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Not to dismiss the X-files team, but 16:9 was already around when they started. Just not in the states. Japan started getting 16:9 CRTs in the early 90s, Europe followed in the mid 90s. America lagged another half decade and effectively skipped 16:9 CRTs mostly going straight to plasma/lcd.

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The first 16:9 content I ever saw was the trailer to "Batman Forever" (with Val Kilmer) in 1995 when I was working at C-Cube Microsystems. The studios use to send them test content all the time for video compression testing. It was on D1 tape, and looked beautiful for SD resolution. The professional Sony CRT 4:3 monitors back then had a 16:9 button to letterbox the image.

Japan has been ahead of the curve on a lot of home media related technology, not least because they manufactured a lot of it.

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