1959 Philco Safari Model H-2010

The 1959 Philco Safari Model H-2010 was the first transistorized, battery operated portable television.

From http://www.tvhistory.tv :

"It all begins with this Philco set. Its dimensions are actually quite large: 8" wide x 15" tall x 5-1/2" deep, but the race to build smaller and smaller sets was on!

RCA and GE had displayed laboratory models of transistorized TV sets in 1956 and 1958, respectively, but Philco beat everyone in the world to the punch by introducing the Safari model in late 1959. They even beat Sony to market, who were planning a release of their set shortly.

The unique design of this set (to conserve battery power) was the ingenious method of using a small 2" vertically mounted picture tube, which reflected the television image at a 45 degree angle off a concave mirror! At the optimum viewing distance of precisely 4 and 1/2 feet, you had what appeared to be the same size image given by a 14 inch picture tube!

There was one serious drawback; This system required a VERY narrow viewing angle. If you were off by a few degrees, the picture would be cut-off easily. The consequence? A stiff neck after a very short viewing time! However, it was transistorized -- battery powered -- and portable -- all amazing features in 1959."

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• 1959
• Philco
• Safari
• H-2010
• first
• transistorized
• battery
• operated
• portable
• television

[CassetteMaster]

Neat! And it looks odd with the picture so far in there.

[SmokyPondFarm]

Yes. The optical system of this set is definitiely unique. The image is comparable to a 14" picture tube when viewed from a distance of about 4 feet. The further away from the set you get, the LARGER the image appears.

[pmscompany]

Fantastic work, nice tv

[SmokyPondFarm]

Thanks. The camera movement is my attempt to highlight the strange optical effects observed when changing viewing angles and distances.

[retrochad]

very nice demonstration! I don't think I've actually seen one of these working before. Did you have to replace old capacitors?

[SmokyPondFarm]

The only thing I did was clean it up and repair the antenna. When I got it, I opened it up, ready to do a mass cap replacement. But the caps were of the more "modern" variety (aluminum with the typical printed shrink-wrap sleeve like we see today). So I lifted one end of several critical caps to test them, and they checked OK on all counts. After that, I powered it up slowly on a Variac, and it worked fine. Linearity was even good.

[USArmy12389]

I just bought one!

[eldorado303]

wow. i love this little tv.

[mkkiani]

Wonderful to see this demonstration of wonderful portable tv set from 1959. It used D type cells, and was the first to use normal batteries. Before this the Ekco TMB 272 was the world's first battery set (but used car battery).

Many thanks again for letting us see this set in action.

[stevenscowboys]

thats one way to block light elfections

[CANVECVIDEO]

this dinosaur tv looks good even for today standards!

[Jo0ngle]

WOW, a 50 year old portable television, thats one for the books right there. Treasure it!

[FelixTheHouseFreak]

amazing and cute little set!

[CassetteMaster]

Strange.