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Your Guide to RCA Cables

 RCA cables have been around for years now. People still use these cables because they are necessary to connect old television and VCRs, among other things. 

A look back at RCA Cables:

RCA cables came into existence in 1930 by Radio Corporation of America. Their primary purpose was to connect record players to AM radios. They were widely used for home audio for years. They had an immense growth for home audio equipment for decades, and an RCA cable found its way in 1980 to connect VCRs and game systems to televisions. Because of its versatility, RCA cables were part of every home. 

Talking about today:

The design provides a solution for low-bandwidth audio, so it's not surprising that it's abandoned today. RCA cables don't offer enough shielding for an HD video application. But, the way we construct them makes it very expensive to create high-quality cables; the F connector is a go-to solution for transferring HD digital video. Every cable and satellite operation in the world uses it. It's possible to get adapters and put RCA connectors on coaxial cables.

Component Video: 

Component videos carried high definition video and audio over separate channels. Once cable carried black and white video signals, while the other two carry color signals, and 4th and 5th carry left and right audio channels. Component video cannot work for customers who want a single cable to do all the work. 

The evolution of cables for audio video has come from the need to get more out of a smaller size, and by reducing the number of ports used on devices.  The lesser the ports, the thinner the device can be. This evolution has also changed the display technology and overall media consumption. It is a domino effect.  

What's next with RCA cable?

RCA cables are not in line for any updates since the audio video data has moved on to digital with newer cables like HDMI and DisplayPort. Not only that televisions don’t have RCA ports, there is hardly a separate use of things like DVD players that also used to use RCA cables. Streaming sticks directly plug into the HDMI port or the USB port on newer TVs. If you are still looking to connect old devices to your TV, you will need to use adapters with the older cables. 

Is an RCA cable the same as a Coaxial cable?

Coaxial digital cable, as the name suggests, carries a digital signal. The connector’s form factor is the same as the RCA connector. It uses electrical signals and the aluminium foil makes for a shield from interference. Coaxial digital cables are a little more expensive than traditional RCA cables. 

While you can use RCA in place of coaxial digital, it is not ideal since the coaxial cable’s bandwidth and shield cannot match the RCA. RCA cannot sustain the signal quality over a great distance. While different RCA cables carry different channels, a single digital coaxial cable carries all the signals.

There are various coaxial cables like rg59 coaxial cable, rg6, rg 11 coaxial cables, and many more.

Today, over a passage of time, use of RCA has decreased. They are now replaced by HDMI, DVI, and fiber optics which are fast, simple, and provide easy connections. Whereas, on other side coaxial cables are still useful but not for household appliances. Coaxial cables provide a multitude of advantages in cost, range, and shielding for RF installations.

To summarize about RCA and coaxial cables we can say:

  • RCA is a connector standard whereas coaxial is a type of cable
  • RCA cable use coaxial cables
  • Coaxial cables do have other uses apart from RCA
  • Coaxial cables are still useful

Hope this guide helped you to better understand the basics of RCA cables and you get the best one on your next purchase.

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