9 chassis, a Sony 5-303W, a Sony KV4000, and a Zenith radio console from 1946. I'm so glad to have a few pieces to remind me how great tv products of yesteryear were. It's great reading everyone's comments. By the way I'm now 58. lol

[tubetwister]

Originally Posted by Popester

This is a great thread. Our first color set was a Penncrest (J. C. Penny's) tube set made by Panasonic. What a thrill having a color tv was. Not only were sets back then great, but tv shows were funny and wholesome. I watch very little new stuff and find I watch ME tv or Antenna tv mostly now. I love nostalgia. I worked at a tv sales and service shop from age 16 until like was 26. That was back in 1975. We sold and serviced RCA, Zenith, and Sony. We were a factory authorized service provider back then. I just love the style products back then had. Sony's were at their hey day in late '70's up till about '85. I spent a lot of money on Sony electronics. I liked Zenith slightly better than RCA, but now it's sad America has no manufacturer of tv anymore, except in name. I have a RCA roundie CTC 9 chassis, a Sony 5-303W, a Sony KV4000, and a Zenith radio console from 1946. I'm so glad to have a few pieces to remind me how great tv products of yesteryear were. It's great reading everyone's comments. By the way I'm now 58. lol

~65 here

Aye , We can allow an argument that Hays code film / NAB programming mid century wholesome TV in most ways outside of ethnic and cultural diversity was better for society somehow but everything else changed around it too and not necessarily for the common good in either case but that was the usual and now absurd alt left that brought that change .

There is too much gratuitous violence and vulgarity on TV and film without making the production really any better now ,

Hollywood ,the alphabet TV networks and the blue coasts are wholly detached from America and have no regard for same or Americans .

Sony XBR CRT was "THE CRT TV "to have writ large until they all quit making them .

My last new CRT was a decent NIB 2003 Sony Wega XBR FD HD ready 36" flat tube boat anchor and followed by a ~spendy NIB 2005 1080p Sony 55" SXRD High-Definition 1080p slim table top rear-projection TV that wasn't bad at all if the prohibitive cost light engine didn't blow up like most of them .


I have a legendary ~2014 Samsung PN64f8500 1080p plasma in one room and a decent 2015 Sony UN 55X850C 4K HDR Triluminos LED/LCD TV in the family cinema that was in here both from Best buy NIB .

In here on the wall is my NIB superlative new 3.5 X brighter 2016 4K 55 KS 8000 and a KS9000 Samsung 4K HDR 1000 QDOT Samsung FA01 panel code binned TV.like mine is still one of the brightest ,blackest ,wide color and best HDR LED/ LCD TV you can get like a Sony X930E and the flagship Sony 9ZD and Q9 Samsung .

2017 Sony X930E ,9ZD and this 2016 Samsung KS8000/or a KS 9000 and 2017 Samsung Q9 are still the brightest TV in 2017 and with Sony and LG OLED as good as it gets for retail TV's ,

[Bill Cahill]

Originally Posted by Jeffhs

My dad was an electrical engineer, so I grew up around the technology of the 1960s-'70s including, you guessed it, old TVs. At one time I had half our basement full of old TVs, from every major TV manufacturer of the time except Magnavox. My pride and joy was a 1963 VHF-only Zenith 23" b&w console I rescued in 1969 from a trash pile, with a little help from an old friend (that set was in a heavy walnut cabinet and weighed the proverbial ton, so I couldn't possibly have lugged it down to the basement myself). The set was missing every tube except the CRT and HV rectifier, but when I turned the set on for the first time after installing the last new tube and got a picture from a local Cleveland TV station (I grew up in a Cleveland suburb some 30 miles from the stations' towers), I was thrilled. That great picture (my console Zenith TV had 3 video IF stages) was also what got me interested in Zenith TVs, radios and such.

I was very disappointed when I read decades later of Zenith's demise, but that's material for another thread. I still have a small collection of Zenith radios from the early '50s to 1981, all but two working quite well.

All through the years it was RCA. Well, I've learned some rotten things about that company, especially with "The General" running the place, but, I stll have a warm spot for them.

[Bill Cahill]

That has grown to when I re build one of my new find Junker wind up machines, and, it starts playing again, the thrill's still there.

[DianaWelch]

Originally Posted by Bill Cahill

That has grown to when I re build one of my new find Junker wind up machines, and, it starts playing again, the thrill's still there.

Is your forum already working? I just check awhile ago and it is not working.