Is there a place for old tech in the 21st Century?

[Marco]

eh, in a word, No. not personally.

Ok, here's a thing then. Next time when I'm due to come up, play me an old cowboy movie, on your AV set-up, and a modern film, and I'll point out to you what I mean - and I bet you'll get where I'm coming from when I explain it

Beta tapes were, originally too short, and cost more. VHS got its nose in front through the rental market, and the rest is history. Beta was better built and had a better picture; it even lasted much longer, but, ultimately vhs was more suitable early on especially for films. think it was 1 hr v 2 hrs in beginning. We had the first ones through the workshop for evaluation and preferred beta. The philips 2000 system was better than both tbh.

Noted, although for picture and sound quality, shorter is better - just the same as it is/was with cassette tape. As for the rest, it was more about the film companies and marketing men promoting VHS, and wanting it to succeed at the expense of Betamax, than anything else - just as happened with DACs, in terms of multi-bit vs. bitstream.

I much prefer the sound of the former, done well, as to my ears, where it matters most, it is unquestionably superior!

Let's face it, there are many examples in audio of old technology outperforming its modern counterpart. The primary reason why the latter exists is to be cheaper and more convenient. Absolute quality/performance is very much a secondary consideration these days with most products.

Marco.

[Barry]

Our Betamax machine was made by Sony, but it was years ago and I don't remember the model.

[PaulStewart]

Nop. As with Audio cassette the pre recorded cassette tape/Video tape used was of poor quality.

Wrong I'm afraid, the tapes we supplied to duplicators was the same as that we put in the VHS cassettes we, (JVC UK Ltd), sold for home use. Certainly in the early days the duplication was real time on banks of recorders that were optimised for the tape in them.

Oh yes, the *only* valid comparison that can be made is when making your own recordings with the hardware concerned. Pre-recorded anything was pish.

Again see my answer above, later high speed dupes were not as good, but good audio duplicators like TAM Studios and Video operators like SVS used top class equipment and optimised it to the tape type when duplicating.

Marco.

[Marco]

Have you compared a VHS (or Betamax) recording with one made on recordable DVD of the same subject?

Nope, but we used to compare the recordings we made direct from TV, with those on tapes we bought new from shops. No prizes for guessing which were better - the exact same as it was when comparing pre-recorded music cassettes with blanks, containing recorded music from your own system

What I have done, is compare, say, my old Dr Who VHS tapes, on a quality VHS player, versus DVDs of the same programmes, and the colours on the tapes look richer and more realistic to me. The colours on the DVDs are 'harder' and more 'acid' in tone, although superficially sharper. It's a difficult thing to describe in words, but it's obvious to my eyes.

Marco.

[Barry]

Nope, but we used to compare the recordings we made direct from TV, with those on tapes we bought from shops. No prizes for guessing which were better - the exact same as it was when comparing pre-recorded cassettes with blanks, containing recorded music from your own system

Marco.

But that's comparing a home tape recording with a pre-recorded tape. I thought you were arguing for the superiority of video tape over DVD.

[Macca]

Old episodes of Doctor Who have some of the worst video quality ever. And they used to do that thing of shooting on video in the studio then swapping to film when they were on location, which made the video shot stuff look even worse.

[Marco]

But that's comparing a home tape recording with a pre-recorded tape. I thought you were arguing for the superiority of video tape over DVD.

Yes, and I gave you an example of that with my Dr Who tapes, on VHS. Scroll up and re-read my last post

Marco.

[Marco]

Old episodes of Doctor Who have some of the worst video quality ever. And they used to do that thing of shooting on video in the studio then swapping to film when they were on location, which made the video shot stuff look even worse.

Yes, and the DVDs would've been made from transfers of the old tapes, and so no better in that respect; in fact worse, as the DVDs subsequently 'hardened' the colours, as I've described.

Marco.

[struth]

Ok, here's a thing then. Next time when I'm due to come up, play me an old western cowboy movie, on your AV set-up, and a modern film, and I'll point out to you what I mean - and I bet you'll get where I'm coming from when I explain it



Noted, although for picture and sound quality, shorter is better - just the same as it is/was with cassette tape. As for the rest, it was more about the film companies and marketing men promoting VHS, and wanting it to succeed at the expense of Betamax, than anything else - just as happened with DACs, in terms of multi-bit vs. bitstream.

I much prefer the sound of the former, done well, as to my ears, where it matters most, it is unquestionably superior!

Let's face it, there are many examples in audio of old technology outperforming its modern counterpart. The primary reason why the latter exists is to be cheaper and more convenient. Absolute quality/performance is very much a secondary consideration these days with most products.

Marco.

Ah, you mean my tv lol... I dont bother with all the av stuff now. I mostly use dvd but have a few blu-ray too. No doubt there is much more info in there, although its not always for the better, but often is. Ive got the dvds of the leone trilogy etc and even though not on blu-ray they are absolutely superb quality. TBH I am not sure why you think an old hybrid colour tv is better than a led tv picture wise, although I will give you the sound bit, as they often had biggish speakers in a big box, so you got a less artificial sound.
I used to have hundreds of vids and was reluctant to move because of that, but really saw the writing on the wall and sold all my rare vids and replaced them with dvd's. Twas the right move

[Macca]

What I'm saying is that they are poorly made so not a good choice for a comparison.

From that era you want Thames TV, all shot on 35mm, The Sweeny, or Minder for example. That's quality for you unlike the cheapskate BBC who even wiped some of the tapes so they could use them again. God knows what they spent all the license money on, but it wasn't making TV shows.