This thread will have to be moved to the solid state section, not sure if I can do that myself or not, couldn't see..
But anyway, I borrowed a CRT tester from my old job, it was a B&K, as for the model I don't remember. I hooked it up, and started testing.
Red gun - Very very weak.
Green gun - Very strong.
Blue gun - Meh. It's border lining of good and bad.
So, I went ahead and did what I needed too, and hoped I didn't fry the CRT. After that was done, tested again. Now, all 3 guns appeared to be holding strong. Took several attempts to get this, but it's now holding strong. Red is still not as strong as green though, but all are "in the green" now though so to speak.
Turned on the TV, now all the colors were off again, and so I had to re-calibrated the colors using a colorimeter probe. Got the RGB levels to where it needs to be, and have been sitting down watching the TV every night when I got home from work. I have been holding off posting about this for the past couple days just to be sure it is going to hold, and so far, I tested last night before returning the tester, it's still in great shape now.
And now here's what my picture looks like:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v3...n/colors-2.jpg
In this picture you wouldn't notice it, but the ceiling light was actually on. That's how bright the picture was, that the TV's bezel looks so dark as if the room light was off. I hadn't adjusted contrast and brightness yet before taking this picture.
Notice how vibrant all the colors are, without a single bit of bleeding or smearing. The color control isn't even cranked up in this picture, I set the color and tint via SMPTE color bars using a blue filter.
The focus on the CRT also seems to have improved which caught me off guard. Because I thought that was a function of the flyback, but it seems the CRT has gained focus too, as you can see in the blue sky, those are the sharpest scanlines I have ever seen on this TV.
For reference, the picture used to look like this, you can see the slight bleeding of colors on the reds.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v3...on/photo-1.jpg
Lets hope this lasts!
Side note, this old effect:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v3...n/IMG_0510.jpg
When on a completely black screen in a very dark lit room, is completely gone now. I can be in a darker than dark room with this TV on, on a black screen, and think the TV was off.