http://fortune.com/2016/07/21/last-video-cassette-recorder-maker/
Wow I thought this was a joke at first though. But amazing how they managed to keep VHS productions a decade after the VHS was beat by DVD sales and the rise of Apple TV and Roku carrying various apps for Movies and TV shows.
Interesting. I still have plenty of VHS tapes and audio cassette tapes. I'm disappointed that our new (2007) car doesn't have a tape deck, but I can live with that. However, having to do without all our VHS tapes would totally stink, especially since we use a lot of them for children. My wife operates a home daycare and home-schools our own, so both cartoons and educational videos are important to us. Eventually the VCR built into our TV will go out (it's already not working the best), so I guess we'll have to go to eBay to find a replacement.
My friend lent me a DVD copy of Zootopia last weekend, and my brother and I laughed because we just assumed they stopped releasing new movies in regular DVD format. So that fact that VHS only stopped being produced now is a real surprise to me!
I might have a VHS player somewhere in the house, but we still have lots of VHS movies from when I was a kid :)
Quote from: 7/8 on July 21, 2016, 01:26:09 PM
we still have lots of VHS movies from when I was a kid
So do a LOT of people. And movies that we bought on tape and won't be able to play anymore. I guess it's all eBay from here on out to replace the players.
I won't be surprised then, after a couple of years the VHS cassettes will be hip and cool again just like the vinyl records.
What's old is new again. After the vinyl records, the audio cassette begin its return.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/jasonevangelho/2016/03/24/forget-vinyl-lets-talk-about-the-cassette-comeback/#294cc9df1723
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/programs/metromorning/cassette-tapes-comeback-1.3490619
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/prince-edward-island/cassettes-music-pei-trend-1.3601018
https://reverb.com/news/the-cassette-comeback-digital-disillusionment-gives-tape-new-life
Who'll be next to return? The 8-track cartridge? ;)
Betamax was good technology. Let's bring that back.
I think more startling in that article was the revelation that Sony just stopped shipping Betamax tapes last year.
If you have anything irreplaceable on VHS tapes–or really tapes of any kind–you absolutely need to digitize them and keep the files backed up safely. Even if production of VHS players went on forever, your tapes won't live that long. I've experienced enough problems with degraded, worn, and unplayable tapes to have learned that lesson.
But about the last VCRs–I'll bet they're real pieces of junk. It's been my experience that the laggard manufacturers who still plod along selling obsolete tech "de-content" it to bring production costs down to rock bottom so they can sell at throwaway prices and still walk away with a profit.
My grandmother went through a series of cordless home phones and answering machines a few years ago; all of them were complete garbage and stopped working within months. Another relative was in the market for a small CRT television around the time that LCDs really took off–all options were very poor quality, cheap-looking, cheap-feeling trash. Compare that with a 4" Sony CRT television I had from about 15 years earlier; it was like a Swiss watch in comparison
My family used to use floppy disks for our computer from 1994-2003, and we still have a ton of VHS tapes and our VHS player. If I dig I might be able to find floppy disks and VHS tapes in my house.
I think the next thing to return would be tape drives, and MS DOS stuff.
Quote from: briantroutman on July 21, 2016, 02:28:27 PM
If you have anything irreplaceable on VHS tapes–or really tapes of any kind–you absolutely need to digitize them and keep the files backed up safely. Even if production of VHS players went on forever, your tapes won't live that long. I've experienced enough problems with degraded, worn, and unplayable tapes to have learned that lesson.
The key phrase in that statement is "keep the files backed up." I've had VHS and cassette tapes last for ten or twenty years before wearing out, but CDs and DVDs get scratched far too easily.
Quote from: kphoger on July 21, 2016, 02:42:56 PM
The key phrase in that statement is "keep the files backed up." I've had VHS and cassette tapes last for ten or twenty years before wearing out, but CDs and DVDs get scratched far too easily.
I didn't say specifically although I should have: I'm talking about having multiple, redundant copies saved across hard drives, flash drives, cloud drives, etc. Optical discs–particularly the low-quality ones sold as CD-Rs–are just as bad as tape if not worse.
Quote from: kphoger on July 21, 2016, 02:12:31 PM
Betamax was good technology. Let's bring that back.
I really don't understand why people always say that. I never saw any discernible difference, except for when you paused a Beta player the screen went blue or black, unlike a VHS where you could still see the image.
There are several youtube presenters, the best being a kid that runs a site called "Oddity Archive" that deal with old time entertainment systems. Including lots of material on the Beta-VHS deal.
If you look closely at the product in the article it is only technically a recorder. Mainly designed to play pre-recorded tapes, or record from the DVD player to the VHS although it does have a set of RCA input plugs so you could plug the output of something like a cable box into it. It does not have a tuner or a timer which were nearly universal when the technology was current.
