### Author:  [@mala](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mala)
#### Post date: [November 18, 2003, 6:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-it-called-a-tv-set-if-there-is-only-one/213861/1 "2003-11-18T06:39:54Z")
I know this seems like a silly question, but what does the ‘set’ in television set refer to?
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### Author:  [@The\_Ryan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Ryan)
#### Post date: [November 18, 2003, 7:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-it-called-a-tv-set-if-there-is-only-one/213861/2 "2003-11-18T07:29:25Z")
I would assume it refers to the collection of devices which compose the TV (cathode ray tube, magnets, antenna, etc.)
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### Author:  [@DarrenS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DarrenS)
#### Post date: [November 18, 2003, 7:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-it-called-a-tv-set-if-there-is-only-one/213861/3 "2003-11-18T07:30:31Z")
It’s just one of the many meanings of “set” (which I believe is the word in the English language with the most meanings in the OED).
From [www-m-w.com](http://www-m-w.com):
> [@](#):
>
> Main Entry: 2set
> Function: noun
> 22 : an apparatus of electronic components assembled so as to function as a unit \
So perhaps the answer to your question is that “set” refers to the collection of components that make up the TV.
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### Author:  [@Grousser](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grousser)
#### Post date: [November 18, 2003, 7:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-it-called-a-tv-set-if-there-is-only-one/213861/4 "2003-11-18T07:44:36Z")
Then we have a computer set, a videocassette recorder set, a dvd player set and a refrigerator set, among other sets. 😉
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### Author:  [@stuyguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stuyguy)
#### Post date: [November 18, 2003, 9:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-it-called-a-tv-set-if-there-is-only-one/213861/5 "2003-11-18T09:01:25Z")
Remember, TV was a direct descendant of radio. Hobbyists had radio (or “wireless”) “sets” that were a collection of distinct components: the battery(s) (often several jars of acid, not the small snap-in “dry cells” we all know today), the receiver, an antenna (another throwback monstrosity: often a clothesline-type affair), headphones, and – if you wanted to transmit too – a telegraph key. (Which brings up another point… I would not be surprised if radio borrowed the term “set” from the ye olde non-wireless telegraph, another arrangement that required many separate batteries and a key, at least.)
It’s no great leap that the lingo that described these early component radios stuck through the era of the all-in-one radio-in-a-box to the age of the TV-in-a-box.
The _real_ question, IMO, is whether “set” was introduced by early radio (or telegraph) practicioners to describe a collection of components (as in, “I have a new set of batteries”) or as a shorthand of the term “setup.”
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### Author:  [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker)
#### Post date: [November 18, 2003, 1:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-it-called-a-tv-set-if-there-is-only-one/213861/6 "2003-11-18T13:10:52Z")
And to add just a little more, I remember from my high school French class that the French call a radio “poste de radio” and a TV “poste de television,” which I guess roughly translates to “radio set” and “television set.”
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### Author:  [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)
#### Post date: [November 18, 2003, 2:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-it-called-a-tv-set-if-there-is-only-one/213861/7 "2003-11-18T14:02:31Z")
We forget these things were named a long time ago and terminological fashion changes.
As someone already pointed out, “TV set” was probably a derivitive of “radio set.” “Radio set” was coined somewhere around 1895 when Marconi built the first experimental transmitter & receiver that actually worked.
Read any book on any topic written around then and you’ll find a lot of language usage that sounds weird to our 21st century ears. Not undecipherable, just a little off. Someone from back then would be just as mystified at our language today.
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### Author:  [@gotpasswords](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gotpasswords)
#### Post date: [November 18, 2003, 5:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-it-called-a-tv-set-if-there-is-only-one/213861/8 "2003-11-18T17:18:55Z")
Way back whenever it was that TV was just starting out, the TV set truly was a set of boxes. The tuner section in the earliest sets was a converted radio receiver, adapted to handle video as well as sound. The picture tube and its high-voltage power lived in another box.