As a Dutch viewer I don't recall any equipment not having Scart, it was as common as HDMI

As someone in England seeing people get confused by Scart is amazing

Genuinely fascinated to learn SCART wasn’t really a thing in Northern America!

From UK here and it’s crazy seeing SCART being called obscure, It’s basically the only connector I used when I was younger and even our composite cables went through an adapter into SCART... they used to work with several pins missing too... they were basically the nokia 3310 of cables, everyone had them and the were indestructible!

SCART wasn't obscure at all. It was the de-facto standard for everything in Europe for almost quarter of a century.

As a European it was all about SCART cables here. You can still EASILY find them in stores, for dirt cheap

S-Video was the middle child that everyone forgot about

Scart was also popular with VCR as it is bi-directional for recording and play

scart was basicallty the standard with dvd players and vcrs but with game consoles they shipped with composite cables and a scart adaptor which had like 4 pins in it to adapt it

"I feel like I'm being called out by this script." Good, that was an awesome video.

Here in the UK, SCART was probably the most common connector I saw in my childhood. My mum still calls HDMI and DP cables “SCART” because it was so common back in the day! The idea that something so ubiquitous throughout my life could be called “obscure” by an expert in the field that covers that thing is… honestly bizarre to hear.

Scart was a really nice connector with the only disadvantage being that it was a quite large connector and a pretty thick cable. I didn't expect this to only be populair in Europe since it used to be the best kind of cable for monitors or televisions most of the time. I liked this scart connection and it is fun to see that we just did it better in Europe than you in North America for example

What, no S-Video?! It was literally SITTING IN FRONT OF YOU on that video card! hehehe

Not to show my age, but Scart coming along was a massive upgrade in my childhood...

I think DVI would obviously be one of the first suggestions. Younger folks are likely to have never seen them but for a brief time they were pretty popular.

Honestly I don't exactly know what it is about Anthony, but I would listen to that lad read a phone book. Maybe its just how knowledgeable he has proven himself over and over. He always has something amazing to add to the conversation

I’d love to see Linus upgrading his home setup to use HDBaseT throughout his house!

Brain: you have no interest in these plugs Eyes: see Anthony Heart: damn it, I have to watch it

Loved those old printer cables, always felt like something special with those huge connectors.

I just love DIN plugs. They're even still used today in MIDI.

god I'm only 23 and I remember scart being everywhere: ps2, vhs, wii dvd player... It really is weird seeing the difference in scale standardisation has taken throughout the years from country to continent to worldwide in some cases. That said this video almost makes me feel as old as when a kid asked me what the heck a "game boi" was T_T

The moment you happen to be European and be much more familiar with scart than an IT channel...

The SCART connector was actually relatively good and highly scalable. In Italy it was the standard for literally everything. The main problem of it though, was that since the cable itself was very thick and heavy, and the plug didn't have any type of locking mechanism, the weight of the cable usually ended up ruining the connector because of the extreme stress on the plug. Then your port would begin to make poor contact and you would get all sorts of noise and stuff, after many years of use you usually ended up constantly messing with the plug, trying to improve the connection. Sadly this could have been fixed by just planning a couple of screws like for VGA cables.

God the CRT clunk at 2:35 takes me back!

Man I remember plugging scart into my dvd, ps2, vhs Those were the days

You know life is missing something when you get excited about a youtube video with Anthony talking about cables you know very well already.

13W3 was widely used by Sun and SGI equipment from the early-mid 90s. I had second hand Sun SS10s and an SGI Indy that I needed 13W3 to VGA adapters for. Thanks for the trip down memory lane!

As a French, I remember so much these fucking PERITEL cables 😂 They where just everywhere ! They where *HUGE* a bit heavy and stiff lol. But strangely, I never had any trouble with them, apart from being bulky and sometimes hard to keep in place when moving the TV.

SCART is awesome, especially when a lot of devices knew that you only had one SCART-connector on the back of your television, so you could daisy-chain the signal I will always remember my Wii->(DVD/VCR)->DTV->CRT set EDIT: it was basically HDMI before digital signals were commonly used for TV

I didn’t know the SCART cable was only European, I’m 24 and in the UK we used it for everything when I was younger and my parents tv still uses it for their sky box

Everything Anthony does is gold. He's the embodiment of "that guy" that everyone knows! Also doesn't take himself too seriously and his on-screen persona is basically who he is when he is behind the camera.

SCART (called the Euro plug in my parts of the wood) was both genius and cursed. On one hand, both audio and video in one cable (something we really take for granted this days) on the other hand, it was a real pain in the ass to maneuver behind the furniture to connect the VCR to the tv.

