INTRODUCTION

The Holy Grail: Barco Cine 9 CRT Projector

Barco
Barco is one of two remaining manufacturers still producing CRT projectors and the leading CRT company in Europe. Their latest Cine series CRT projector offers the best video performance currently available to the consumer market. Period. Unfortunately, with a pricetag that equals a Jaguar sports car, the Cine 9 is not exactly in the budget range of the average home cinema enthusiast. Luckily, the older and less advanced 8" models such as the 600, 800, 801 and 808 are. In essence, the current Cine series are based on the 808 and 1209 models and contain similar electronics and optics. The Cine8 for instance is pretty much a color-corrected 808 with a black case and some inputs optimized for consumer video formats. The 800 offers less resolution, lower refresh rates, less fancy electronics and electrostatic (ES) instead of electromagnetic (EM) focus, but still delivers a kick ass picture at an unbeatable price.

Barco Data 800 CRT Projector

Barco Data/Graphics 800
So, as you may have guessed, this site focuses on Barco's discontinued 800 series entry/mid level CRT projector, which was produced until around 1993. The Data and and its higher-scanrate brother, the Graphics 800 are probably some of the cheapest and most quiet CRT projectors currently available on the second-hand market. Contrary to most other brands, Barco projectors including the 800 have a very modular design and are easy to service. Parts can usually be obtained quite easily and 800 tubes are relatively cheap. If you know what to look for, most parts can be bought at reasonable prices from online retailers, fellow Barco enthusiasts (though forums) or off ebay. (Ordering parts directly from Barco is ridiculously expensive). You will find that with some time and patience, the Barco 800 will prove to be a great projector for your home theater.

Why CRT Projection?

Cathode Ray Tube (CRT) with yoke

Instead of liquid crystal display panels (LCD) or tiny arrays of mirrors (DLP), Barco CRT projectors use - as their name indicates - cathode ray tubes or CRT's. Cathode Ray tubes do not have a fixed panel resolution, which means they can display any resolution that is within the scan range (RGB bandwidth) of the projector. Deeper blacks, vibrant colors, extremely high contrast ratios and complete lack of pixel structure are some of the properties that set CRT projectors apart from even the most expensive DLPs. In short, CRT projectors provide the most film-like viewing experience possible. As an added bonus, the flexible resolution often allows even the cheapest Data range CRT projectors to output a 1920x1080i HDTV resolution! CRT projectors are heavy, difficult to setup and everything-but-portable, but despite what most salespeople will tell you, their performance is still unmatched by any other technology.

Are you out of your mind?
Of course the size and weight dont exactly give the Barco a high "Wife Acceptance Factor" or WAF, which is why many people tend to go for the smaller DLP and LCD projectors and I for one don't blame them. The steep learning curve, mounting constraints and many myths that have been created by salespeople of modern DLP technology will scare off a lot of people. CRT owners are often refered to as the "mad scientists" that refer to their projector as "the precious" but scary as some of them may look or sound, they are always willing to help you out with whatever problems you run into. The home theater communities on the internet and CRT owners in particular often provide you with all the support you need on a technical level. However, it is up to you to gain the support of your significant other :-)

Auch! burned tube :(

Lifespan
CRT tubes have an average lifespan of about 10,000 hours, which is longer than most people will ever spend in their home theater. Compare that to the 1000 hours you'll be able to push out of most DLP projector bulbs! The chassis of most CRT projectors will last even longer than that, providing you with countless hours of home theater fun before requiring replacement of tubes or other parts. However, tubes can wear out much much faster when a projector has been driven too hard or installed incorrectly. Prolonged periods of displaying static images will quickly result in tube-burn, which also drasticly reduces the lifespan of the tube. A cheap projector can turn out to be a very expensive deal if the tubes have wear or burn. Tube replacements costs are high and in many cases even higher than the price for which you will have purchased the projector.

So..
Many companies and individu(h)als are replacing their old CRT projectors with smaller, easy-to-setup DLP projectors. CRT projectors are not plug and play. At all. They weigh a lot, are big and bulky and have a serious WAF problem. Luckily, because of that, they can be obtained at a fraction of the costs of DLP or LCD projectors. Since most CRT enthusiasts will be buying second-hand, discontinued CRT projectors I thought a little help and advice prior to embarking on the CRT adventure might be useful. Make sure you read and understand the "Buying a Barco" chapter of this website and understand what kind of trouble your getting yourself into when buying a CRT projector :)

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