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Video recorders |
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#1 |
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Forum Member
Join Date: Aug 2004
Posts: 24,424
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Video recorders
I had a look on ebay seems they are worth £30 for a cheap branded one and upto about £80 for the good Sony video recorders. How come they are worth so much? I take it there's a bit of a retro market for them now? Is it worth holding on to them for a few more years will they increase more in value?
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#2 |
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Join Date: Jan 2004
Location: The Sticks
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Small markets cost more to produce. I don't suppose there's much call for a recording device that's so low image quality and uses perishable media. I probably paid about £300 for a Sharp nicam model with 4 heads and stereo output 20 years ago.
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#3 |
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Join Date: Sep 2004
Posts: 14,718
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They're becoming harder to get hold of and people still want them so the price is bound to hold a bit.
I can think of two reasons why people still want them: The first is they have loads of programmes recorded an the second is that many people (especially the elderly) thinking the new technology is harder to operate - the second reason is exacerbated by many people thinking the next step from a VCR is a DVDR (complicated) when for most it should be a PVR (simple). |
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#4 |
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Join Date: Mar 2006
Posts: 1,332
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Quote:
Small markets cost more to produce. I don't suppose there's much call for a recording device that's so low image quality and uses perishable media. I probably paid about £300 for a Sharp nicam model with 4 heads and stereo output 20 years ago.
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#5 |
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Join Date: Mar 2003
Location: S.West England.
Posts: 18,037
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no thats not really it, its due to LP VHS mode just runs the tape at half speed, and this makes the picture go soft. More video heads also helped to improve this. On DVDR/RW media, the only way to force more onto a disc is to use digital compression, which makes things look like lego blocks. You get the same effect with digital pictures if you zoom in really close on your PC screen, especially if your camera is only 5 or 6MP.
The human eye wont easily spot a soft picture, but will pick up on squares, on say peoples heads. I point the earlier post above, the step on from VHS is a PVR, where you can record loads and loads to a hard disc drive with no added compression. DVD is still good for pre-recorded playback, but recordable dvd is only really any good for the odd few things you want to record and keep on the shelf for a long time. |
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#6 |
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Join Date: Mar 2003
Posts: 4,884
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Perishable media?Still have many tapes that are 25-30 years old no problems with them so far,wonder if you could still watch today's DVDRs in 20 years time.Unless you encode today's media at a decent rate the picture quality is often worse than old VHS even in Long Play.
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#7 |
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Join Date: Jan 2004
Location: The Sticks
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I just mean that the number of scan lines on VHS was very low. Even if it encoded the colours in a reliable way it would be like a low quality image. Some pre-recorded music videos I still have are really bad for blues merging with reds.
I transferred a friend's old wedding video to DVD a few years back. I gave him 3 copies and all were encoded at the highest bit rate possible. I'm perhaps hard on VHS because when TiVo launched the first time in the UK I swapped to recording regular TV digitally. My only tapes were pre-recorded stuff that I've since given away, unable to even sell on ebay. |
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#8 |
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Inactive Member
Join Date: Mar 2010
Posts: 8,622
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Heavy, bulky, pain to sell, obsolete, limited supply...the things will then increase in price for those who are still willing to pay, because if you actually need it, you can be charged a fair amount...otherwise they are worthless to you. And if the seller wasn't sufficiently motivated with financial incentive, they couldn't bother with such old equipment either.
If you want to see expensive, look for hi-8 decks. |
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#9 |
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Inactive Member
Join Date: Dec 2010
Posts: 1,017
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VHS LP was shit - end of story.
I still have a couple of VCR's and I've used these to copy VHS tapes of material thats not available on dvd over to hard drive then to my own dvd's. All my camcorder tapes needed copying too. Like Laserdisc before it there will always be a collectors market to play back items that cannot be obtained on current formats. Both my Panasonic VCR's are useful as they play SVHS tapes , albeit in VHS quality and they play NTSC tapes too |
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#10 |
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Join Date: Jan 2004
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Quote:
...NTSC tapes...
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#11 |
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Inactive Member
Join Date: Aug 2010
Posts: 5,043
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I still use video recorders of different formats including the early vc1600 format that had the tape spools on top of each other as opposed to side by side, I find little difference in picture quality compared to dvd and the tapes do last longer than dvd. I have found that the later multi-head vhs machines give better picture quality than the mass produced dvd players though a good quality dvd player costing over 400-500 pounds might give slightly better quality pictures. As for having any value, I could sell any of my very old Sony betamax machines and buy 5 dvd players/recorders with the money, check out the prices the good ones are getting on ebay.
