I miss vision pro monitor's....

NoahsArcade

New member
Joined
Sep 4, 2007
Messages
490
Reaction score
2
Location
Edwardsville, Illinois
Why did happ have to stop carrying the 19" vision pro's? I hate LCDS! I just hate em! The look and feel retarded!

Back in the day I was able to get those things for 140 shipped. Great price and product!

Another project with another stupid looking LCD.

Just felt like venting!
 
Too expensive/hard to get

CRTs (no longer being used much for PCs or Televisions) are now more of a specialty item. There are many fewer manufacturers than there were years ago. That makes them expensive, and (for the operators that Happ mostly serves) too expensive.

In addition, some older CRT designs used a lot of lead, and Europe went lead-free a few years back. At the time I was working for a test instrument manufacturer, and we (like everyone else who used CRTs) took a long, hard look at our product line. Between stuff that had small CRTs that we couldn't get anymore, and stuff that had lead in it (which we couldn't ship to Europe anymore) I think we ditched about half the stuff in our line.

I know it stinks if you still want CRTs, but the sad truth is that CRTs aren't a commodity item anymore. And that puts us in a bad position.
 
I totally agree, I have two NIB and haven't decided on which games are most deserving. Vision Pros were always packed well and the bonus was reusing the box to ship vectors or store project monitors.

The other avenues- tube swaps and flakey vendors will have to make due but between trying to find suitable tubes and seeing how some vendors ship poorly; I long for the good old days.

The vendors I contacted either didn't return emails or calls, didn't have stock they showed on their websites, or shipped so poorly packed that things arrived broken. Now the supply of 19" TVs seems to have dried up since some thrift stores refuse to accept them.

Sigh.......
 
Yeah I know and understand why they dont make them anymore. Just stinks.

OMG I loved re using those happ boxes to store stuff. I have about 40 of them stacked real neatly in my storage unit! lol I have 6 vision pro's left and I have been rationing them on what machines are worthy. I use to use them a lot on multi and classic re sales but now Im just keeping them for my own machines or (fingers crossed) future projects.

The ol' tubes have gone the way of the buffalo...
 
Why did happ have to stop carrying the 19" vision pro's? I hate LCDS! I just hate em! The look and feel retarded!

Back in the day I was able to get those things for 140 shipped. Great price and product!

Another project with another stupid looking LCD.

Just felt like venting!

Try these guys: http://www.pentusa.com/default.php

They list a bunch of 19" CGA CRT monitors. I bought a chassis from them that worked perfectly. They shipped fast and it was packed well. Their web site sucks, but I got email responses back from them very quickly and called to place my order, since they don't have web ordering.

ken
 
Yeah I know and understand why they dont make them anymore. Just stinks.

The ol' tubes have gone the way of the buffalo...

You can still find some oldies, but goodies...In the past month I've found 4 cabs in the wild, 2 have near mint monitors (manufacturing ranges from 80-late 80s) and the other two were in decent condition. Been lucky lately.
 
Yeah I mean there are a few places that still sell them. Arcadeshop.com has them listed. I dont know if they have any in stock. I just cant find prices as cheap as I would get them from Happ. Since most of my other equipment comes from them my S&H costs were always pretty low.

Yeah I have found some nice monitors in the wild too. I really need to commit myself to learn how to repair monitors. For some reason its never something I was confident enough to get into. I cant tell you how many non working monitors I have sold to a collector in town to for next nothing. Usually use them as trade bait but maybe its time i get under the hood and start tinkering around.
 
I'll take a G07 over a new monitor that is made in China any day. I would rather have a little burn on a rebuilt G07 than a new one that probably wont last and then won't be easy to fix or get parts for.
 
I miss the old days when VisionPros were easy to get and often went on super-sale, too.

I've bought a few of 'em over the years, and they've always had a superb picture and have proven to be very reliable.
 
Yeah I mean there are a few places that still sell them. Arcadeshop.com has them listed. I dont know if they have any in stock. I just cant find prices as cheap as I would get them from Happ. Since most of my other equipment comes from them my S&H costs were always pretty low.

Yeah I have found some nice monitors in the wild too. I really need to commit myself to learn how to repair monitors. For some reason its never something I was confident enough to get into. I cant tell you how many non working monitors I have sold to a collector in town to for next nothing. Usually use them as trade bait but maybe its time i get under the hood and start tinkering around.

Those older monitors are cake to fix. You would be doing yourself a huge favor by getting to know them better.

Matt
 
I'll take a G07 over a new monitor that is made in China any day. I would rather have a little burn on a rebuilt G07 than a new one that probably wont last and then won't be easy to fix or get parts for.

Aint that the truth. The only good thing about those crappy made in China monitors are the tubes. I took a tube off of a fried Kortek today and put it on a K4900 chassis. Super nice picture and ultra reliable electronics.

Eff China!

Matt
 
CRTs (no longer being used much for PCs or Televisions) are now more of a specialty item. There are many fewer manufacturers than there were years ago. That makes them expensive, and (for the operators that Happ mostly serves) too expensive.

Let's make some comparisons:

$200 for a 19" horizontal mount CRT monitor

$400 for a Happ 19" LCD monitor that also needs additional $50 mounting brackets. Now add another $25 for shipping. Oh yes don't forget taxes too. That brings the total up to $500 for a 19" monitor!

Game operators are notoriously cheap. Tell me what are they going to go with a $200 CRT monitor or a $500 LCD monitor? CRT monitors are also meant to be repaired when they breakdown whereas the LCD monitors are meant to be thrown away when they breakdown.
 
Last edited:
Not to mention that a LCD that's on 24/7 will show some nice burns very quickly. Or dead pixels, or the brightness runs low very soon.

Not to mention angle problems, black not being black etc. etc.

I hate them.

Good link Yellowdog. Any idea what chassis it was ? Any idea what brand monitors they've got ?
 
LCD's are crap, I will let a game die before putting one in. They have no place in classics. I would probably MAME, and use a CRT pc monitor first if I HAD to.

On the topic of the Vision Pro, I dont think they are all that great. I have one, brand new of course, and I think that a non burnt and recapped; G07, WG4K, or even a Matushita TM202 look better than that one. I do have to say I like the external control board.

Would I buy one right now for $140? Yeah, I would probably have to take two :)
 
Good link Yellowdog. Any idea what chassis it was ? Any idea what brand monitors they've got ?

Sorry, don't know for sure. I think they picked up most if not all of the assets of Pentranics when they evaporated. So my guess is that they are Pentranics. The chassis that I bought said Pentranics and then some other name pencilled in over it. All I know was that I plugged it in and the tube fired up and looked great.

I had bought 5 tubes for $20 off EBay from one of the local 8Liner places and 4 were Pentranics, one was a WG. 2 of the Pentranics were toast & the neck on the WG snapped off in the trunk of my car. So net I ended up with 2 nice working monitors for $80 ($20 for the monitors & $80 for a new chassis, less $20 for selling the WG chassis).

ken
 
We can all thank the enviro-nazi's for taking away our CRT's.

The Pac-Man pictured in my avatar needs a new one really bad, and I'll be damned if I put an LCD in a classic such as Pac-Man.
 
We can all thank the enviro-nazi's for taking away our CRT's.


Seriously!?! No, you can thank progress coupled with the lack of profit in continued manufacture of outdated electronics. Our little niche market isn't enough to keep the CRT manufacturing plants, even those in China, turning a profit.
 
Back
Top Bottom