Correction on the scart spreading through europe graphic: it was in common use in the nordic countries as well not just continental europe. In fact you can still find them on new TVs along HDMI etc because it was popular for so long if you want to use some old console or DVD player etc you'd need one or to convert to HDMI

This needs to be longer tbh.

I could hear Anthony talk about retro video game tech for hours. Really happy rn

Literally used a SCART cable last week, plugging in my old dvd player to watch some boxsets I don't have access to via streaming (and because the dvd player in my TV is ridiculously loud). Image quality was pretty good, considering I'm so used to HD content over the last few years. Excellent cable for its time.

The great thing about scart is that most crt televisions from Europe have the scart connector on the back, allowing you to connect up a modern TV router and watch HD channels and Netflix!

Anthony you skip S-Video connector! I remember as a kid hooking my NVIDIA video card to analog TV with that connector. My parents get super proud when I can watch any movie from Internet on that old TV :)

love watching even older videos with Anthony! His love and knowledge of tech is addictive and mind-blowing ... what a wonderful guy

I had a bunch of used Macs growing up. Daisy chaining SCSI devices, terminating the bus and setting SCSI IDs properly are things I learned to do when I was like... Around 10 years old.

I'll just add myself to the pile of europeans SCART was my whole childhood, standard do-it-all cables, every house had at least 3 of them lying around xD

As a broadcast engineer I love this episode

I'm so excited that HDbaseT is getting recognition, we used them in my high school for our broadcasting class when we had to send signals from across the school, or even across the property. Was awesome having dedicated untapped ethernet lines to simply plug into, that ran back into our ops room.

SCART was ubiquitous here in the UK, and it was an awesome connection. Fantastic image quality.

Scart was very user friendly. Most devices would allow for pass-through, so you could chain all of them together and only one of them eventually connected to the TV. And tv's would automatically switch to Scart input when a signal turned on. I still have a dvd player and vcr connected to my TV with Scart.

When i was a kid, my dad used the dip switches on the monitor cable as a way of locking me out of the computer :(

I did the DiCaprio point meme IRL when I saw the HDBaseT. It's like I'm back at the office!

Ooh, interesting to hear you mention HDBase-T! I'm actually using Extron DTP myself in my home theater setup (the photo at 2:50 looks like an Extron switcher device). With the switching equipment in my basement server rack, and 4-way HDMI distribution amp, DTP allowed me to connect the my projector and all the TVs in my house to a common signal feed, simply by running Cat6 cables to each TV, and having DTP Rx 230's on the back of each screen.

Obsure video connections: *shows Scart* Me as a European 🤔

I remember when I and a friend were the unofficial “tech support” for whenever our teachers needed to plug in a laptop to the projector.

While it was a (somewhat) common computer interface (especially on Apple devices), it is less widely known that Firewire / i.Link / IEEE-1394 was used for transporting compressed SD and HD video signals between video devices. This is how I was able to record and play back ISDB-T and ISDB-S programs on D-VHS deck and RCA Scenium HDD deck from/to my (JDM) Sony TV circa 2005-2010. In the U.S., some cable boxes supported Firewire for a period of time if I remember correctly. DV camcorders also supported the interface.

that last releases of the xbox 360 came with a cable that was standard RCA on one end and an audio jack on the other for video, you can use an HDMI cable. one thing i figured out was you could plug headphones into the port and have working audio, you just couldn't change it (no my knowledge) and for those wondering, i have no clue if i could use a mic in that port for online as i never had xbox live at the time and most people were on the xbox one

As a uk fella, scart was an amazing thing. Perfect RGB picture for all the crappy pal conversions we got.

I only started using HDMI about 5 years ago. Before then Scart was all I knew. I still refer to HDMI as a ‘Scart Lead’ by accident sometimes lol.

I always liked the DVI cable - as it included VGA as well as digital. Other noteworthy video connectors that I can think of SVGA / CGA / EGA and going further there's a couple of coaxial standards too.

I must admit having a chuckle whenever I hear someone across from the pond call SCART 'obscure'. It was basically the standard video connector in Europe for several decades. Pretty much every single TV, DVD player, VCR, etc came with one or more connectors for it until well after 2000. Many of the HD and even 4K TV's sold here still offer a way to connect up SCART equipment. Some retail stores still stock the cables to this day, even though HD TV's have been the standard for around 15 years now. That's how ubiquitous it was ;)

I still use RF every so often for my NES 😂 it gives off that *feel* of old school console gaming. Also shoutout for S-Video!

