If I remember correctly the reason Beta lost favor was because Sony wanted to charge other companies to use that platform. With VHS everyone could manufacture it for free and for less money so consumers went that way. VHS took some time but they improved the video quality to be equal to Beta. There was a significant quality difference at first. At least this is how I remember things back in the late 80's and 90's.
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Does anyone remember VHS HIFI ?
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I thought Sony was hoarding the format and would not let anybody else use beta.(?)
restorer-john
Grand Contributor
I bought a Mitsubishi HS-E70 SVHS recorder specifically as an audio recorder as I was sick and tired of waiting for DAT to come. Think it was about 1990 or so. About AU$2500.
It was one of the few that could not only happily record AFM HiFi audio in three speeds (SP/LP/EP) but also it had full indexing and addressing of tracks which I figured would be awesome for my compilations of jazz etc that I loved at the time. I could give individual HiFi audio tracks their own track numbers and search like a CD player. It was amazing. And it would record audio only without a video sync signal. Flying erase heads etc and 400 line video res, individual 14 segment adjustable rec level etc. Massive die-cast mechansism base blah blah.
Sound was the best I had heard after trying the Panasonic SVHS, the top JVC SVHS and an editing Sony unit can't recall the model. The head switching noise at low level was incredibly low and better than the other brands but soon I had a DAT and the poor mitsubishi got boxed up as new- thirty years ago.
I still have the Mitsubishi in the storeroom and I can still get a belt kit as of a few months ago. Maybe I'll drag it out! LOL.
It was one of the few that could not only happily record AFM HiFi audio in three speeds (SP/LP/EP) but also it had full indexing and addressing of tracks which I figured would be awesome for my compilations of jazz etc that I loved at the time. I could give individual HiFi audio tracks their own track numbers and search like a CD player. It was amazing. And it would record audio only without a video sync signal. Flying erase heads etc and 400 line video res, individual 14 segment adjustable rec level etc. Massive die-cast mechansism base blah blah.
Sound was the best I had heard after trying the Panasonic SVHS, the top JVC SVHS and an editing Sony unit can't recall the model. The head switching noise at low level was incredibly low and better than the other brands but soon I had a DAT and the poor mitsubishi got boxed up as new- thirty years ago.
I still have the Mitsubishi in the storeroom and I can still get a belt kit as of a few months ago. Maybe I'll drag it out! LOL.
Was it Mitsubishi or Hitachi video machines that had the grease of doom? The gearing and such used a grease that hardened within a few short years and the techs had to disassemble the entire machine and remove the grease and apply proper grease.
I think you're right. thanks
Guermantes
Addicted to Fun and Learning
I have this model JVC in the rack next to me at the moment, but it hasn't been used in anger for a couple of years. It tracks audio on tapes that the Sony and Panasonic units have trouble with.
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The big deal initially was vhs was cheaper and offered longer recording times. Beta fixed recording length but was a day late and a dollar short. Also vhs was unknown to Sony until just prior to its release. They over estimated what they could charge.
restorer-john
Grand Contributor
The red stuff? Mitsubishi used some of that stuff- got super sticky, slowed down the mech cams to the points the OC/timeouts would trip. Bet you came across loading mech timeouts in logic controlled cass deck car audio.
Anything that came across my workbench for car audio was worthy of a full rebuild. Soundstream, Coustic, Alpine, Sony, Pioneer where everyday and due to specializing in car audio I became very fast at disassembly, rebuild and reassemble with calibration and test. There where jammed mechanisms and yes some logic timeout issues from all sorts of failures of the mechanism. Mostly it was fried solenoids with fried driver transistor, CPU failures, bad displays and driver, lots of front panel switches so I had inventory on the types required, failed voltage regulators, zener diodes failing, burned PCBs from people having a bad ground on their amps and the head unit supplying ground through the RCAs, reel tables/clutches and so I had inventory on hand for those too, jammed loading mechanisms, jammed cassettes, belts, water damaged and on and on. It's car audio so one expects anything and multiple faults due to people not wanting to remove the head unit till it reallly has to come out for service. After awhile I found the head units to be pretty routine to service and looked to 10 disc changers and bigger and bad'er power amps to get my kicks. Due to the harsh nature of the car environment and the multiple faults in most every repair I disassembled most out of warranty units and did a full rebuild so the owners got their moneys worth and they had no issues upon re-installing.
As a side note if you ever see one of these Soundstream TC-308 cassette units get it/add it to your collection... They have wow and flutter down to about 0.05%. Are simply wonderful to work on too. It's a precision mechanism and one can feel it and see it as they work on it. Lotsa fun servicing those. It's the best cassette head unit I have ever seen and calibrated.
Guermantes
Addicted to Fun and Learning
But Sony's Betacam format became fairly successful in the broadcast industry and gave birth to a line of analogue and digital camcorders and editing gear.
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True, but you could not make use of it from the local electronics store. Beta at 1st only recorded one hour. Then two. I think VHS started at 2 hrs and then 4hr and finally 6 hrs. 2hrs was the minimum for most movies. Supposedly a big deal was 4 hrs was enough to record USA football games. Beta matched all that, but was late each time until in the minds of consumers VHS was already king. A slight quality advantage and a higher price wasn't knocking JVC's format off the pedestal at that point. My 1st VHS machines were JVC, there was one Philips in the middle, and the last ones were Sony.
I still have my 6 head Philips VHS and a library of films, all gathering dust.
The first digital mastering I utilised was a Sony system ... Called F1 I think.. it was essentially a ADC and DAC over a betamax (looked like 2 boxes) with the vidoe able to store the bits at speed I guess.. It was clearly superior to the quarter inch revox| tape I was using. It was very close to exact same impact of the live mix I remember... Hugely exiting at the time. Recorded a couple of tracks live and direct which was fun....
OyVeyzMeir
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Might consider a motorized potentiometer that you can control remotely? I would fear the effects from lengthy wires on an analog circuit where nothing but board traces are expected.
Andysu
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it would work .
norcalscott
Active Member
Yes, the recording length made VHS a better option for consumers, even if the quality wasn’t as good as beta, but the main reason VHS won was that the porn industry standardized on it - this is no joke and really had a major impact on the VHS versus Beta wars. The jump from 8mm to VHS really caused that industries growth explosion in the 1980s.
I managed a AV store in the mid 80's and we had ~400 VHS movies for rental and VHS machines too. We never even bothered with stocking beta rentals. It really was a dud at the time for us.
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