Whenever I tell family or close friends who know me well that I got a new TV, they tend
to expect that I’d get the best of the best.
An 8K OLED, paper thin, hyper-realistic masterpiece… or something like that.
Then, when I show them the TV that I DID buy, they’re often confused, disappointed, or
horrified.
Let’s see why.
I’m EposVox, here to make tech easier and more fun showing off my new television and
gaming setup.
This is pretty close to the ultimate gaming setup from my childhood dreams.
Well, what am I stalling for?
Let’s head to the living room.
I’ve ditched the crappy Magnavox CRT that I’ve had since I was a baby and picked up
a beautiful Sony Trinitron WEGA HD CRT TV.
Specifically, the Trinitron KV-34HS420.
This thing is a boss, and I got it from a local Craigslist sale for only 50 dollars.
The best TV value anyone could possibly get, IMO.
We’ll come back to this in a second, but it’s also worth noting that the guy I bought
it from also came with the TV stand.
It was supposed to be on wheels, but he only had 2 of them.
Kind of a shame, but it was free.
I will hopefully upgrade entertainment centers in the future, as I’ve already overloaded
this one, as you can see.
It’s got 2 levels of shelves with cable management holes in the back.
Now, for a normal casual home user, the side shelves are meant to hold movies or music
or games or something, but I need all the surface area for game consoles that I can
get.
I’ve got every console I’ve ever played shoved in here, pretty much.
NES, Super NES, Nintendo 64, Wii U, Playstation 1 slim, my modded PS2 fat, PS3 slim, Xbox
360 slim, and Xbox one, along with the Atari anniversary and SEGA Genesis anniversary collection
boxes.
The only things missing are the Nintendo GameCube and the original Xbox.
I actually have recently picked up an original Halo-themed Xbox and am just waiting to mod
it up before I install it in here, but I haven’t picked up a replacement GameCube just yet.
My PS4 was originally fit in here, but I’ve since moved it back to my desk so I can use
it for recording, capture card testing, streams and so on.
Someone’s probably noticing a severe lack of SEGA - I never really owned any SEGA consoles,
so I have the Genesis collection box, and hopefully I’ll be able to add more to the
collection at some point.
I love my retro hardware.
Since the shelves are fully-loaded with consoles, my massive game library is stored on this
HUGE game shelf unit from Wayfair.
My parents actually bought this for us when we first moved into our previous apartment
- and it was in the background of virtually every video in 2016.
Now it does its job holding hundreds of BluRays, DVDs, and games.
I also have a few huge disc binders full of games that I don’t have cases for, too.
But how can I hook up so many consoles at once?
How can I even hook up things like the Xbox One and PS4 to a CRT TV in the first place?
This magical beast was one of the last CRT TV models ever produced.
A last grasp at the market before flat screens fully took over.
As such, the TV actually supports input signals up to 1080i and even has a HDMI port on the
back!
This thing looks sharp and crisp with video signals from 240p from the original consoles
all the way up to 720p from the modern Xboxes and Playstations.
It’s got amazingly-deep blacks and vivid colors that make every game look great.
Plus, many games like Silent Hill and other horror games from the PS2 era were designed
with this look in mind, so the atmospheric look intended can only be obtained on a TV
like this one.
However, the modern consoles likely won’t be staying in this setup for too long.
I have my old 1080p flatscreen upstairs in the bedroom that will serve them much better.
The issue is, any game consoles outputting higher than 480p over HDMI have a huge overscan
crop applied to them, which isn’t fixable without crazy scary service menu hacks.
And even then, it gets up-converted to 1080i with a very obvious flicker that gives me
a headache within 5 minutes!
Pretty frustrating, but this is why we have HD TVs, after all.
The same consoles - such as the 360 or PS3 - outputting over analog signal, and any analog
native consoles do NOT show this issue or give me headaches, so I’m confident in dividing
up the games.
I honestly don’t play the Xbox One much anymore anyway, and the PS4 stays at my desk
more for hardware testing, as I mentioned before.
On the back, the TV has a few standard composite and S-video inputs, a couple component inputs,
and the single HDMI port - along with the RF signal adapter.
It can display low-resolutions in 4:3 better-looking than any TV I’ve ever seen, and does a great
job at zooming in or stretching signals to widescreen if you’re into that sort of thing.
I have a composite and S-video switcher from my original gaming setups as a kid that most
of the classic consoles run through, and the PS2 and original Xbox use the Component inputs
for high-quality 480p output.
On this, also attached the Red and White to 3.5mm headphone adapter cable that came with
my original Turtle Beach X11 headset.
This runs to the analog input on the mixer console for my SteelSeries H Wireless headset
The modern consoles run through this 5-port Monoprice HDMI switcher, which also splits
the audio via optical to my SteelSeries wireless unit.
I can’t listen to everything via the headphones, but I can listen to most systems this way.
I don’t use them most of the time, however.
The speakers on this TV are actually very nice-sounding.
The previous owner clearly didn’t blast them out for years on end, and they are quite
pleasant to game with.
I’ve also got a few plastic totes for my hoard of controllers, and the end table features
charging docks for most of the common ones I use.
I keep my PS3/PS4 steering wheel set under the table.
I also just recently picked up a nice JVC VCR and DVD player combo unit that I will
want to integrate into the setup at some point, but I don’t currently have room for it.
This is a kickass setup, and I’m super grateful to be able to put it together.
This is essentially the ultimate dream gaming setup I always wanted as a kid.
For the future, I’ll want to upgrade entertainment centers so I can more comfortably fit the
consoles, maybe get some LED flair going on, too.
And I’ll want to get a nice A/V receiver to run everything through with a proper speaker
setup.
But for now, in my humble apartment, this is a dream come true.
It’s been so great to escape from the madness of the world nowadays to put some hours into
Baldur’s Gate or Metal Gear Solid on PS2 and actually game.
No DLC, no pre-orders, just fun.
I hope you’ve enjoyed this video.
Do you have an awesome gaming setup?
Let me know in the comments down below.
Hit the like button if you enjoyed, and subscribe for more videos like this.
I’m EposVox, and I’ll see you next time.