Whether or not the public cares, it's hard to make an idea successful if companies can't agree on its exact implementation. Scart wasn't established as its name here either. Some RCA Dimensia models made a brief attempt by renaming it "EIA Multiport" in the US. Commodore acted strange even in places where Scart had started to become established. At least four different RGB connector flavors can be found on Amiga monitors around the world. http://betastart.com/SW/DSC01504.jpg http://www.amiga-hardware.com/display_photos/1084st_ports_sm.jpg http://vogons.zetafleet.com/files/normal_cimg0599.jpg http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3456/4551877438_03179baeae.jpg
Just because Scart can carry RGB signals, doesnt mean RGB = Scart. You can use pretty much any connector you like. Its probably because SCART is also known as Euro Connector that the Americans didnt like it. And regarding commodore - their monitors were multisync and really designed to be paired with an amiga. Using standard connectors doesnt matter when your device isnt supposed to be used by other inputs.
Actually, we did have RGB in the US. It was called VGA, which is really RGBHV. We just didn't have it on TVs. It was in arcades too, of course.
SCART definitely doesn't mean RGB. In fact, a lot of people use or at least used it to connect their composite cables. SCART is also pretty much dying off now: my TV only has one SCART port, whereas only a few years ago a TV probably would've had two.
Not all SCART inputs are RGB enabled either. Usually your TV will have 2 inputs, but only 1 is RGB capable. And if you connect a Composite wired cable into a RGB socket, it will fall back to composite. Yay!
Yeah, there have been TVs released in Europe with only a single Scart socket that accepts RGB, composite, and S-video. Scart is just the connector type that can carry various signals.
Well yes. In practical use that doesn't mean much. HDMI supports a digital version of RGB color too. Most older console and arcade games run at resolutions not specified by VGA, if they happen to work through VGA on any given monitor you're lucky.
It is expensive for the consumer, your TVs cost more because of it*. Back in analog days this was especially so since SCART takes significant support circuitry to handle auto switching and fast blanking with any sort of quality. RCA input requires a latching pushbutton or rotary switch. *I know they also cost more for other reasons such as that 240V components cost more than 120, and 50 Hz components are heavier to ship and take more resources, and you have higher taxes/tariffs. At a higher price range SCART makes up less of the total cost, but it's still the consumer paying for it. It's true SCART is pretty easy/understandable for the consumer as a monolithic cable, as long as it just works when you plug it in. If you have to make consumers change settings or make them understand RGB, use composite adapters, define input/outputs then it's not easy. My comment about ease was more about RGB than SCART, 4/5 separate wires. And the price is bad, especially when using SCART for composite since the patch cables are overkill. You don't need to tune your TV for RCA composite input either. Plus it's not like SCART displaced RF, you still needed a tuner for OTA reception. Analog cable and satellite boxes output composite video so SCART's facilities were wasted on the vast majority of people until DVD players and digital cable/satellite, *if* those defaulted to RGB for them. I wonder how many people realized the difference. Old consoles run at CGA/EGA frequencies, but the majority of CGA/EGA monitors only take 1-bit/2-bit digital RGB input. Commodore monitors are one of the few with analog/"linear" input. A lot of early VGA monitors WILL take CGA video for backwards compatibility, it's the mid-90s onward SVGA monitors that will not since they must scan at a higher rate and it's cheaper to drop low frequency tolerance than support a very wide range of frequency. Another reason 15 kHz video was dropped was because the phosphors changed on the new monitors and 15 kHz video (including video games) is meant to be viewed on the old TV kind. Lots of people don't seem to know this and I don't think upscanners compensate. BTW, another thing that RGB nerds haven't seemed to figure out yet is that you can still view 240p *with true scanlines* (not artificial ones like that "scanline generator" crap) on a late SVGA CRT monitor, instead of line-doubling you just frame-double which has the same effect of bringing 15 kHz to 31 kHz, the only downside is that the monitor must lock to 120 Hz and you need to buffer a full frame of video. It looks very good and obviously there's 0 flickering.
