CurtPalme.com Home Theater Forum

[halofan]

I found this vph-g90 for sale on e-bay. Do you think this would be a good buy?

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Sony-VPH-G90-CRT-Projector-/321075805476?pt=US_Video_Projectors&hash=item4ac19bfd24

thanks
halofan

[Zolzar]

I am not a G90 guy by any means but it looks pretty good to me. Low hours and a single owner pretty much says it all.

[Curt Palme]

Even at 2100 hours, it will need a Dallas chip for sure, and there will be green tube wear unless he had it in standby mode for most of them. Just FYI.

[Curt Palme]

Even at 2100 hours, it will need a Dallas chip for sure, and there will be green tube wear unless he had it in standby mode for most of them. Just FYI.

[HaydnG90]

Odd the seller rates the red in worse condition than the blue and green tubes. Must have been pushed really hard to show any wear after such a short run time.

[Spanky Ham]

He only has a pic of the the tubes lit up through the lens. You can't rate tubes with the lens on. Period! If you are near the location, then you might want to check it out.

Funny story. About seven years ago, I bought an XG off ebay for $900 or so. The seller showed pics of the tubes with them on. When I finally got him on the phone, the auction was almost over. I asked him to send pics with the tubes off. Unfortunately there wasn't enough time and had to take his word that the tubes were good. When I picked it up, my heart sank when I looked in the lens and saw that they were toast. Seller never responded to my emails or phone calls. Lesson learned. I have never bought another pj sight unseen again.

[Nashou66]

Only 2 rates.

Hmmm

Nashou

[halofan]

Nashou66 mentioned only 2 ratings, but the seller is just the owner, not a business.

[jbmeyer13]

At that price if the tubes are shot you could still part it out and recoup your investment. You better buy it before Nash does, cause if he gets his hands on it we'll see a new thread about a G90 blend;-)

[Spanky Ham]

[Nashou66]

[bachiano]

I contacted the seller before and he refuses to remove the lenses and take pics of the tubes.
I asked him how he evaluated the tubes.
His response was that he knows the condition of the tubes because he is the only owner :-/

So his evaluation of the tubes was done through the lenses.

[CIR Engineering]

Most likely the green tube will need to be changed unless William Phelps setup the projector originally. William really did a nice job maximizing the raster and using all possible phosphor. If that's the case you can be reasonable sure that you could work within the wear pattern. But only if William set it up originally.

The seller clearly doesn't want to give, or doesn't actually know how much wear is on the tubes. He's taking a blind guess and has revealed a definite lack of knowledge. Red is always the least worn tube unless the green and blue were changed at some point. But at only 2k hours and with an original owner the green and blue were never changed. The red tube is most likely a 9+ and the blue is most likely a 9. The green will have obvious wear and would only be usable if the wear pattern is maxed out to the sides. Blue will probably even show some visible wear on screen if you can't stay within the original wear pattern.

For $900 if you can pick it up yourself it would be worth it if you want a G90. Just plan on changing the green tube.

craigr

[km987654]

[Curt Palme]

Yup. I've seen wear at 800 hours on a G90! Minimal of course, but it was there. Ditto for other sets at 1200 hours.

I bought the reference set from Widescreen Review at the end of last summer, ditto for their DTV 1200. Insanely low hours on both sets, 560 on the G90 if I remember, but it appears that it had had a reset done, as it came with 2 sets of lightly used tubes, so they'd been replaced. The tube in the set at 560 hours was very very good, but also had wear. A hint of it.

But you know how it goes, it's the same with race cars. If you can afford to buy one, then it's assumed you can afford to maintain one. We're super lucky that way, getting the electronic equivalent of a racecar for pennies, problem is the replacement engines are still retail. Mind you, less than the Sony retail, as Sony wanted $3300 per tube back in the day.

There's a G90 in my future. and that 560 hour set of tubes is going into it. I'll put up with the hint of wear, and since it's over a large area of the screen, I won't see it anyway.

[Curt Palme]

Yup. I've seen wear at 800 hours on a G90! Minimal of course, but it was there. Ditto for other sets at 1200 hours.

I bought the reference set from Widescreen Review at the end of last summer, ditto for their DTV 1200. Insanely low hours on both sets, 560 on the G90 if I remember, but it appears that it had had a reset done, as it came with 2 sets of lightly used tubes, so they'd been replaced. The tube in the set at 560 hours was very very good, but also had wear. A hint of it.

But you know how it goes, it's the same with race cars. If you can afford to buy one, then it's assumed you can afford to maintain one. We're super lucky that way, getting the electronic equivalent of a racecar for pennies, problem is the replacement engines are still retail. Mind you, less than the Sony retail, as Sony wanted $3300 per tube back in the day.

There's a G90 in my future. and that 560 hour set of tubes is going into it. I'll put up with the hint of wear, and since it's over a large area of the screen, I won't see it anyway.

[HaydnG90]

[Curt Palme]

Just roll back the contrast some to anything less than 80, the factory default, and you'll reduce wear. By comparison, my retro Barco 808 has now 45,000 hours on the original tubes, brightness and contrast are well under 50, and save for a bit of green fungus that I really will get to one day (already did the blue 3 years ago), the set is running peachy, with no wear when I checked at 43,000 hours.

[Curt Palme]

Just roll back the contrast some to anything less than 80, the factory default, and you'll reduce wear. By comparison, my retro Barco 808 has now 45,000 hours on the original tubes, brightness and contrast are well under 50, and save for a bit of green fungus that I really will get to one day (already did the blue 3 years ago), the set is running peachy, with no wear when I checked at 43,000 hours.

[CIR Engineering]

On a G90 the tubes (especially the green) will show wear quickly, but the tube is still good to use. The phosphor will start to change color quickly, but the G90 won't care. The G90 has so much drive that it just sends a boat load of electrons at the phosphor. This makes the phosphor discolor quickly, but there is just no reason not to keep using the tube because the G90 can maintain focus even at exceptionally high contrast levels.

You just can't easily relocate the projector because you'll need to stay within the wear area otherwise the boarder will show up on screen. But if you leave the projector alone and don't move it, you can just keep using the tubes for a very long time... and this costs you nothing.

I posted this thread some months back:
https://www.curtpalme.com/forum_archived/viewtopic.php@t=32454.html

My client has 17k hours on the original tubes and his G90 still looks fantastic.



craigr

[Spanky Ham]

[bachiano]

I might go down on Saturday to take a look.
I just wish the seller removed the lenses himself and took pics of the tubes saving me the trip.
I'm not all that motivated as my G70 is looking really sweet at 1080p.

Why aren't you using your G90?

[Spanky Ham]

It is a long story. Right now I am gutting a condo and it is taking more time than I thought. Hopefully I will be done soon and then I will have a Crabb decision to make on whether to keep the G90 or go JVC.