Of course there’s buffers. Once RAM got cheap enough to have a buffer to represent the whole screen, everyone did that. That was in the late 80s/early 90s.
There’s some really bad misconceptions about how latency works on screens.
Those are on the graphics adapter. Not in the CRT.
You can update the framebuffer faster than the CRT can draw. That’s when you get tearing. Same VSync then as now.
CRTs (apart from some exceptions) did not have a display buffer. The analog display signal is used to directly control the output of each electron gun in the CRT, without any digital processing happening in-between. The computer on the other end however does have display buffers, just like they do now; however eliminating extra buffers (like those used by modern monitors) does reduce latency.
Of course there’s buffers. Once RAM got cheap enough to have a buffer to represent the whole screen, everyone did that. That was in the late 80s/early 90s.
There’s some really bad misconceptions about how latency works on screens.
Those are on the graphics adapter. Not in the CRT.
You can update the framebuffer faster than the CRT can draw. That’s when you get tearing. Same VSync then as now.
CRTs (apart from some exceptions) did not have a display buffer. The analog display signal is used to directly control the output of each electron gun in the CRT, without any digital processing happening in-between. The computer on the other end however does have display buffers, just like they do now; however eliminating extra buffers (like those used by modern monitors) does reduce latency.
Doesn’t matter. Having a buffer means either the buffer must be full before drawing, or you get screen tearing. It wasn’t like racing the beam.