If a person had a properly maintained VHS, or for that matter Beta, system and could put up with it limitations, it could still function as a crude "time shifting" TV recorder via a cable box or a ATSC downconverter, and it could still play old tapes. Yes, tapes degrade over time, but really if you keep the player clean and the tapes in a good environment and run them through the machine now and then, many will be playable for many years to come.
IIRC, the last CRT was made about 10 years or so ago. The change from them to LCD (and other format) flatscreens in TVs and desktop computer monitors is one of the *fastest* examples of consumer technology obsolescence that I have ever seen. CRTs went from nearly 100% of the video market to GONE in, maybe, 5 years or so.
Vacuum tubes held out much longer in the face of transistors.
Mike
Tangentially related...
I've never bought a TV set brand-new. The one we currently own was a hand-me-down from a friend of the family who used to use it at church, and it's one of those big CRT sets with a built-in VCR, the kind you used to see strapped to a metal cart to be wheeled around school. Anyway, a few years ago, I won a raffle at my company's Christmas party and ended up with a free Blu-ray player. Talk about a serious technology gap between the devices! The only inputs on the TV are 3-patch composite (red-white-yellow), but the only output on the Blu-ray player is HDMI. In order to watch movies on our FREE device, we had to go online and purchase a converter to downgrade the signal into a usable format our TV could use. Offhand, I seem to remember it being about 20 bucks.
CRTs went away quickly because of their girth. They were BIG AND HEAVY, you never wanted to move one. Flat panels could easily fit in many areas and be made in much larger sizes.
VHS did get a 21st century upgrade. Digital VHS allowed direct bitstream recording of MPEG2 HD video and for a while it was the only home HD video system available. It allowed time shifting from cable boxes (ever wonder why your CATV box still has firewire ports?) and pre-recorded movies were available for it.
They also made great playback devices since JVC usually equipped their units with SVHS playback and picture enhancement circuits. Those crappy Funai decks couldn't hold a candle to playback quality of late SVHS/DVHS decks though.
Both VHS and Betamax live on in this house (along with CRT TVs for vintage gaming):
(https://www.aaroads.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi820.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fzz122%2Fnjroadfan%2FPB200004_zps55286463.jpg%7Eoriginal&hash=7304cb9eb88eda609aa61abf5339274098820bbd)
I'm presently looking at an LG DVD recorder/VCR combo from about 2008 or so. Thankfully, it did have a digital tuner included. Oddly. some DVD recorders I sold in my last days with Walmart did NOT!
Keep the relics alive! I have a ton of VHS, most are my childhood Disney movies.
Betamax produced a much better quality of recording/playback because of one thing: 3 times the tape-to-head contact. Unfortunately, that came with a much more complicated tape-threading mechanism that actually bent the tape in a C-shape around the head. VHS simply pushed the tape up against the rotating head; only about a 1 1/4-inch section of tape contacted the head at any point. The Betamax format was a consumer-grade derivative of the industry-standard Sony "U-Matic" commercial video tape system, while VHS was strictly a consumer-grade concept from the get-go. Eventually VHS won the format "war" when most of the major recorder vendors signed on (RCA, Samsung, Philips, Matsushita/Panasonic); by 1983 or so Beta ceased to be a viable format, and production ceased for pre-recorded Beta tapes -- although, as has been stated earlier in this thread, blank tape production from Sony, the format originator, continued through mid-2015.
1980s and 90s "old" tech is trending again, like Vaporwave music on Youtube, we seek the recent past for things we remember and loved to do or use at the time. I never even thought the VHS or VCR was still produced for current use. 5 years from now, CDs and DVDs will be finally abandoned.
CDs are a terrible storage medium. They're too large to comfortably fit in a pocket and they're fragile as hell and one-time-use. If there had been a feasible way to make 800 MB floppies, CDs never would have taken off. I'm glad that 1 GB+ flash drives are cheap enough now.
Quote from: sparker on July 26, 2016, 05:21:28 AM
Betamax produced a much better quality of recording/playback because of one thing: 3 times the tape-to-head contact. Unfortunately, that came with a much more complicated tape-threading mechanism that actually bent the tape in a C-shape around the head. VHS simply pushed the tape up against the rotating head; only about a 1 1/4-inch section of tape contacted the head at any point. The Betamax format was a consumer-grade derivative of the industry-standard Sony "U-Matic" commercial video tape system, while VHS was strictly a consumer-grade concept from the get-go. Eventually VHS won the format "war" when most of the major recorder vendors signed on (RCA, Samsung, Philips, Matsushita/Panasonic); by 1983 or so Beta ceased to be a viable format, and production ceased for pre-recorded Beta tapes -- although, as has been stated earlier in this thread, blank tape production from Sony, the format originator, continued through mid-2015.
