Mondo Knows Facts
Mechanical television used a spinning disc
A spinning perforated disc scanned the picture one line at a time Early television systems used a Nipkow disc, a spinning plate with a spiral of holes, to scan an image line by line and rebuild it at the receiver. John Logie Baird's demonstrations relied on the principle. The picture was small and dim, and all-electronic scanning soon replaced it. It sits in Mondo's movies & tv collection, one of 200 facts that each trace back to the reference below.
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Facts that can change over time are reviewed and updated. If something here looks wrong, Mondo would rather know than be confidently incorrect.
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The iconoscope was the first practical TV camera tubeVladimir Zworykin's tube stored a light image as electric chargeCoaxial cable built the first TV networksAT&T linked stations by cable so programmes could reach many citiesKinescopes filmed live television off a screenA camera pointed at a monitor preserved broadcasts before videotapeVideotape arrived in 1956Ampex demonstrated a machine that recorded television pictures on magnetic tapeAmerican colour television was standardised in 1953The FCC approved a compatible system that black-and-white sets could still receiveBBC Two began colour broadcasts in 1967Britain launched a full 625-line colour service on BBC Two in 1967
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Tags: television, history, baird
Mechanical television used a spinning disc: the short answers
- Where does this come from, and can I check it?
- A spinning perforated disc scanned the picture one line at a time. The figure is taken from Science and Media Museum, which is linked in full on this page. Every fact on Mondo Knows names its source rather than repeating an unsourced claim.
- Is this really a movies & tv fact?
- Yes. It sits on the Movies & TV shelf, one of 2,600 sourced facts grouped into space, animals, the human body, history, science and more. Category pages collect every fact in the same field.
- What else can I read about it?
- The links under the fact point to a quiz, game, puzzle or calculator on the same subject, and the shelf below shows related facts. The wording here is original, and quoted phrases are marked as quotations.