3 ms·

Because LaserDisc could hold high quality video?

• actionfromafar 3y ago
  Yes, that, but also that it was easier and cheaper to master and control an analogue signal than pushing that much video and sound data digitally through a computer.
  • TerrifiedMouse 3y ago
    You could store and playback video from a CD … it looked like crap though. The best computers could handle back then was MPEG-1 video which it was really really blocky at CD bit rates. Double whammy of lack of storage and lack of processing power. Things finally got good enough with DVD that had 7x-13x the storage and MPEG-2 was available.
    • actionfromafar 3y ago
      The CD came a decade before MPEG-1, though.
    • CharlesW 3y ago
      > The best computers could handle back then was MPEG-1 video… Fun fact: MPEG-1 decode needed enough horsepower that software decode implementations shipped several years after popular-for-CD-ROM video formats like Cinepak¹. The timeline: Cinepak shipped as part of QuickTime in 1992. Myst (a very popular CD-ROM title which used Cinepak) shipped in 1993. Apple shipped their MPEG-1 QuickTime extension (PowerPC-only) in 1997. ¹ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinepak https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinepak