It is a cheap Bush 28" Flat screen CRT we have had for about 2 years. Bought it from Tesco when the last one blew when we were at a financial low point and in store it had the best picture for the money.
Every now and again, usually when just switched it it would whistle for a few seconds. Now though it has been switched on for about 1 hour and just started whistling. Has been doing it for over quarter of an hour, and cycling in an our. Goes from nothing to full volume very quickly, but the length of the cycle at full volume varies.
Seems to have stopped now, but there is still a lower frequency hum (still pretty high) in the background (bit like a tinitus ring/whistle but different frequency again).
Oh well, lets hope Aldi/Lidl get a decent sized TFT special on soon. I see they have a 26" coming up. But it looks pretty feature rich.
Surely finding a CRT that somebody's chucking out to be replaced by a TFT/plasma has got to be the best value? Especially since you can probably find quite a posh one for bugger all cash, which will have a decent picture and life.
50 quid for ours, does what it needs to do. Sound goes via the normal stereo, but we've done that for years. (not a home cinema setup, just a normal pair of speakers. I mention it because I notice the sound much more than the picture.)
I think ours was =A3199 when we bought it. We had a Schneider from ASDA previously. That just gave up totally with=20 no notice but was under warrenty, so I took the money back and ran.
Nobody had anything like the price of the old Schneider, so it was find=20 something suitable. Problem I find with second hand TVs even good ones=20 is, they can be fine right up until they pop, and it might last 10 years=20 or 10 days and if it goes you are screwed.
If another Aldi/Lidl one comes up they tend to be pretty good=20 picture/sound quality for the money and have a 3 year warranty.
--=20 Carl Robson Audio stream:
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Playing at home:Frank the Baptist-beg steal and borrow
I'm not running an old Panasonic like you, that I can say is still reliable, but my approx 5 month old Panasonic 1080p full-HD 42" plasma is really the bees knees. It replaced an LG that was 18 months old, and faulty, and LG kept sending out the same dumb-f*ck engineers who couldn't see a fault (they were a contracted non-LG company from York), even when I showed them it when they arrived to pick it up one time.
The fault was that very often when you had had it turned off a long time (say, over night), if you turned it on and had left it on AV1, it just froze, had to pull the plug. Also if you turned it on on the normal DTV built in freeview channel it fired up everytime - then if you flicked to AV1 it just did the same thing. I kept telling the engineers this, and they kept bringing it back saying "It's been on AV1 all day, and it's never gone wrong.....". Not to mention they damaged the edge of the built in swivelly stand and stuck some hugely sticky stuff that was insanely hard to shift on the surround... Did LG care? Nah. We even told them the, true, circumstances I was in where I was pretty much bed bound on treatment at the time - not looking for special treatment, just explaining why we were ringing so often and so keen to get it fixed. But no, nothing helped, we just gave up in the end seen as all they were willing to offer was the same repairers, who clearly had MASSIVE problems reading what THEY wrote on the job sheet when they came to pick it up....
Anyway, when I got the bad diagnosis, I thought wtf, and just bought a much, much better TV to replace it. The Panasonic picture, even displaying the output from the same freeview PVR as the LG was, is much better. To the point where people actually comment on how good the picture is unpromted. And when playing a Blu-Ray of a film (new films on BR seem to be better than older films converted to BR, presumably as they were recorded in higher quality or something?) they look really awesome, I never thought it would be that noticeable over DVDs but it really, really is :-)
So, in summary, Panasonic TVs have really good pictures, and this one came with a 5 year warranty - hoping after the LG joke I never have to use it... But surely they can't be *as* bad...? And, on from that, LG TVs have pictures that aren't as good, when displaying from the same scart connected freeview box as the Panasonic.[1] And also, the customer support is truely beyond useless, as are the people they 'hire' to 'fix' (supposedly not damage...) your TV... Also, mine was unreliable at just a few months old. I could be unlucky of course. I'd never buy an LG again, or recommend one to
*anyone* - even people I don't like. I'd only buy a Panasonic again (so far) and I'd recommend them to everyone :-)
[1]But the Panasonic does have a better screen so I guess that's to be expected, even though I suppose they're displaying the same thing, and both the same way as the Panasonic isn't using it's HD advantage, they're both just scarted, and the PVR won't output any different? Can anyone confirm/deny that?
Another vote for picking up a Panasonic widescreen CRT here.
Bought ours from a Granada ex-rental sale at least 6 years ago (we rented out car park space to them when I worked for Safeway - so got a nice discount - still cost me £300, though) - and it has been faultless since.
Great picture quality, loads of inputs (4 x SCART - a couple RGB and a couple S-Video) plus front composite and S-Video and Dolby Pro-Logic.
I've looked at Plasmas and LCDs for years now, but just can't justify replacing such a good CRT - even if I had to, I'd probably look around for a cheap or freen Panasonic CRT to replace it.
We've got a Sony CRT that was a mad price new, picked up cheap just over a year ago. My plasma is unarguably a better picture - it's a 42" and I'm not sure what size the CRT is, but pretty huge, I'd have thought 36" or so like Steve's.
TBH I've never rated any Sony stuff made in the last 10 years, the picture isn't as good as my old Panasonic CRT used to be either I don't think.
Possible fault with the flyback transformer? (I'm assuming you mean the whistle isn't coming through the speakers here).
Grappenhall TV & Video, Knutsford Road - near the Springbrook - may be able to help you out with repairs or a replacement second hand CRT. They some with a 6 month warranty (at least mine did).
Recently done an install in a new house - all HDMI throughout. Panasonic
1080p 42" plasma in one room, sony 20" LCD in another, Tesco Special (Technika?) in another, TV for the last room hadn't yet been delivered when I was there.
The Sony did not like being at the end of a slightly delayed HDMI signal, and the Technika had a better picture. The Panny though is the business. Must admit though I have a now aging LG plasma that apart from not having a large colour gamut (you get banding on graduations) and being SD (848x480) is still going strong. It'll get replaced when it's broken and not before - I don't currently have any HD sources to drive anything better and refuse to give Sky any money.
Had similar eperiences to Dan with LGs customer service too but all it takes is a few calls and faxes, with most companies the trick to good service is getting past the call centre and getting to the executive office.
Panasonic are the best of the bunch at the moment, unless a Pioneer Kuro is in your budget - that is real PQ.
Mine's a 32". Any bigger would be overkill in here.
As for picture quality - unless you're watching HD channels, you don't need the resolution of Plasma or LCD. Sky compress the signal so a massive extent on normal channels, meaning a really good quality CRT is all you need.
Keep an eye on Freecycle. I've had 2 28" CRTs off there - a Sony and a Panasonic, both perfect working order. There seems to be loads of them about as well.
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