PC-TV – A Blast From TV’s Past

Because there are no standards in what is known as the PC-TV category, products from different manufacturers will be incompatible. For consumers to have confidence in this new product, and for this new category to grow, open industry standards based on today’s technology must be established. Such standards will allow companies from both the PC and CE industries to develop compatible PC-Theater products. Consumers must be able to select a display and a PC from different manufacturers and use them together as a system without needing custom cables and complicated setup procedures. In addition, the standards must be compatible with existing standards, so PC Theatre displays and computers may be used with standard PC and CE products.

TV on PC - still in effect!
TV on PC – still in effect!

Last year, a consortium consisting of Compaq, Hitachi, Intel, Mitsubishi Electric, NEC Technologies, Philips Electronics, Thomson Consumer Electronics, and Toshiba announced the PC Theater Initiative and support for standards that will be created for this product category. The primary focus of this initiative is to develop interoperability standards between PCs and large-screen displays capable of displaying high-quality progressively scanned video.

This Video Electronics Standards Association (VESA) committee was established to address the new interoperability standards and to work with