Might've been worth mentioning that Japan also used the "SCART Connector" ie physically the same 21 pin connector, but with a different pinout standard, which enthusiasts today generally refer to as JP-21 The standards are physically but not electrically compatible, so you can have a SCART setup or a JP-21 setup, but you can't mix and match

Every time I see the amount of different Connection Cables/types we had for Printers and all kinds of different Peripheral Devices back in the Day (and remember the Difficulties setting them up in Windows...), I'm really happy about the existence of USB once again.

Interesting about the 13W3 connector. It's in the exact format for the windshield anti-ice (main power) plug on a Textron (Cessna) Citation Mustang jet. If you look up a datasheet on mouser (P/N: DAA3W3PK87F0) the diagram looks exactly the same. Only difference is that the 3 shielded RGB plugs are a 10 AWG pin to carry the current.

I remember the Scart, here in Spain we called it "Euroconector", you could translate it to Universal Connector and oh boy, that brings up memories with VHS

I’d love to see a version of this talking about BNC and fiber channel. You know all the stuff you probably use there.

Working AV i love my DVI. Just for the screw on connection making it bomb proof if equipment has to be moved during production. That DP is locking is its only grace, but i can not get over how many times there is a problem with hand shakes getting missed. But our newer mixer all come with DP for bigger resolution. Nice informative video!

0:11 I love how from any possible RCA cable, instead of just a regular one that has the same conectors at both sides he decided to pull off a Wii RCA cable

I remember seeing a lot of 13W3 on old Sun workstations (late 90s, I think). BNC would be another interesting connector to feature. Thank you as ever for a great video, Anthony. I admire your retro SCART devotion!

i remember the mind blowing jump in picture quality when i upgraded my Amiga 500 from the shoddy tv modulator to a SCART connector...

SCART was great. Advanced VCRs even had multiple SCART sockets so you could daisy-chain devices (e.g. consoles, or even DVD players) as earlier TVs usually only had one SCART. That also let you rip DVDs to VHS, or copy VHS tapes between two VCRs, etc. The downside of SCART was that the pins were wobbly and flexible. The amount of SCART cables I've had with pins that fell out or bent because they wobbled out of position while trying to insert it... In the UK, both of my Samsung smart TVs still support SCART input.

SCART connectors were so common in Greece, that you could buy ( and still can) unsoldered connectors of all types from your local electronics store . M/F case mount / PCB mount / right angle / for making cables etc

I'm Turkish and I still use Scart on my little CRT television. It was, and still way popular

For me SCART was as used at the time as HDMI is being used right now (and idk why, but most of the people I know we called it "Euroconnector")

As a French, SCART is so common here for so many years that even on my brand new LED TV, there is still one present... Near ALL video devices were using it: VCR, DVD players, cameras, all 8/16 bits consoles, and even some 32 bits consoles too. It was common to see a console shipped with a cable equipped with a little box in the middle to output native SCART signal - which was a packaged RCA->SCART convertor, in fact, but "hidden" - when the console wasn't directly built with a native SCART-compatible output (European versions of these consoles, not surprisingly). My Sega Genesis (Megadrive here) have an adapter on its output cable, while my Nintendo SNES (Super Nintendo here) have a native SCART cable. My TurboGrafx, Japan import, have RCA connections. It's even funny to see that our TV were often lacking RCA or SVHS inputs, but a SCART was a normal, expected thing - my last cathodic TV even had THREE scart inputs! We were often very upset when a device (an import console, for example) had only RCA connectors... So I still have a SCART plug with 3 RCA female connectors to adapt them - still plugged to my TurboGrafx, in fact. Since HDMI is a common thing, we rely mostly on little conversion boxes to handle all these "old" connections... I have one, which can take VGA, RCA, SVHS, SCART, antenna and convert them to HDMI, so pluging an old device is extremely easy even on an extremely modern TV. Without any surprise, it don't make picture better (antenna signal is still a mess, while VGA or consoles SCART output is very clear), but it handles resolution and aspect ratio automatically.

Growing up in Australia, I remember seeing SCART in the original Xbox days, only on high end rear projection TV's of the day. Always wondered what the deal was there... thanks for filling in that gap!

13w3 was popular on Sun Workstations too... used it on 20" Sony Trinitrons that you needed two people to carry

I love when Anthony nerds out on a subject I don't know anything about. It is always a fun video and I get to learn something new.

As an American living in the EU SCART is in use still on some equipment. That second connector 13W3 was used by industrial electronics, I even had a Briefcase mobile phone in the seventies that used it to connect the mobile phone to the external antenna via the single coaxial connector while the rest of the pins provided power and a link to an external control head up front in the vehicle.

