At the time, it was pretty far outside my comfort zone and I had a looming deadline (dad's birthday). Writing the software to work "as I intended" turned out to be much harder than I'd expected, so I ended up hacking things and making single 8-hour long video for each channel (with some persistence, so on next boot it'd continue from where it was)
On the positive side, Dad loved it, and keeping the tuner (the channel dial) with some high resistance made the TV feel as if it was truly an original TV.
Unexpectedly, everybody loved the ads that I added! I think my family mostly felt nostalgic about them
The Sony, in particular, would make an amazing terminal screen.
Trouble is, it is becoming harder and harder to find repair manuals for these.
If anyone knows of a community where these kinds of repairs are executed successfully, I'd love to hear about them. I've kept these things on my shelf for decades now, and I remain committed to their restoration. I'm pretty sure the tubes are still viable .. but maybe the capacitors aren't.
Chatgpt (especially deep research) is pretty good about digging up stuff like this
Guess I’m gonna go to a local service place with this PDF and the TV and see what they can do. I’m filled with anticipation for the day that I can boot up a terminal on Sony’s first TV and include it in one of my exhibits.
I do retro computing exhibits, in case you were wondering why I have all this junk… ;)
There is something so magical about those early products.
Not inaccessible in a modern “can’t de-cap that chip without killing the machine” kind of a way, but more of a “so many bespoke parts which are just not replaceable any more, unless you wanna Frankenstein the thing with 3D printed parts .. eventually ..”
I’ve since been directed towards the manuals I might need, by other HN’ers, so I’m going to have a renewed attempt at getting this old Sony and the Red/Black TV up and running. I do retro computing exhibits in my region (Vienna, Austria) so if I do end up getting these TV’s working again, they’ll be featured for sure. Recent efforts on my part have introduced over 40,000 people to retro computing platforms at a local museum, so it’ll be really fun for me to introduce the Sony TV, which is delightful bit of technological history, to the exhibit manifest.
When I think of all the folks with great stuff in the attic, potentially being lost to the landfill, it just motivates me harder to get all my own junk in good shape that will make sense for someone to maintain for decades after I’m gone ..
I also see Polish forums when looking for TV stuff but I don't have a specific suggestion for that corner of the web.
Just touching the insides can kill you worst case and that can be days or longer after it was switched off. Sometimes the chassis itself is live.
This is not like fiddling inside a computer where you tend to be pretty safe.
So if you value your life, sure play with old televisions - without opening them.
My worst shock was from an old tube shortwave receiver when reaching over it and learning that the antenna lead was hot by touching it.
Somehow I got my hands on a semi-functional CRT oscilloscope and of course took it apart. Within minutes of the initial disassembly, I accidentally discharged a large capacitor through my body. I still remember the blinding pain and passing out from literal shock. I'm lucky to be alive today. I gained a healthy fear of electricity that day.
Through the many years that followed I continued my trajectory in electronics, eventually designing and fabbing my own analog and digital circuits. Today I continue to be extremely careful whenever dealing with power circuitry. Always proceed with caution!
> @FozzTexx hasn’t posted When they do, their posts will show up here.
A young person about 10 years old came over "What's that thing hanging off the back of your TV?"
I got some nice parts out of that TV, and cracking the vacuum seal on the CRT was just so satisfying.
I've totally felt this before! As a teenager we were offered an old CRT for free if we would pick it up. We spent several days trying to fix it but ended up breaking it much worse than it already was, to the point where my friend's dad (who was a programmer but also did a lot of electronics repair) basically told us to take it to the dump. We did, but not until we took it deep into the mountains and shot the vacuum tube with a .22 long rifle :-D (we did get our asses reamed because we didn't know there was mercury in there, but even after that the consensus was still "it was worth it" though we never had the guts to tell parents that). We did at least have the foresight to put it on a big drop cloth so cleanup was pretty easy, though I later became mortified at our recklessness. The only thing better than shooting that was being able to shoot an old church bell that somebody dumped in the woods.
It's on my back-burner list to make a portable projector that does this.
For a purely-online version, check out: https://exptv.org/ (warning: sometimes has nudity and stuff)