Personally I don't understand the obsession with scanlines though I've yet to move fully from a CRT at 480i for most gaming purposes. I probably have my nomenclature mixed up but my understanding is that SVGA essentially translates to 800x600. If you mean to say that you'd need a monitor whose maximum resolution is 800x600 and can lock at 120hz I'd have to think such a mission very difficult without shelling out cash the second you found what you wanted on Craigslist (which I did to the tune of $25 for 2 Sony PVMs). Or would it need be capable of 120hz at 240p? You're one of the few people who make me genuinely feel ignorant Calpis. I also agree with Calpis in that American consumers (really 99% of worldwide consumers I'd imagine) prefer something simpler and that "just works" (har har) over something technologically superior. My female half really doesn't understand why I busted my hump to get these two Sony PVM displays and my technically oriented friends understand but seem apathetic overall and understandably so. Granted I haven't gotten the SCART coupler to wire up to BNC cables yet so I can't even use them beyond component video (which sooooo wasn't the point in getting these things). Perhaps afterwards they will see the point. My grandmother can hook up coax without trouble but she'd prefer I'd handle it because she knows I'd get everything correct. With her cataracts I don't think she can see well enough to appreciate the difference between 480i and 1080p. Now obviously with games like Dead Rising 1080p is practically a requirement to even read the damn screen; combine this with having HDTVs become somewhat of a status symbol and you'll find people scrambling to get whatever is the latest and greatest. SCART was luck from the looks of things. Doesn't mean I'm any less jealous that a UK resident can walk into a store and pick up a brand new TV that is RGB capable though.
I finally got one of these a few days ago and it's simply fantastic besides that it has a dvd menu burned into the screen.
It does, but it's also the generic name for a monitor supporting any VESA modes, "XGA" nonsense and beyond too. I just meant anything over VGA or 480p/31 kHz. To an analog monitor the output resolution doesn't really matter much, it's just about staying within the frequency tolerance for synchronization. Actually each "supported" video mode has a profile in the monitor so it can jump to the correct horizontal and vertical size and position, but if you don't mind setting those manually then you can view all sorts of crazy video. It's not uncommon for SVGA monitors to support H frequencies of 30 kHz-70 kHz and V of 50-160 or something. Once you get a very big H and V frequency product like with 1600x1200x75 the clarity will be lost though, the CRT won't be big enough and the dot pitch won't be small enough so lines smear and the electron gun amplifiers won't be fast enough so the pixels will. Also if you view too low of a resolution the raster can't get thick enough and the scanlines will look ridiculous. Neither. It requires that you generate "240p120" video yourself since nothing else does (that I know of). It's just the same video at 2x the pixel frequency, with each frame scanned out twice. Technically an upscanner would have no problem at all doing this but I've never heard of one implementing it. Hah thanks, I feel that way every day about everything, life is ridiculously complex. "The more you know, the more you know you don’t know." I've been there, but what's worse is when a friend acts interested and excited by your <something> but turns out to be incapable of appreciating it once you help them get one too or give them one of yours. I made the mistake of giving away a small pile of good SNES games to friends that hadn't played them. Only for each and every one of them to pass the games on to their respective friends, STILL without having played the games. And Earthbound costs what, $150 now? !@#$%^ It is, kinda, but CGA uses the same approximate frequency ranges as NTSC and PAL so the monitors can sync to console video. The original CGA card also actually had a composite video output, which people were expected to use until CGA monitors hit the market. Despite video compatibility they usually can't interface with consoles because CGA (and EGA) define a DE-9 cabling standard with very very short-sighted 1-bit digital RGBI for CGA (2-bit digital RGB for EGA). Some CGA monitors either have another separate analog input, or a DAC bypass switch which WILL work for games. Then there's also another slight issue that some of the ancient monitors don't have a sync separator built in so that'll have to be done externally. About a decade ago (yikes) I picked a nice 13" CGA monitor off the side of the road thinking it was an analog RGB monitor. It's has the same case as a C= 1084, composite video input, but alas only digital RGBI, no analog nor Y/C.
