VCR/VHS Forum

No such forum ever on AVS and whenever the subject comes up the answer has always been(by senior moderators as well as David the site founder) why bother at this point. Not saying whether I agree with this or not but thats the way it is.
The default forum for VHS talk has always been here in the DVDR forum, if your talking about DVHS then it's been in the HDTV Recorders forum over here.

What recent interest? Not being a prig but I don't see how VCRs can compete against modern technology. DVD has at least twice the resolution of VHS or Beta, isn't subject to self-erasure, mildew, stretching and edge damage and is smaller/lighter/easier to transport and store.

You can make a case for retro technology with CD vs. LP, tube vs. solid state, etc., but I fail to see any benefit from videotape.

Only One Thing Wrong with HDD DVDRs: Slow But Inevitable Loss of Mechanical Skills!

Sadly, among the MANY benefits of a HDD DVDR, there will also be a point of no return for many:

If and when you go to set up your old VCR to record something, you will most likely forget to insert a tape!

Please try to remember this procedure for when you really want to "tape" something on your VCR or the one in the local museum:

1. Do all procedures the same as setting a HDD DVDR to record something.
   
   
2. INSERT A TAPE... you know, those big plastic cases with little windows on top so you can make sure that thin, tapey-looking stuff is all on the left side!
   
   
3. Take your heartburn med and prepare yourself for playback hell... you won't like it!

Wow you must be a young lad compared to many of us grand pa types here- who used to regularly play 8-track tapes in our vehicles as teenagers.

I always had the same question, I thought that the Tape forum (VHS/Beta/SuperBeta/Betacam/Video8/Super8...) was something like a TABU or secret place for this AV forum, not available for new users, I mean this place was established in 1995... so, thanks for the answer.

Teenagers? I had an 8-track in the car well into my 20's. I had an 8-track recorder (one of those sun-on-the-beaches) and recorded all of my own custom tapes. After manually fixing my car player for the 3rd time, I finally threw down my screwdriver & went out to buy the cheapest car cassette player I could find.

Hey,maybe we could start an 8-track recorder forum?

Hey, there are still folks out there who collect 8-track tapes and hardware. I remember them, but I'm young enough not to have had one in a car. An enduring memory of my childhood is seeing the long ribbons of tape blowing in the breeze at intersections, where a furious driver had pulled the snarled tape out of his car's player and thrown it out the window.

I do have about 25,000 audio cassettes that I recorded from about 1977 to 2000. Now *there's* a big analog-to-digital dubbing project waiting to happen..... (I duplicated a lot of that stuff on CD, though.)

Ditto on both those points(I had several wood counsels(you remember the ones, 5+' wide and held a stereo, turntable, speakers and many times 8-track player)) along with several under dash Craig and Pioneer car 8-track players(never had a 8 track recorder) and I also remember seeing the tape along the side of the road, it looked so pretty blowing in the wind

25K I have about 130 cassette tapes mostly re-recorded on my Nakamichi 700ZXL on metal tape. I loved that Nak, the only tape deck I ever had that basically sounded the same as my original LPs
I've actually never converted any tapes to CD, don't really have anything to do it with. Most of my tapes/LPs I've repurchased on CD. Of course the pack rat I am I've still got all the cassettes and LPs of course my audio collection is dwarfed by my 1500+ video tapes, which I'm glad to say have been all converted to DVDs, 3000+ and counting

Does anybody still make a CD recorder? I remember at one time Harmon Kardon had one with a hard drive so you could store your collection on it.

I asked about this ages ago and was told to discuss VCR's in the DVDR forum. It does feel a bit weird about talking about them in here so i would be open to a dedicated VHS/VCR section as i feel i would get a lot of use out of it.

Yep. Sony and Crosley, according to Best Buy. Now ain't that a spread in manufacturers!

edit: even more at Amazon, including the $700 Microboards CWL6200 CopyWriter Live CD Recorder.

What's an 8-track? Is it anything like the 45 or 33? Or Webcor wire recorder?

Rhetorical question. I have seen the 8-track; may even have one around somewhere.

I remember how much I wanted to get sound on my 8mm (film). Then the magic of tape!!!

Perhaps it's time for me to upgrade from my 4-track!

I remember getting a stereo system for xmas back as a teenager in the early 80s...it had a turntable, dual-cassette, AND 8-track player! That was a rarity. I still have a crate full of LPs and and few 8-tracks in my storage closet. I should catalog those for nostalgia.

Wow you're that young? I was always under the impression that when you were a young lad -horse & buggy was the common way of travel.