Of course, VHS won the format war for another reason: adult entertainment. Studios used VHS tapes because they and VCRs were a hell of a lot cheaper while being able to record for longer.
Right -- Beta maxed out at 4 hours (at the slower and "grainier" speed); the faster, 2 hr. max, speed was what most early prerecorded tapes utilized. VHS machines recorded at three speeds; the fastest VHS was equivalent to the slower Beta in quality. But the maximum available with standard VHS tapes was 6 hours; thinner tapes allowing 8 hours' recording time at the slowest speed started popping up about 1990 or so. But the mechanism in the VHS cassette was much simpler, so the per-unit cost was considerably less than Beta -- that, coupled with the reduced production cost of VHS machines, spelled doom for the viability of the Beta format. What got the adult industry into VHS -- although the visual definition, a selling point for porn producers, was decidedly less than Beta, was the advent of multi-head VHS machines. Most entry-level VHS machines had one recording head on each side of the rotating head drum (2 total); some higher-end machines featured 4 total heads, spread out over the drum in quadrants for greater tape sampling rates. That produced higher definition recording -- a real selling point for adult entertainment. Some later portable VHS machines, designed to be used with external cameras (mid-80's and pre-camcorder) featured as many as 6 heads on the drum. At that point, the quality of VHS -- at the fastest speed with the greatest number of recording heads -- was very close to Betamax.
Quote from: sparker on July 28, 2016, 01:32:13 AM
Right -- Beta maxed out at 4 hours (at the slower and "grainier" speed); the faster, 2 hr. max, speed was what most early prerecorded tapes utilized. VHS machines recorded at three speeds; the fastest VHS was equivalent to the slower Beta in quality. But the maximum available with standard VHS tapes was 6 hours; thinner tapes allowing 8 hours' recording time at the slowest speed started popping up about 1990 or so. But the mechanism in the VHS cassette was much simpler, so the per-unit cost was considerably less than Beta -- that, coupled with the reduced production cost of VHS machines, spelled doom for the viability of the Beta format. What got the adult industry into VHS -- although the visual definition, a selling point for porn producers, was decidedly less than Beta, was the advent of multi-head VHS machines. Most entry-level VHS machines had one recording head on each side of the rotating head drum (2 total); some higher-end machines featured 4 total heads, spread out over the drum in quadrants for greater tape sampling rates. That produced higher definition recording -- a real selling point for adult entertainment. Some later portable VHS machines, designed to be used with external cameras (mid-80's and pre-camcorder) featured as many as 6 heads on the drum. At that point, the quality of VHS -- at the fastest speed with the greatest number of recording heads -- was very close to Betamax.
It's still 240/250i, so the beta vs VHS arguement was moot even then. NTSC was 480i. If you wanted really high quality video back then you had the laserdisc, which was 425i. Or if you wanted total crap, you got the RCA Selectavision, all the drawbacks of VHS, with none of the recording. 240i video at most, a lot faster wearing down of the media, a stylus that had to be replaced, and RCA going bankrupt after the failure of their 20ish year project.
Quote from: SteveG1988 on July 28, 2016, 12:40:20 PM
Quote from: sparker on July 28, 2016, 01:32:13 AM
Right -- Beta maxed out at 4 hours (at the slower and "grainier" speed); the faster, 2 hr. max, speed was what most early prerecorded tapes utilized. VHS machines recorded at three speeds; the fastest VHS was equivalent to the slower Beta in quality. But the maximum available with standard VHS tapes was 6 hours; thinner tapes allowing 8 hours' recording time at the slowest speed started popping up about 1990 or so. But the mechanism in the VHS cassette was much simpler, so the per-unit cost was considerably less than Beta -- that, coupled with the reduced production cost of VHS machines, spelled doom for the viability of the Beta format. What got the adult industry into VHS -- although the visual definition, a selling point for porn producers, was decidedly less than Beta, was the advent of multi-head VHS machines. Most entry-level VHS machines had one recording head on each side of the rotating head drum (2 total); some higher-end machines featured 4 total heads, spread out over the drum in quadrants for greater tape sampling rates. That produced higher definition recording -- a real selling point for adult entertainment. Some later portable VHS machines, designed to be used with external cameras (mid-80's and pre-camcorder) featured as many as 6 heads on the drum. At that point, the quality of VHS -- at the fastest speed with the greatest number of recording heads -- was very close to Betamax.
