Found this article about TV collecting in the SMH website. It was published in 2010 but is just as relevant today.

Enjoy!

http://www.smh.com.au/money/investing/retro-telly-watchers-20100914-15a2e.html.

Nick.

I wouldn't mind having a small collection of valve televisions however space is at a premium due to my radio collection. I remember having a rather large HMV Nipper in my bedroom for a year or two when I was a kid which was surplus to my parents' requirements and it went to the tip when it started popping valves.

My only vintage telly at the moment is a solid state Thorn from 1982 and still has a very good picture even before allowing for its age.

I think the mention in the article of everyone chucking their B&W sets out when coloured transmissions started is a bit off the pace though. I know a number of people who still have 3 in 1s in their formal lounge rooms and simply do not use them as they have plasma sets in their sitting room and simply watch telly there whilst leaving the lounge room as it was in the 1960s. They also still feature quite often on council cleanup piles. When I see one I always rat the valves from it.

When I was a kid, I used to live near a tip. We used to go "hunting for treasure" in the afternoons after the ranger had gone for the day. We could never lift the TVs to get them to our cubby house. We had this vague hope of a cubby house like in Fat Albert with a working TV in a junkyard. Lots of TVs being thrown out. Couldn't get any working tho.

Ahh memories...

Yeah, I remember the tips in Sydney at what is now known as Olympic Park. When my old man would take some junk down there it was more or less mandatory to go with him and go on a hunt whilst he was emptying the trailer. Sometimes he'd forget to check my pockets before we left for home.

The article is wrong in one respect; in Australia you don't need to modify a black-and-white set to use it to view off-air digital broadcasts. All you will need is a digital tuner and a VHF modulator between the aerial and the set.