This one is a bit of a story. If you’re here to see the pictures and the specs feel free to scroll along but I really would love to share this story with people who LOVE CRTs!
I’ve become a bit of a FACEBOOK MARKETPLACE ADDICT. It’s a real problem. I am always hunting for the next CRT even though I am clearly at maximum capacity in this wonderful house of mine. I’m at MAX with my beautiful fiancés patience and the structural stability of the room I store these tubes in. ANYHOO, I proceed to find an interesting listing for a 36 inch Trinitron VERY local to me, about 20 minutes away. ……..yeah 36 inch….. What am I thinking? The tube was one of those 90s dark grey Trinitrons (GOD TIER for RGB mods or at least that is what I was thinking to justify going to get this thing). Upon reading the listing, "FREE TO A GOOD HOME". I didn’t hesitate to send the seller a message. We arranged a pickup time, I assured her I would arrive ready to roll with my Toyota Tacoma.
SOMETHING freaked me out a bit. The picture in the listing seemed very blurry and just "off". I chose to reverse image search the TV on Google and GO FIGURE it’s an image from eBay. Against my better judgment, and my fiancés advice, I still chose to go "take a look". Worst case scenario I waste twenty minutes of my life. Best case scenario I drag another ridiculous CRT home.
OH MY GOD I am so glad I did.
Go figure, the TV was NOT AS DESCRIBED... It was BETTER.
I present to you all... the SONY KV-36HS420.
The Crème of the CROP.
An absolutely MASSIVE HD CRT.
I was at a loss for words when I walked into their front door and I was presented with this BEHEMOTH. The previous owner didn't really understand why I was so excited. Meanwhile I was practically stuttering asking, "C-can I plug it in?" We powered it up and immediately I knew this thing was healthy. Bright tube, beautiful cosmetics and somehow it even had the ORIGINAL SONY STAND. At that point I didn't care what it weighed, it was coming home with me.
I grabbed photos while we waited for the neighbor to come over and help me toss this BEAUTIFUL SPECIMEN into my Tacoma. "Toss" might be generous considering this thing weighs somewhere around TWO HUNDRED AND THIRTY FIVE POUNDS. With some teamwork, a lot of grunting and probably a few poor life decisions later, she was finally sitting safely in the bed of my truck. I used an old school bus seat to protect the screen for the ride home and headed back wondering how in the world I was going to get this monster inside.
Time to be more prepared for getting this girl into my house.
I called my uncle who agreed to assist me but he was running a bit behind. While I was waiting the radar started showing a nasty thunderstorm moving in. Perfect timing. We were going to be racing Mother Nature with a 235 pound television.
MEANWHILE...
I completely forgot I had someone on the way to pick up a free CRT from my surplus collection.
When he arrived we loaded up his car with the console style Zenith and a few other random CRTs I had sitting in the shed. We got talking and I casually mentioned, "You wanna see what I picked up today?"
His eyes got HUGE.
He immediately knew the exact Marketplace listing I was talking about.
Turns out...
HE almost went to get it.
HE also thought it was a scam because of the fake eBay picture.
I just happened to beat him to it.
I told him, "Dude... she listed the wrong TV. Wanna see the real one?"
He practically ran inside.
Little did I know a future friend of mine was standing in my living room drooling over my insane hoard of "obsolete" technology.
I gave him the grand tour of what has become my game room. He had never seen a real Sony PVM or BVM in person before. Watching someone experience RGB SCART on a Super Nintendo through a professional monitor for the first time was almost as fun as buying the TV itself. He couldn't believe how sharp it looked.
His name is Steve.
We talked CRTs for what was supposed to be a quick pickup that somehow turned into HOURS of conversation. We discovered he had actually reached out to me nearly a year earlier asking for repair advice after finding my website. Neither of us realized we lived so close to each other. He collects BIG consumer Trinitrons while I've gone completely off the deep end with broadcast monitors, PC CRTs and anything else with a vacuum tube inside it.
Before he left I told him something that has become my philosophy with this hobby.
"I'm not a flipper. I just have a problem saving CRTs."
I ended up loading him up with even MORE televisions, a couple computer monitors and even a broken Sony PVM that had been sitting in my shed waiting for someone to rescue it. I'd much rather see these things go to another collector than sit on my shelves forever.
Before pulling out of the driveway Steve looked at the giant WEGA sitting in my living room and simply said,
"When you're ready to move that thing into the game room, call me."
A few days later he was back.
Together we wrestled what can only be described as a refrigerator with a picture tube into my game room. My uncle had already helped me get it inside the house (and earned every penny of the fifty bucks I paid him after nearly dying carrying it), but Steve helped me finish the job and get it exactly where it belonged.
That one Marketplace listing completely changed my room.
The modern flatscreen TV was removed.
I purchased a modern OLED monitor for my computer desk instead, giving my gaming PC, Xbox Series X and RetroTINK-4K a proper modern display while freeing up the room for something much more interesting.
The KV-36HS420 officially became the centerpiece.
One of my old broadcast racks was converted into a rolling AV cart holding all of my favorite consoles instead of every console I own. My PVMs and BVM became display pieces that I can simply place on top of the cart whenever I want that professional monitor experience.
Then came the calibration.
Hours and hours inside the service menu.
Geometry.
Pincushion.
Corner correction.
Bow.
Learning that Sony stores completely separate geometry memories for every input and scan rate. Video 5 480p has its own adjustments. 1080i has its own. It was intimidating at first but eventually became one of my favorite things about the television. The amount of control Sony gave owners over geometry on this late generation WEGA is honestly incredible.
Finally I connected my RetroTINK 2X Pro and compared gameplay directly against my 200Hz OLED running through the RetroTINK-4K.
The result?
I couldn't feel any meaningful input lag.
That was the moment this television officially won me over.
Many people don't realize that Sony once operated a massive television manufacturing facility just outside New Stanton. For years they built Trinitron televisions and manufactured CRT picture tubes right here in my backyard. Thousands of people from this area worked there.
After getting the television home I looked over every square inch of it and there it was...WESTMORELAND COUNTY printed right on the back of the original Sony picture tube. Then the previous owner told me something that made the story even cooler.
He explained that one of his friends worked at the Sony plant and helped him purchase the television using an employee discount.
So this wasn't just another Marketplace find.
This television was built in my home county, purchased by someone with a connection to the very factory that made it, spent over twenty years living only a few miles from where it was born, and somehow ended up sitting in the game room of a guy whose biggest hobby is preserving CRTs.
I genuinely can't think of a better homecoming story than that.
The KV-27FS100 will always have a permanent place in my collection for native 240p content. My BVM-D14H5J is still my reference monitor. But this giant 36 inch WEGA has become the queen of my game room. It handles everything from YouTube to Wii U, Xbox 360 and modern HD content beautifully while still giving me that unmistakable CRT look that no flat panel has ever been able to replace.
Sometimes the best Marketplace finds aren't the ones you planned for.
Sometimes they're the listings with the wrong picture. Sometimes they introduce you to another collector who becomes a friend. And sometimes they completely change the way your game room looks forever.
Looking back...
I'm really glad I ignored that reverse image search.
Download the complete original documentation package for the Sony KV-36HS420, including the owner's manual, service manual, warranty information, installation guide, factory stand instructions, and safety literature. Everything you need to own, restore, or service one of Sony's finest HD CRT televisions is included in a single archive.
Here is the EBAY listing the seller used as the image for the Facebook marketplace listing....LOL