But when the TV comes with it as standard and there ISNT tv's without it. Its not costing you anymore - its just "the price". Technically if they didnt use scart, maybe your TV would be cheaper. But this is all theoretical as thats not what happened. TV's came with RGB scart sockets. You are arguing a technicality vs "How it is". Scart "just works" If you plug in a Composite cable into a RGB enabled socket - it will work as composite. If you plug a RGB wired cable into a non RGB scart socket, it will work but as composite. There is nothing to change, scart has pins to let the TV know what input to use. There are no adapters. The only time you would need an adapter is if you had a device trying to use RCA cables and you wanted to plug it into a scart socket. This is also the only time you need to define input/output too. Also, its only 4/5 wires within the cable. To the consumer, its 1 cable. RCA would be 2/3 - Video, Audio L and R. American view point. If you had Satellite (in the UK), you would hook it up via scart. Composite is still better than RGB and it "just worked" no tuning required. Also, the picture is far better than OTA. Most of my TV's and people I know never had OTA tuned it, it was pointless. Same with cable. All OTA channels were on available on Satellite and cable, with superior picture. But this isnt RF vs Scart. This is RCA & S-video vs Scart. Scart does everything RCA does and more and came as standard. You could always fall back to RF if you wanted to. You are arguing about something you were never here to experience. Which is why the OP asked for European input. =/
I understand "how it is", but the argument is valid for why grandiose solutions aren't adopted when simple/cheap solutions are already in place. This tangent started over why SCART wasn't adopted in North America and it's a pretty straight forward explanation. Exactly. And this happened a lot I gather since PAL consoles didn't ship with SCART cables. One time is too many for a lot of people, as would be setting up the daisy-chain order. People I know have to repeatedly ask "now yellow connects to yellow, right?" Maybe for a composite only cable? SCART cables I've seen are "straight-through" 21 pins, or 13 pin ribbon cables presumably with a common ground. They're also around 6 GBP or 10 USD online right now. For comparison I can buy a stereo composite RCA cable at a brick and mortar store for 2 USD or less. I understand that a lot of things could be hooked up via SCART and SCART alone. My point is simply that for the majority of use, there was no benefit over RCA, which you probably still had to resort to if you used an external sound system. At a price, as does everything. Have you considered that maybe you don't mind the cost because you are one of the few who can appreciate it? Maybe it is the "rugged-individualist" Yankee in me, but I don't like paying for stuff I don't need nor want (not terribly liberal of me). For example, it really upsets me that multimedia-navigation systems and iPod docks/other planned obsolescence are now standard in practically all cars. Just because that stuff is standard doesn't mean you aren't being upsold at a mere 5% of the total cost and don't have a reason to be upset. Sometimes you can't go without and there aren't feasible alternatives.
Scart leads are like £1-2. But the point was you are saying RCA is easier as its 1 cable, when its not - its actually 3. But then say that scart is more because RGB is 4-5 - when its actually just 1 from the consumer point of view. Your initial point was about "ease for the consumer" - which is scart is 1 lead, rca is 3. But then get technical, with how many wires are inside. Using your own reasoning, the consumer doesnt care how many wires are inside. Just that its 1 vs 3 for rca. PAL consoles shipped with Scart leads (or if they shipped with RF, you could often buy scart leads - not RCA). Those that shipped with RCA (like the Wii and PS2) came with a RCA to scart adapter (I assume thats why you mean by composite adapter? as scart is plenty capable of being composite only) that is hard wired for input only and this is probably just cost saving as you can ship the same lead to Europe and the US. You only see the in/out converters if you go and buy one especially. As I said, you are talking about something you dont really know about (other than the technical aspect, not "how it is"). And again, you are mixing issues. Your point was from the consumer point of view. If all TVS come with scart, to them, there is no price hike for the inclusion of scart. The point wasnt about why it wasnt adopted in America, it was you saying it was expensive option to the consumer HERE (as you directly quoted me, then said it was).
In Europe sure. Most US sellers or those who advertise shipping here ask more. Perhaps, but which consoles shipped with RGB scart leads? It makes a difference. AFAIK with at least SNES, the official RGB version scart lead was released exclusively in France.
This is about how much it costs here, my post said "Scart doesnt cost us much here" to which Calpis started these replies. But it doesn't make a difference... even if they shipped with Composite SCART - its the same as RCA, but has less wires. But RGB is an option. With RCA you are stuck with composite and more wires. Again, SCART wins on "ease for the consumer!" as apparently that's all they care about according to Calpis. Most consoles that didnt ship with scart leads, shipped with RF. Which is exactly what happened in the US too. Again having scart makes you no worse off, but if you want RGB you can spend the money and get the best picture quality on a port thats ALREADY ON YOUR TV. No different than consoles shipping with composite, but you can buy a HDMI lead and get a better picture. Nintendo were odd about the whole RGB thing. Removing it, changing the circuit on different region consoles etc.
