How common were SCART TVs in the US (and Europe) in the late 80s to mid 90s?

[retrospiel]

I had an old 70s TV that didn't have SCART (and thus no RGB), but EVERY other TV anyone in my family ever had did have a SCART socket.

[TmEE]

In here there were very few TVs without SCART, I can only think of some Samsungs which only had composhit inputs. Almost everything else had SCART. Most TVs I see here only have SCART, no separate s-video and composhit inputs so you have to use an adaptor on those TVs. My TV has a pair of SCART and nothing else, aswell as TVs at my parents place and my other relatives...

[sheath]

Ah, yeah, if I grew up with RGB as the standard input, I'd probably think Composite was garbage as well. As it stands, over here it was Composite and RF only for the lower middle class until 1991 at the earliest, and then S-Video until sometime around 1999 or 2000. Component wasn't big here until after that, for the average person I mean. The move to HD required all of the Television networks to switch their antenna signals to digital only, and people STILL play their Xbox 360's over Composite on an SDTV.

[eddiespruce]

Back when I was about 5 years old, our TV had RF only, not even composite, you needed a VCR for that. It was a General Electric 21" TV, with no remote, and had two rows of little black circular buttons.

[TheSonicRetard]

SCART was exceedingly uncommon in the US. I've owned tons, and tons, and tons of different tvs - CRTs, projection screens, LCD, plasma, the works. I have never, ever seen a scart connection. It was pretty much a europe only thing.

from what I've read, they were more common in france than anywhere else. Anyone with more direct experience want to confirm or deny that?

[lumclaw]

Yes, the context was what sort of TVs did most people have/use at the time, not what sort were being bought/sold new . . . (obviously new sets would more likely have SCART -or in the US, composite and probably S-video on a mid-range set by the mid 90s)

So would be be fair to say that in the UK around 1993/94, the majority of TVs in home used were not SCART/RGB-capable? (not the rest of Europe, just the UK -I know the rest of Europe tended more towards SCART earlier on, obviously France first and foremost)

On another note: is it also true that some TVs in the UK had RCA jacks for audio and composite video (either in addition to SCART or standalone like TVs in the US/etc)? I know that was virtually nonexistent in mainland Europe (pretty much went straight to SCART), but I'm talking about the UK specifically.






Almost nonexistent. There's a few examples, but the only one off the top of my head would be the RCA Dimensia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RCA_Dimensia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Di..._Interface.JPG
Albeit it's referred to as an EIA interface:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EIA_interface

Also funny that that TV predated S-video, so there were models with composite, RGB, but no S-video input.





It was/is also used in Japan somewhat commonly and there was some attempt to standardize it in the US too. (unsuccessfully)





It started in France and spread from there to most of Europe and parts of Asia (especially Japan).


EDTV/HDTVs have been supporting RGB from pretty much day 1 (via a DE-15 connector using the standard VGA pinout), though not all TVs have it -less common than component and HDMI but more common than S-video. (S-video is oddly uncommon on HDTVs)





The easiest way is to use a RGB to component transcoder, preferably with an SDTV. PVM monitors tend to be far tougher to find (and expensive -especially large ones) and less convenient to use than a TV you might already have set-up.





The US does have a standardized RGB connector, and it was introduced some 24 years ago with the introduction of VGA. If SDTVs had gone RGB rather than YPbPr, that definitely would have been the most sensible connector to use. (like component, it would be forwards compatible with analog HDTV resolutions -which had already been used on VGA monitors for years -technically RGB via SCART should be just as good as YPbPr for HD transmission, it's just that there was never a formal standard to use SCART for that purpose -and YPbPr is relatively poorly supported through SCART as well)

The DE-15 connector used for VGA is actually pretty convenient to use: fairly compact and easy to plug-in even with limited visibility/space. (vs dealing with 3 RCA cables for component -on top of audio- and fiddling around with S-video connectors trying to tell if it's lined up right)

