Well, it’s time for another viewfinder hack! I’ve been after one of these for a while, this is from an early 1980’s era Sony Trinicon camera, and instead of the tiny ½” round CRT display, these have a 1.5″ square CRT – a Matsushita 40CB4. Luckily I managed to score
Continue readingSony HVF-2000P Viewfinder Teardown & Composite Video Hack
Here’s the CRT & it’s drive board removed from the main chassis. Nicely modular this unit, all the individual modules (radio, tape, TV), are separate. This is effectively a TV itself, all the tuner & IF section are onboard, unlike in other vintage units I’ve modified, where the tuner &
Here’s the CRT circuitry from a tossed STVG-502 Karaoke Machine, which got a good soaking in Manchester’s brilliantly wet weather before I managed to get hold of it: I didn’t do a full teardown of this unit, since it was soaking wet & smelled rather badly of sour milk, so
Here’s the other TV that was picked up from the local water point having been put of to be recycled. This one is much newer than the Thorn TV, a 10″ colour version from Ferguson. The colour CRT used is an RCA branded one, 27GDC85X. Like the other TV, this
The other day at the local canal-side waterpoint, this TV was dumped for recycling, along with another later model Colour TV. This is a 1970’s Black & White mains/battery portable made by Thorn. It’s based on a common British Radio Corporation 1590 chassis. Having received a soaking from rain, I
The old Panasonic NV-M5 has the standard for the time CRT based viewfinder assembly, which will happily take a composite video signal from an external source. This viewfinder has many more connections than I would have expected, as it has an input for the iris signal, which places a
Here’s another Sony Flat CRT TV, the FD0280. This one was apparently the last to use CRT technology, later devices were LCD based. This one certainly doesn’t feel as well made as the last one, with no metal parts at all in the frame, just moulded plastic. Being a later
Here’s an oddity from the 1980’s – a CRT-based portable TV, with a very strangely shaped tube. Sony produced many types of flat CRTs back in the 80’s, with the electron gun at 90° to the curved phosphor screen. The front panel has the display window, along with the tuning
I’ve had a couple of viewfinder CRT modules for a while, & haven’t done much with them, so I decided to make a very small B&W monitor. I ordered a small transparent ABS box when I made a large order with Farnell, that turned out to be just about the
Here’s another viewfinder CRT, removed from a 1980’s vintage VHS camera I managed to get cheap from eBay. This unit is very similar to the last one I posted about, although there are a few small differences in the control circuitry. Here’s the schematic, showing all the functional blocks of
I recently managed to score a 3″ B&W portable TV on eBay, a Panasonic TR-3000G. As these old units are now useless, thanks to the switch off of analogue TV signalling, I figured I could find a composite signal internally & drive the CRT with an external source. Here’s the
Here are the viewfinder electronics from a 1984 Hitachi VHS Movie VM-1200E Camcorder. These small CRT based displays accept composite video as input, plus 5-12v DC for power. Here is the front face of the CRT, diameter is 0.5″. Closeup view of the PCB, there are several adjustments & a