If someone is still making CRT monitors I'd love to know where.
Wow. Ok, I expected that CRT monitors would still be available, but I'm not finding any either...
You can still special-order broadcast 19" HD CRTs from Ikegami, at least theoretically — starting at $8500.
No, I didn't accidentally add an extra zero there.
But yeah, googling for "last CRT computer monitor" seems to indicate 2012 as when people were already asking this question
in the past tense.
Sony, who arguably made the very best CRTs ever made, shut down the Trinitron production lines in 2008.
There are still some CRT TVs (14-19") made in and for emerging markets, if alibaba is to be believed, but I think even they must be living on borrowed time, given how cheap large LCD panels have gotten. But unlike TVs, I don't think that emerging markets continued with CRT computer displays any longer than developed countries.
Theirs still a few refurbished ones on amazon.But I imagine that the same thing will happen as when turntables disappeared off the market.Eventually niche markets will pick up the demand for CRT monitors again.
Arcade game refurbishers were the very last source of demand for large CRTs, and they lost that battle, having totally depleted stocks of some sizes a few years ago. I think they're basically doing LCD retrofits wherever possible, and saving the CRTs for games with light guns that simply cannot operate with any other display type.
I honestly don't think these things will make a comeback. The image quality advantages of CRTs can likely be matched or exceeded by newer technologies (I'm lookin' at you, OLED!), and I suspect that for applications that require the specific properties of CRTs (like light pens/guns), it may even be possible to make retrofit OLEDs that mimic those properties. (For example, is there any reason you couldn't simulate the line-by-line painting on an OLED panel, given beefy enough drive electronics?) Given that the expertise in making quality CRTs is in retirement right now, and will soon die off, resuming CRT production would require enormous investment that almost certainly will never be worth the effort.
Theirs still a few refurbished ones on amazon.But I imagine that the same thing will happen as when turntables disappeared off the market.Eventually niche markets will pick up the demand for CRT monitors again.
Setting up a production line for CRT monitors may just be a tad more involved than for a turntable though...
Ditto Nixie tubes
Honestly, I think that Nixie tubes are positively
trivial to make compared to color CRTs. So many more parts, and they all must be in perfect alignment.