Of course, the US didn't go for RGB at all (until VGA on many HD sets), but went for YPbPr component video instead . . . intended to mesh with the YCbCr colorspace used in DVD video. That was rather pointless though, since and YPbPr to RGB conversion is relatively simple, and many DVD playback devices didn't even end up natively outputting YPbPr. (but using RGB and transcoding that to component -including the PS2 )





It's most commonly supported through SCART, but it's not supported on all TVs. (far more common than component video on SCART)








VGA is RGB . . . just 30+ kHz RGB (well, technically that's SVGA, true "VGA" was limited to ~30-31 kHz iirc), so it's just the SDTV resolution (15 kHz hsync) RGB that's lacking in common/standard support.
The Atari ST and Amiga were the 2 most common to use RGB at SDTV sync rates . . . CGA/EGA used proprietary monitors and odd digital RGBI/RGB connections. (aside from CGA -and some EGA- cards with composite video and EGA/CGA modes through a VGA card)

Multisync monitors were/are the common standard for VGA, but it's just that few support SDTV sync rates (15 kHz) since that's not among any of the standard VGA/SVGA modes. (early monitors sometimes had it for CGA/EGA modes -for VGA cards that didn't automatically scan-double the low-res modes)

That would have been a bad plan. Not enough VGA monitors accept SDTV sync rates. It'd have led to misinformed gamers buying monitors out of positive word for RGB, only to find out they won't accept the signal.

[SF78]

from what I've read, they were more common in france than anywhere else. Anyone with more direct experience want to confirm or deny that?

I think it was pretty much established that pretty much every TV (except those 14" and smaller screens) sold in Europe from the mid 80's onwards had Scart.

[kool kitty89]

OK, so given the comments, it looks like my perception of mainland Europe was fairly accurate (SCART being fairly dominant relatively early on), but the main point of contention was over the UK.

Ah, yeah, if I grew up with RGB as the standard input, I'd probably think Composite was garbage as well. As it stands, over here it was Composite and RF only for the lower middle class until 1991 at the earliest, and then S-Video until sometime around 1999 or 2000. Component wasn't big here until after that, for the average person I mean. The move to HD required all of the Television networks to switch their antenna signals to digital only, and people STILL play their Xbox 360's over Composite on an SDTV.

Yeah, except RGB wasn't good for much regardless. Prior to the Master System, all consoles and most home computers were composite and/or RF only, though the ST, Amiga, and Amstrad CPC used RGB. (the Atari 8-bit and C64 also had s-video)

VHS wouldn't support RGB either . . . neither would SVHS or Laserdisc. (and only a few laserdisc players supported s-video -using internal high-end comb filters, since the LD format uses native composite video)

That would have been a bad plan. Not enough VGA monitors accept SDTV sync rates. It'd have led to misinformed gamers buying monitors out of positive word for RGB, only to find out they won't accept the signal.

No, the idea would be to have SDTVs use the standard VGA pinout on a DE-15 connector to accept HD and SD RGB signals (SDTVs obviously only accepting 15 kHz, HD sets carting to both). Not just 15 kHz either, but standard support for c-sync as well as separate H/V sync (which some VGA monitors have), perhaps with standardized sync-on-green support as well (which many multimedia monitors have)

It wouldn't be intended to force VGA monitors to accept 15 kHz . . . or for SDTVs to accept PC VGA out (aside from some video cards that supported SDTV resolution -and many did via composite/s-video and sometimes component), though HDTVs obviously could be used as such (as they can today via VGA and HDMI).

The only other difference would be having standard support for 15 kHz RGB in HDTVs (like component does currently and a handful of TVs in VGA . . . and most European HDTVs via SCART).


Plus, there's a surprising percentage of people who prefer the blurry/obscured mess (dot crawl and all -though that's TV dependent) over sharp RGB displays. Be it due to dithering or just low resolution. (the latter more for the SNES and Master System than most MD games)