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VGA Laid to Rest in 2015 with Transition to DisplayPort, HDMI
Various PC makers will be laying the VGA port to rest in 2015 and transitioning their computers–desktops and laptops–to the digital DisplayPort and HDMI protocols in 2015. AMD, Dell, Intel, Lenovo, and LG all have announced that they will be dropping the analog VGA and LVDS connections in the company’s AMD and Intel-based computing products.
Digital standards consume less power and support better resolutions and colors than the analog protocols, which were introduced over 20 years ago. Chipmakers Intel and AMD will remove support for the LVDS protocol starting in 2013 in the company’s PC processors, and VGA will begin to disappear in 2015.
DisplayPort will be used in the industry for computer monitors and HDMI will mostly be used on HDTVs. VGA support has largely continued as a legacy interface that’s still popular and widely used in many enterprise environments, especially for monitors and projectors. The newer digital DisplayPort technology is backward compatible with VGA through the use of adapters.
Today, many tablets and smartphones support HDMI output, either natively, through a dock, or via an adapter cable.
Via: Electronista
Yogh
12/09/2010 at 9:16 pm
Finally, DisplayPort is managing to do what DVI failed at.
Tim Hutchinson
12/10/2010 at 12:15 am
While I’m happy to have tech move forward, I’m also a bit annoyed that my PC purchase after 2015 will mean I’ll need to replace my 2-year old (then 7 year old) 24″ monitor. For the average PC user, I haven’t seen the benefit of digital outputs compared to analog. Since today’s monitors stick to 1920×1080, it’s not like the higher resolution argument holds any water. Colors are again not terribly differentiated between a digital and analog monitor from my experiences, especially with TN panels. Using less power could be a good argument, but I’d like to know how much more efficient it actually is.
Also, how about we actually get some DisplayPort monitors into retail stores? All the ones I carry are VGA/DVI, with a few optionally featuring HDMI.
Cuhulin
12/10/2010 at 12:32 am
There are adapters to take displayport and DVI to VGA monitors. While I am stunned to find out that a 2008 24″ monitor came without a digital connection, the adapters should allow it to continue to be connected.
Whether it will still work adequately when 7 years old seems like a more significant question. I find that the power circuits on these things tend to give out more quickly than that.
Tim Hutchinson
12/10/2010 at 7:08 pm
It has a digital connection in the form of DVI, as do pretty much all monitors sold currently. I just happen to be using that connector for other purposes, and of course would need an adapter for that as well.
I guess my point is, we’ve made the pledge to abandon a standard before we’ve started seeing it’s replacement actually existing on retail products. DVI has been around on plenty of pieces, but I’ve yet to see DisplayPort on anything but a few Apple and Dell monitors. Basically, it seems they’ve set a timeline that will be requiring a large segment of the market to be buying adapters, instead of actually starting to work the standard into the market first.
As for longevity, my previous Samsung 19″ is still functioning perfectly, and I think it must be about 6 years old now?
Anonymous
12/18/2010 at 6:54 am
I won’t be complaining as long as the VGA adapters do their job and let me drive my FD Trinitron G1s to their full potential (like 1600×1200 at 95 Hz compared to the EDID’s conservative 75 Hz) without breaking the bank.
Yes, I still use CRTs. Can’t beat high-end aperture grilles in terms of bang for the buck regarding image quality, especially gaming.