A lot of households in Greece still have the SCART because some years back we changed from analog to digital tv and converters or decoders were needed,. These decoders connect to older televisions with the SCART connector, newer models have the decoder built into them.

Anthony's knowledge unmeasurable. His voice is like angel.

When I was a kid someone at the video game store I was a regular at kept referring to them as SHART cables, so thats pretty much what I call them now.

Having worked in the commercial AV installation, I used to install a bunch of HDBaseT systems for businesses and high end home systems. I even installed some 8K compatible systems that ran off fiber optic instead of Ethernet. That was for an NBA player who spent $750,000 on just one home cinema room that had a $350,000 8K projector and 32 speakers with Dolby Atmos.

As Italian born in late 80s I grow up with the scart connector! Almost all console from 90s had a RCA to scart adapter...

Ah yes Scart my TV still has a Scart connection on the back

POV: You’ve been scrolling for an hour trying to find a comment not mentioning SCART

I definetly missed them DVI-Quad Link, these DVI conectors found on some GPUs which only had space for one connector yet featured up to 4 monitors, also DVI in general its such a nice system with multiple screens via one cable and stuff

I don’t know I really loved SCART it was so good. Always worked, was on everything, had nice angled cables, looked great, cables and connectors were reparable with a soldering iron. What else can I say

Ahhhh the good old days when we moved around the dvd player with scart around the house.

I remember those 13W3 connectors from my SGI and Sun workstation days...

At my old job we dealt with all kinds of equipment for a big blue computer manufacturer and I recall running across a SCART connector or cable and had no idea what it was. Now I know!

I had a Mac with the “weird VGA” cable but it was for one of those super good monochrome 1 page displays, I loved typing on that thing because it was so clear and easy to read.

Oh… Seeing Scart again is just SOO nostalgic! Remember plugging my old STB into my old Panasonic TV using that thing

Plugin in the SCART connector blindly wasn't an easy task! I always had to take the VHS player out of the shelf to plug it in. I still have a few of those around in the house.

Scart had really nice features. For exemple, there's a pin where a +12 signal tell the TV to use the VCR(for example) as image source, and switch automatically to it. No need to manual change the channel or Input 1 / Input 2, etc.

I agree that SCART is a good standard, but the actual physical connectors could be a bit finicky. The pins were often wobbly, meaning they either got bent during insertion, or even got pushed back into the housing, so you would have to take the housing apart and push the offending pins back into place from the rear. The higher end cables were better quality, but they could be pretty expensive.

Fun fact: In spain we call SCART "Euroconector"

You missed one that I liked: S-Video as well as one that "changed everything"; my original PC link cable, where you could connect 2 PCs together via the COM port and play together with a friend. (and also transfer files from one PC to another at "blazing" speeds)

I'm always here to watch Anthony talk about his retro gaming interests.

Scart was great! The communication capabilities were pretty nifty. I remember it was possible to program a VHS recorder to automatically turn on and record a certain movie with a code that some channels sent via the sat signal and which was included in TV papers so you could type it in via the remote. (if your receiver and VHS recorder were compatible with that, of course)

In europe scart was about as popular as hdmi is now in all honesty it's kinda like it's analogue equivalent. Rgb picture from them is still really nice if you can upscale it correctly or have a compatible crt monitor. One of the cool things it did was telling the display whether it should display something in widescreen or 4x3, very handy for anamorphic resolutions.

hell yea, this is a subject I am interested in too bad none of the weird DVI relatives made it in, these tend to get wild

I remember the 13w3 connectors. They were also used with Sun Workstations in the 90's. The monitor that I used to use with it could probably have doubled for a 40 megaton bomb is dropped from the sky... the dam thing was hit by a forklift in the warehouse.... barely scratched the case...

Ooooh man. I could talk about connectors for hours. I worked in a retail store before, that's known to have good knowledge and assortment of connectors and cables. I had many times customers that came in with an obscure connector and wanted a replacement or another question about it. One of the most obscure I got was a connector that connected the panel from a BO TV to the TV box. I don't remember what I found out then, but think it was a MDR36. Had to count pins and scourge ebay to give the customer a hint of what cable to get. Not easily found. And I can tell you, there are a lot of connectors in the world... Personally I have a fascination for RF connectors, especially SMA that have nice max frequency capacity for the size. And the engineering in durable MIL-spec connectors aswell. But we have come a long way, and think that USB C is the one and only connector we should need in this future that we live in.