12 Volt Television

[Yorkshire Man]

Hi,

Thinking of purchasing a 12/240 volt TV. Anyone any recommendations? 🤔

Cheers,

[Czech connection]

Avtex for me

[rslsys]

Avtex for me

 

+1

 

Cheers

Keith

[Seaman]

+1 from me too.

 

David

[gravon42]

And another!

[N&L]

Avtex are good and although expensive they have a good warranty

[Tyton]

Avtex great after sales service.

[Les Medes]

This is getting very boring !!!!! another for Avtex, so good we bought another for the Kitchen at home, and as Tyton says great after sales service

[ScoobyWRX]

We recently bought a 22" full HD Cello. Good picture, easy to set up.

Couldn't justify £250 more for an equivalent Avtex. They should come with a good warranty paying £400 for a 21. 5"!

[Pheasant]

First one in Tesco,20yrs. ago, £75. 00 next in Carrefour Spain, e100. 00 last one two yrs. ago from Currys, £120. 00 always buy the ones that have a 240 to 12 v transformer,chop off the wire past the transformer and fit a cigar plug,all three have worked brilliantly all over Europe.

Only reason I have used three in twenty years is because I let one go with motorhome I sold.

Why do Avtex cost so much??

[bspks]

Cello Traveller range for me too.

A lot cheaper than an Avtex, although the picture won't go quite as bright, and the sound is a little tinny.

The good points are they have extremely low power consumption, a very sensitive tuner (one weekend my friends next door with an Avtex struggled to get most channels, whereas my Cello got them all perfectly, it often happens that he struggles with some channels when I get them all) and the most important of course is the £200 or so cost savings.

[Woodentop]

May not be a good idea to use the caravan 12V to run the TV. The 12V mains adapter will be exactly that - 12V - but your caravan supply will be 13. 8V or even 14. 4V if your van has a charger as distinct from a plain simple power supply. Even the battery alone if off mains will be 12. 6V if fully charged.

[Paul_B]

We went for the Cello Traveller because of the low power usage, the only problem I have is with the sound, everyone else thinks its ok but I lose quite a bit of the higher range of sounds due to industrial deafness, I resolved this by fitting some battery powered speakers.

 

We bought ours for the 2012 Olympics so they could have changed.

[JTQ]

May not be a good idea to use the caravan 12V to run the TV. The 12V mains adapter will be exactly that - 12V - but your caravan supply will be 13. 8V or even 14. 4V if your van has a charger as distinct from a plain simple power supply. Even the battery alone if off mains will be 12. 6V if fully charged.

 

Surely a TV designed specifically to run off our leisure batteries will include its own internal regulated voltage circuitry?

 

I have an Avtex after the built-in "Vision Plus" TV went belly up out of warranty.

 

The big fault with the Avtex [or the one they made for me] is the appallingly slow "auto tune" feature. The set take a minimum of five minutes to autotune each time we locate to a site falling into a different transmitters coverage. The Vision Plus was hands down better as is a portable SONY TV we have.

 

I would test the autotuners performance if ever buying again; hopefully, Avtex have addressed this failing in a product aimed at a travelling user market.

[ScoobyWRX]

We went for the Cello Traveller because of the low power usage, the only problem I have is with the sound, everyone else thinks its ok but I lose quite a bit of the higher range of sounds due to industrial deafness, I resolved this by fitting some battery powered speakers.

 

We bought ours for the 2012 Olympics so they could have changed.

I bought an Anker sound core bluetooth speaker and connect it to my Cello, works well

[wasp]

I bought a cello 24" tv dvd 2wks ago and have just come back from 8 days away, I must say it is a very good buy, TV and delivery £169. 99.

 

Peter.

[Woodentop]

 

Surely a TV designed specifically to run off our leisure batteries will include its own internal regulated voltage circuitry?

 

I have an Avtex after the built-in "Vision Plus" TV went belly up out of warranty.

 

The big fault with the Avtex [or the one they made for me] is the appallingly slow "auto tune" feature. The set take a minimum of five minutes to autotune each time we locate to a site falling into a different transmitters coverage. The Vision Plus was hands down better as is a portable SONY TV we have.

