The CRT Hype Train Might Be Out of Control... - CRT vs OLED

Should you spend your hard-earned money on an HD display from 2003? CRT had some interesting final days that not a lot of people experienced or even remember and we're going to find out what your retro games look best on.

Purchases made through some store links may provide some compensation to Linus Media Group.

FOLLOW US
---------------------------------------------------

MUSIC CREDIT
---------------------------------------------------
Intro: Laszlo - Supernova

Outro: Approaching Nirvana - Sugar High

CHAPTERS
---------------------------------------------------
0:00 Intro
1:30 Why?
3:16 Infamous
6:21 Marvel vs Capcom 2
8:13 Power Stone 2
9:55 Sonic Adventure 2
12:00 FFX Remaster
13:28 Super Mario World
15:20 Ape Escape
17:05 Cross Code
18:36 Conclusion
20:11 Outro

[DundeeZhang]

dont worry Linus, i'm too poor to afford anything you recommend

[yzapre]

If we bought everything you recommended, Linus, we'd be broke.

[BaalFridge]

Gotta remember graphics designers always optimise for their current display technology, a lot of people who think old games look like crap probably just never saw them displayed on a CRT.

[EstanBulLoFre]

Fun fact about the color issues of old games: old games were intentionally colored a certain way to work with CRT's and how they naturally mute out the intensity of yellows and browns, so games were programmed with odd neon orange and yellow colors because, when run through CRT's, the colors would be washed out through the tubes and would display the desired colors. With OLED, you're seeing the compensating colors without the CRT washout and wind up with jarringly oversaturated colors that don't look good. So what Linus and co. are seeing in the OLED screen with DreamCast sprite games is the raw coloring that you were never ment to see, which would be corrected by the CRT tubes. If you don't have these intense colors, the browns and yellows would be washed out completely.

[Superradman]

The most vivid memory of a crt i have is a table collapsing because of the sheer weight of the 32 inch crt and it exploded, then we did not have a television for 13 years lmao.

[Nevermind_Im_Lost]

This is my favorite format now; staff member brings something they're passionate about, explains and shows it to Linus and they rate it as they go. It's so cool

[dieKatze]

Be VERY careful buying HDCRTs if you watch this and think "That's for me." Some of them have half second lag times. I've tested some. They are NOT all the same.

[brandonlee]

The fact that CRT still has advantages really shows how great it was. Im 22 so i haven't had much experience with CRTs. As ours was replaced in 2007 so i was only 6 so it feels like we've had flatscreens for a long time. Would love to see a modern CRT capable at 4k resolution and HDR but not sure if that is possible, would be great for retro and modern gaming, would probably have to be pretty small as we are use to our light flatscreens even though they can be pretty awkward to hold at 65inch and up. 27inch would be fine

[ProfNekko]

the one thing I remember as to why older games that were made when CRT setups were the dominant format is that sprites and models were crafted specifically to use the screen lines to "complete" the sprite. Hence why the smooth aspect from LCD and OLED screens looks much more "wrong" on older games

[Dicorays]

The overly warm/red image on the HD CRT is likely due to what the CRT community calls "Trinitron Red Push". This red push was implemented by Sony to make TV content such as skin tones "pop" on the showroom floor, at detriment to the overall accuracy of the image. Luckily this "feature" can be easily disabled to bring the display back to a balanced and accurate color profile usually by turning the AXNT setting in the service menu from 1 to 0.

[ammakko]

It almost looks like games at the time were optimized to look good on CRTs!

[Wearywastrel]

I have a 1980's console crt in my living room dedicated for my vintage systems and an OLED in the bedroom for the more current ones. It's tough to justify, but visitors always comment on how great it is to play old games as they were.

[TheNinjaCrash]

I feel like there was a missed opportunity here. One of the consoles they should've tested is an SD console made in an HD era. That would be the Wii. I would've loved to see wii games on this thing.

[NivenGe]

Another interesting note about CRTs and retro gaming is that for some consoles, such as the Sega Genesis/Megadrive, you might actually be hamstringing yourself trying to go for the best picture quality. Practically all transparency and extra color tricks rely on the signal bleed from a composite signal, of which only really works with a CRT accepting that signal. There's also another transparency trick that renders the sprite/background every other frame, taking advantage of the slight phosphor afterimage of a CRT.

[flinnja]

CRT phosphors *do* emit light when theyre "off" if they've recently been activated. its why your CRT tv glows in the dark when you turn it off, and you can draw on the screen with a torch in the dark. but the contrast is so great that when other parts of the screen are lit the dark parts are basically as good as true black

[mkII.]

These widescreen trinitrons are absolutely gorgeous blu ray monitors. I mean they rival any oled imo in terms of black levels and color clarity and resolution. I liked it so much I bought a second one of these exact tv's on craigslist. I got about 3 years of amazing gaming and movie watching out of my first one before the power supply died and the second is still in the closet. These Sony tv's use a special grid of phosphorus in order to maintain geometric clarity and color separation. They really were the best of the best of crt technology. Any Sony trinitron is worth grabbing.

[Appletank]

The issue with certain sprites on the OLED (like Wolverine) was because they were designed with the expectation that horizontal lines of color will get blended a bit due to how the electron beam works.

[JoelCreates]

I wondered if I was an idiot as I carried a free 27" tube tv into my garage yesterday

Still unsure

[sphreofpain]

I HAD THIS TELEVISION! Yall should have uploaded this video in 60fps to show off the SPLENDOR! Back in the day you had to order component cables for the original Xbox, GameCube and PS2 but once you got em hooked up you could game in Hi Definition on those consoles. People used to come over to my house all the time to game and play Guilty Gear on the PS2 and would wonder why it looked so good on my 34inch Sony Wega but not their TV 's at home all you had to do was press X and Triangle at the same time before the game loaded and it would ask you "Would you like to play in Progressive scan?" Select yes and BOOM glorious HD on all your PS2 games. Fun times.

[axemike]

Mgs 1 is a perfect example of CRT looking way different the colors (specially the codet calls) pop and look more vivid