My very first home receiver (still lived at home) had a none magnetic-cartridge turntable, AM/FM, and 8-track recorder without manual rec levels. Recording and switching tracks no fade-out just without warning interrupt the song CLUNG track change.

I also remember my friends and myself shoving matchbook covers under the cartridge in out car stereos to help track the tape as those 8-track players would double track (leak other tracked signals into the current tracks) Then one day a buddy got one of those fancy 8-track players with a tracking knob moving the head to align with tape. Miracles do happen.

I think it was my Pioneer underdash 8-track that had such a "tracking" knob. The cool thing was you could turn it so far as to hear a neighboring track, which was playing backwards. Never really heard any of that satanic stuff on Led Zepplin IV, I think that was the album that was supposed to have it. Just the sound of people singing backwards, which I grew tired of quickly

^^^
I think you must be thinking of a cassette deck? If memory serves me right 8-track cartridge tapes moved in one direction only and cassette tapes reversed direction?

Your right turning the adjustment knob too far would only result in hearing the adjacent track, must have been one of my many cassette decks of the time.

This is why there isn't a "tape" section on AVS: discussion always turns to the damn 8-tracks! Since we're listing those, my parents had an Electrophonic console stereo with an 8-track in it, my best bud in grade school had a Zenith "Allegro" with 8-track (and the really nifty AM/FM plasma tuning bands), and another friend had that crazy Panasonic portable 8-track player that looked like a dynamite detonator Wylie Coyote would use.

In answer to morc258's original question, VCRs are covered here in the DVD recorder area because 90% of current VCR use is to dub old VHS collections to DVD recorders. So it seems the most logical place to discuss them, and the threads come and go, with repeated queries about the Panasonic AG1980 SVHS deck in particular. Perhaps once a year someone starts a thread to talk about how much they hate digital video and have stocked up two dozen VCRs against the future, pledging "analog forever" etc. Those threads don't usually stay active for more than a week or two.

I know you're joking but actually, you're not far off. Earl "Madman" Muntz developed the "Stereo-Pak" 4-track continuous tape/player in 1962. It was the predecessor to the Lear 8-track player of 8-track fame. Yes that's THE Lear, as in LearJet. They designed the 8-track.

Some of the guys I went to college with in the late 60's still owned Muntz's and had modified reel-to-reel tape recorders so they could make their own tapes. I already had a Lear 8-track in my car (I bought the first model - they were originally so unreliable that the dealer went through 6 in my car alone).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stereo-Pak

That's the only thing I use my VCR for.

But aside from that, as more time passes we will probably see a nostalgia market develop for "antique" VCRs. To some extent, we do see that for the even older open reel VTRs that preceeded Beta and VHS (primarily EIAJ compatible 1/2" models, but also the Akai 1/4" VTRs) -- look around and you can find websites set up by people who are dedicated to restoring these old dinosaurs.

And it is fascinating...I remember hearing about those old VTRs when I was 11 (this was a couple years before the first Betamax) and as soon as I knew such a thing existed, I really did want one. I never did get one of those open reel decks, and eventually satisfied my desire for a video recorder with a closed out RCA VCT-201 VHS VCR in 1980. I suspect that many of us here have similar stories...those who are videophiles and interested in modern video technology are also the people who were fascinated by previous video breakthroughs.

There's a Yahoo group called "Old VTRs"

Now they are mostly broadcast and old reel to reel industrial units of the 1960s and 1970s. Not too much VHS and Beta, some 3/4in talk, but there are a lot of broadcast engineers there that know analog video tape systems inside and out.

There's always been a cyclical discussion of VCRs here; it's nothing new. As said, the discussions are primarily regarding dubbing from VHS to DVD, and with DVD recorders pretty much going, going, gone, even that's been less than it has been. Heck, I keep wondering if this DVD recorder forum isn't on its last legs.

There is the occasional nostalgia thread that pops up, and I've even participated in (I still have a VCR in my HT rack), but that's all it is, nostalgia. Nothing that warrants a whole forum to VCRs, as there hasn't been any new ones since 2007 (aside from combo units) and certainly nothing new technically since the early 00s (if not the 90s.) It wouldn't get enough posts to justify itself.

When I was very young, I'd ride the dinosaur home from school to watch our gasoline powered TV, by candlelight.

Why, that's nuthin - I rode trilobites, one for each foot...

Wow, no mention of uphill both ways through the tar pits? You guys must have lived privileged lives in the granite neighborhoods.

You must have been one of the first Romneys!