 

I would test the autotuners performance if ever buying again; hopefully, Avtex have addressed this failing in a product aimed at a travelling user market.

 

No, domestic TVs with an external 12V power supply are NOT designed to run from battery supply. Most modern TV's work off a 5V and a 12V supply internally, and the supply can cause issues, so some manufacturers make the TV case smaller by putting the power supply outside. The supply is a regulated 12V and the 5V supply is derived from it.

 

Realistically the higher supply from the battery - 13. 8V - probably won't do any harm but the increased power dissipation in the 12V-5V regulator may cause it to fail.

Edited May 17, 2017 by Woodentop

[sleepyfolk]

Bought a 12v Finlux 3 years ago from the finlux direct website, £110 I think, low power consumption 22" and quite a few different connections on the back for various wizardry

[BigT Radioman]

So is anyone using a decent 240 volt, like a Sony or Samsung with an inverter? Simple 12 volt to 240 volt 300 watt inverter is only around £30. Most 240 volt TV's only draw 75 watts and usually have better tuners for freeview.

[JTQ]

 

So is anyone using a decent 240 volt, like a Sony or Samsung with an inverter? Simple 12 volt to 240 volt 300 watt inverter is only around £30. Most 240 volt TV's only draw 75 watts and usually have better tuners for freeview.

Not now as the van has its own built in TV, but for many years we used a SONY 15" TV that because its interface was at 16 Volts DC we used via an inverter, powering its mains adaptor. Excellent TV in every way but of the old screen dimension format, and running it via a quality sinewave inverter it worked well. I measure the inverter losses and this was reassuringly low but being a while ago I have not the details to hand.

 

If buying today for a caravan/motorhome with the failure of the supplied Vison Plus, and the dreadfully slow autotune in our replacement Avtex, then it would be with something from SONY or Samsung's domestic range based on how good we have found them. I have no hang up about using my inverter in that role.

Edited May 18, 2017 by JTQ

[Yorkshire Man]

Hi Everyone,

Thanks for the replies. Must admit being a little more confused than before now. Is paying £200 more for a tv really worth it? Me wonders?

Thanks again.

[daveat92]

I simply bought a 2nd hand tv that runs off 12v or mains (a transformer is put in line when using mains).

£60 from a pawnbrokers, with 3 mths warranty, and it has a CD player. I think it was one Tesco's ones (Technika?)

The sound is poor, but I use the radio's auxiliary socket and that's great.

 

If it gets stolen, it's no big deal and it's small enough to fit under the bed, out of site when I'm out, or travelling.

 

It says 12V input, no mention of tolerance. I just plug it into the 12V socket and it works, irrespective of the state of charge in the battery.

If on mains EHU, I use it on mains.

 

I've been using it for about 3 yrs now.

 

Like Yorkshire man, I balk at paying £200 and more for the TV in the van when I didn't pay that for the big one in the house!

Edited May 20, 2017 by daveat92

[matelodave]

My 22" Logik full HD TV/DVD from Currys works a treat (£125 four years ago), good picture and more than adequate sound.

 

I got a Maplins 150w inverter about 10 years ago and the TV runs from it without any problems should we wish to go off grid. We used when we had a very prolonged power cut at home when we decanted ourselves into the van to take advantage of it's facilities - heating, cooking and TV

 

Although the sound is adequate, I'm a bit deaf so we use a bluetooth transmitter plugged in the back of the TV and a £20 KitSound bluetooth speaker located a lot nearer to enhance the clarity and to avoid having the volume cranked up too loudly so it doesn't disturb others.

Edited May 20, 2017 by matelodave

[hp100425ev]

Never felt the need to spend silly money on a tv for caravan.

The 19" we bought 10 years ago and used for about 5 years is still going strong at home, as is the 22" bought to replace it, both Aldi specials.

Currently using a Cello 24" which is 18 months or so old.

12/240v and 1028p ready, currently receiving HD through a set top box under the front bed, but there is a model now with Freeview hd tuner built in.

Sound can be a bit tinny, but we solve that by routing it through the radio speakers.

[PR1]

Ours came from Aldi! 12 or 240 volt supply. Built in DVD and a three year warranty?