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#12 |
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Inactive Member
Join Date: Dec 2010
Posts: 1,017
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Quote:
nudge, nudge!
I had several NTSC tapes of films and documentaries that were not out in the UK . That was at the time of course which is a while back. There were some documentaries on the Bond films that were made for Laserdisc and I got them on tape aswell as some Twilight Zone episodes that were never repeated on tv. Although twice in the last 6 months I've had to import NTSC tapes from Amazon for a mate who wanted the films and they were not out on dvd in the US or UK. Fortunately my Pioneer dvd recorder will accept the PAL 60 output by the VCR - something that Panasonic dvd recorders won't do. |
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#13 |
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Forum Member
Join Date: Feb 2004
Location: Manchester
Posts: 2,945
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I have a Philips VR-1000 (JVC HR-S7600) which only has brilliant and sound and picture, it has a built-in timebase corrector - excellent for transferring VHS to computer/DVD
I'm currently working my way through hundreds of tapes
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#14 |
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Forum Member
Join Date: Sep 2008
Location: At college, in L.A.'s office
Posts: 54,221
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Quote:
They're becoming harder to get hold of and people still want them so the price is bound to hold a bit.
I can think of two reasons why people still want them: The first is they have loads of programmes recorded an the second is that many people (especially the elderly) thinking the new technology is harder to operate - the second reason is exacerbated by many people thinking the next step from a VCR is a DVDR (complicated) when for most it should be a PVR (simple). |
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#15 |
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Join Date: Mar 2003
Location: S.West England.
Posts: 18,037
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If tape was so good, why didnt D-VHS win out over DVD/R/RW and PVRs?
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#16 |
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Join Date: Mar 2008
Location: TheEssexSunshineCoast Clacton
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Quote:
Perishable media?Still have many tapes that are 25-30 years old no problems with them so far,wonder if you could still watch today's DVDRs in 20 years time.Unless you encode today's media at a decent rate the picture quality is often worse than old VHS even in Long Play.
Which give me 2 hours 30 mins. On a tape you could get 4 hours in SP or up to 8 hours on LP. LP on DVD is unwatchable. |
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#17 |
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Join Date: Apr 2006
Location: North Derbyshire
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Quote:
If tape was so good, why didnt D-VHS win out over DVD/R/RW and PVRs?
The whole point of DVD was the 'V', Versatile - a common format across TV and computers, for data, video and audio was always going to be a winner. |
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#18 |
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Inactive Member
Join Date: Dec 2010
Posts: 1,017
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Quote:
If tape was so good, why didnt D-VHS win out over DVD/R/RW and PVRs?
But it came at a time when tape based formats were on the way out and as it was tape it was still prone to the problems inherent with any tape format. It was better than dvd but it still needed rewinding and did not offer instant access to any section Nobody said tape was so good anyway. In general VHS was shit but it was the best we had for a long time |
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#19 |
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Join Date: May 2005
Location: Redditch Worcs
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Quote:
If tape was so good, why didnt D-VHS win out over DVD/R/RW and PVRs?
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#20 |
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Join Date: Apr 2010
Posts: 5,045
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Quote:
It did absolutely nothing - too expensive, too complicated.
The whole point of DVD was the 'V', Versatile - a common format across TV and computers, for data, video and audio was always going to be a winner. |
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#21 |
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Join Date: Jul 2008
Posts: 1,006
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Quote:
Wasn't it too late as well? D-VHS, ISTR reading, was launched in 2004, by which time DVD was obviously well on its way to replacing VHS.
(According to Wikipedia D-VHS actually came out in 1998). |
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#22 |
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Join Date: Mar 2010
Posts: 8,622
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Quote:
Wasn't it too late as well? D-VHS, ISTR reading, was launched in 2004, by which time DVD was obviously well on its way to replacing VHS.
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#23 |
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Join Date: Feb 2004
Location: Manchester
Posts: 2,945
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It's all a bit of a shame.
I've been chucking out high grade VHS tapes left right and centre. Quality magnetic tape, down the trashcan. |
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#24 |
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Join Date: Mar 2005
Posts: 6,572
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Quote:
It's all a bit of a shame.
I've been chucking out high grade VHS tapes left right and centre. Quality magnetic tape, down the trashcan. ![]() Uses for old VHS tapes Crafting with VHS tape |
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#25 |
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Forum Member
Join Date: Apr 2010
Posts: 5,045
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Quote:
It's all a bit of a shame.
I've been chucking out high grade VHS tapes left right and centre. Quality magnetic tape, down the trashcan. ![]() I upload old adverts and things up to YouTube and my sources for material are VHS and Betamax tapes
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