Before the television served to watch TV. It’s logical. But today, the television has become a peripheral that works for everything: watch DTT channels, cable television or Internet (IPTV), play games through consoles or installed on the TV itself, surf the internet, get information online through installed applications… Come on, the television has become a hybrid, a kind of computer that does everything. It is not surprising that there are those who, having a smartphone, tablet and/or smart TV, dispense with a computer at home.
But at the turn of the last century, televisions were bulky, did what they did, and depended on you hooking them up to an antenna or, at most, a set-top box. What’s more, to play, you had to connect the console on duty to the TV. For its part, the computer was king in other sections, and both technologies lived in parallel albeit with much in common. Both televisions and computer monitors were based on same CRT technology that made them so bulky. LCD and TFT technologies have been around since the 1960s, but were not in the hands of consumers until the end of the 20th century.
Interestingly, in the 1980s, televisions and computers lived a moment of idyll and cooperation with the launch of the first home computers. Computers that were actually game consoles, like the Atari 400 and 800, the Spectrum or the Commodore, devices that brought all integrated in the keyboard and that they needed a television screen to function. However, and in parallel, most of the sector opted to offer home computers that integrated a monitor. A way of avoid disputes at home to see who controlled the TV. Mixing both worlds was not good.
The best of two worlds
Let’s return to the present briefly. If you have a computer at home, or a smartphone or tablet, you don’t need a television to “tune in” to television channels. Almost all of them are accessible via the web or through official or third-party applications. Even pay TV platforms offer their content via web and apps. What’s more, current monitors have little to envy to television screens. For a small price you can get a sizable monitor that plays Full HD content. And if you scratch your pocket a little more, there are also them in 4K. The fact is that the Internet has eliminated the barriers that separated computers from televisions.
However, in the last decade of the last century, television was still make the leap to digital. So to watch television content, the only way was to tune in to the channel on duty. The web pages of the channels were in their infancy or did not exist at all. If you wanted to watch television from your computer, the solution was to install a TV tuner card. And the result was not always the desired one. But with some skill and a good card, you could turn your computer into a television. Some manufacturers thought it was a good idea create a hybrid computer to do both functions. On paper, the idea was very good. But in practice, it did not always come to fruition.
Macintosh TV (1993)
The beginnings are not easy. Today, all televisions have a CPU, RAM, a storage unit, WiFi tuner, Ethernet connectivity and a long list of components that were previously exclusive to computers. All thanks to miniaturization. But to get to that point, we have had to come across experiments like the MacintoshTV.
It was launched in October 1993 and by February 1994 it was discontinued. As I explained in a previous article in which I talk at length about this hybrid computer that combined PC and TV, the main reason it did not work on the market was its high price. Yes, it was two devices in one. But the price was not worth it. And that on plane was a good piece of equipment: 14-inch Sony Trinitron CRT screen, 640 x 480 resolution, integrated TV tuner card, CD player, remote control… But only 10,000 units were manufactured.
It was not easy to unite television technology, completely analog at that time, with the digital technology of computers. The result was an expensive machine that not everyone could afford in that distant 1993. Furthermore, the idea of integrate television and computer had little appeal at a time when they did not yet exist TikTok, YouTube, Twitch or P2P services that allow sharing multimedia content. Come on, watching television on your computer did not have too many advantages over watching it on a regular television.
The point is that the MacintoshTV served to learn from the mistake. The integrated TV card was incorporated into later models, already cheaper. And all the knowledge acquired related to the integration of computer and television we have been seeing over the years with the AppleTV.
ICL Fujitsu PC TV (1995)
But if we talk about uniting the best of two worlds, computer and television, a name that always appears is that of the ICL Fujitsu PC TV, released two years after the Macintosh TV. A project in which the Japanese Fujitsu and the British ICL participated. By then, the British had already been bought by Fujitsu after more than a decade collaborating on various projects.
What did the ICL Fujitsu PC TV offer? Outside, a 14-inch screen with integrated speakers, controls typical of a television, CD player and floppy drive. To control it, a keyboard that integrated a trackball instead of a mouse. And inside, a 486DX2 processor, video card with 1 MB of RAM, 4 MB of RAM (expandable to 64 MB), Sound Blaster compatible sound card….
According to a news item at the time in the English newspaper independentthe ICL Fujitsu PC TV it had support for teletext (and for Ceefax, the English equivalent created by the BBC). You could also play music from the CD player and, as a computer, it used the Windows operating system. Its price, £1,500. In statements by those responsible for ICL, “it is what would be paid for a powerful multimedia computer”. The editor of the news adds, “others would say that it is a very expensive television.” The computer also included specific software for tune the channels of television and allowed connect external devices via serial port, parallel port, mini jack port, joystick/MIDI port, etc.
Although I have not been able to find exact figures, everything indicates that this hybrid computer was not a great success either. The reason, the same one that ended the Macintosh TV: its high price. The cost of offering a very complete product with a very expensive technology and focused on a domestic audience that was not left with money.
Gateway 2000 Destination PC (1996)
But it’s not all bad news. There was a television computer that did attract attention. To the point that it made Compaq Computer was considering creating his own hybrid computer that would combine a PC and a television. Something that I do not know if it came to be forged or not. The point is that there was a off road multimedia computer which was better accepted than the previous ones. Its about Gateway 2000 Destinationa giant in every sense made by the computer manufacturer Gatewaywhich in 2007 was bought by steel.
Founded in 1985 as Gateway 2000, in 1996 launched what would be the first of several hybrid computers that acted as a computer and a television. An all in one for the whole family, as long as they can afford it. With prices ranging from 2,500 to 5,000 US dollars, the Gateway Destination it stood out mainly for its screen, a 31-inch Mitsubishi CRT monitor. For the time, a portent of screen.
Sold exclusively in the United States, its advertising was focused on all audiences. For the home but also for education, for companies… In short, it was used for everything. And the PC part also imposed. It featured a keyboard with an integrated trackpad, a wireless remote control, and an imposing horizontal tower with floppy drive and CD player. The more expensive versions also included speakers and even stereo sound system. It also incorporated a modem. And in the software section covered all fronts with a Microsoft pack that had Windows, Microsoft Works, Encarta and other applications like Quicken, for finances.
Gateway 2000 managed to succeed where others had failed. Although their prices were also high, the monitors already offered a considerable size It was well worth the investment. In addition, the internet was beginning to emerge, which, as a whole, amortized the price. Such was the success of the Gateway Destination that others jumped on the bandwagon. In an article from PC Magazine of 1997 there is a comparison of several of these television computers, such as the ELLiVision Gammathe Toshiba Infinia 7201 or the nettv world vision.
And then came digital TV and the internet
The three models of television computer that we have seen exemplify very well the brief history of this type of hybrid computer. They were born at a time of transition between analog and digital television. That for one thing. On the other hand, something called the internet was beginning to emerge and nobody knew very well what it would be used for. And that, in the end, has turned out to be a channel through which many consume television today.
Although in the first half of the 1990s, the first hybrid computers did not have the expected success, in the second half they were rewarded thanks to the larger screens and the introduction of the internet. Combined, they made the high price of these devices more than offset by their many features. However, his life was rather short for several reasons.
Technologies such as DTT or internet television (IPTV), in principle, should have helped the emergence of more computers with television capabilities, since analog signal became digital. However, early tuners were expensive and could not yet be integrated into a computer. And to this we must add the arrival of devices such as TiVo either Web TV, which were cheaper, were connected to the television and allowed to watch television but also to access online content. All this through a subscription that, on occasions, was integrated with your television or internet provider.
Still, hybrid computers provided a way to integrate computer and television in an analog age where it wasn’t so simple. A first effort that we have seen rewarded with devices such as Apple TV, Amazon Fire TV either chrome cast. And, finally, with the current Smart TVs that act as television and computer thanks to the apps installed by default and the ability to connect keyboards and other peripherals via Bluetooth.