It's still 240/250i, so the beta vs VHS arguement was moot even then. NTSC was 480i. If you wanted really high quality video back then you had the laserdisc, which was 425i. Or if you wanted total crap, you got the RCA Selectavision, all the drawbacks of VHS, with none of the recording. 240i video at most, a lot faster wearing down of the media, a stylus that had to be replaced, and RCA going bankrupt after the failure of their 20ish year project.
I'm just old enough to remember LaserDisc. Every once in a while, I saw a video on one in elementary school.
Quote from: cl94 on July 28, 2016, 12:43:42 PM
Quote from: SteveG1988 on July 28, 2016, 12:40:20 PM
Quote from: sparker on July 28, 2016, 01:32:13 AM
Right -- Beta maxed out at 4 hours (at the slower and "grainier" speed); the faster, 2 hr. max, speed was what most early prerecorded tapes utilized. VHS machines recorded at three speeds; the fastest VHS was equivalent to the slower Beta in quality. But the maximum available with standard VHS tapes was 6 hours; thinner tapes allowing 8 hours' recording time at the slowest speed started popping up about 1990 or so. But the mechanism in the VHS cassette was much simpler, so the per-unit cost was considerably less than Beta -- that, coupled with the reduced production cost of VHS machines, spelled doom for the viability of the Beta format. What got the adult industry into VHS -- although the visual definition, a selling point for porn producers, was decidedly less than Beta, was the advent of multi-head VHS machines. Most entry-level VHS machines had one recording head on each side of the rotating head drum (2 total); some higher-end machines featured 4 total heads, spread out over the drum in quadrants for greater tape sampling rates. That produced higher definition recording -- a real selling point for adult entertainment. Some later portable VHS machines, designed to be used with external cameras (mid-80's and pre-camcorder) featured as many as 6 heads on the drum. At that point, the quality of VHS -- at the fastest speed with the greatest number of recording heads -- was very close to Betamax.
It's still 240/250i, so the beta vs VHS arguement was moot even then. NTSC was 480i. If you wanted really high quality video back then you had the laserdisc, which was 425i. Or if you wanted total crap, you got the RCA Selectavision, all the drawbacks of VHS, with none of the recording. 240i video at most, a lot faster wearing down of the media, a stylus that had to be replaced, and RCA going bankrupt after the failure of their 20ish year project.
I'm just old enough to remember LaserDisc. Every once in a while, I saw a video on one in elementary school.
Friend of mine has the original
Star Wars on LaserDisc.
Used to sell all these machines back in the late '70's/early 80's, my recall of the actual technical specifications (not always necessary for sales applications) of the units is vague at best after 30+ years. I still have an old (ca. 1987) Magnavox 6-head VHS machine stashed in a storage unit -- with no immediate plans to retrieve it! Never had any large (10") original laser discs, but I did have a Pioneer LD player from about 1990-91; at the time, they were about the most accurate disc transport (the things would play any size disc, including CD) around; I used it as such with a separate DAC (digital/analog converter) for my audio needs -- the Pioneer LD player had a SP/DIF digital-stream output for this purpose. Used it for a couple of years until a specialty audio company (Audio Alchemy, based in Calabasas, CA) introduced a even better dedicated CD transport.
It's sad, in a way. My brother was in Kuwait during the entirety of the 2004 racing season so he asked me to record all of the NASCAR Nextel Cup races as well as the entire F1 season (FP2, qually and race) for him so he could watch it it on his return. I have all 38 Cup races as well as every televised F1 event from that season sitting on my shelf and no longer have any way to watch them.
I'm going to need someone to teach me how to digitize them.
You may be in luck -- right now on ebay there are a number of Toshiba VHS-to-DVD converters available (model DVR620) -- new (probably old stock), for between $220-280 plus shipping. I know a couple of local folks who are in the same boat as you -- so good luck; I'm advising my friends to snag these before they disappear. There are services which will convert your videotapes to either disc or flash-drive format, but if you've got a whole NASCAR season plus a lot of F1 stuff, the cost of doing so would easily exceed buying a conversion machine and doing it yourself. Plus, once you're done, you've got a DVD burner to use.
And thanks for the local take on the I-42 development -- please keep up the good reportage!
Quote from: sparker on July 29, 2016, 05:23:20 PM
You may be in luck -- right now on ebay there are a number of Toshiba VHS-to-DVD converters available (model DVR620) -- new (probably old stock), for between $220-280 plus shipping. I know a couple of local folks who are in the same boat as you -- so good luck; I'm advising my friends to snag these before they disappear. There are services which will convert your videotapes to either disc or flash-drive format, but if you've got a whole NASCAR season plus a lot of F1 stuff, the cost of doing so would easily exceed buying a conversion machine and doing it yourself. Plus, once you're done, you've got a DVD burner to use.
And thanks for the local take on the I-42 development -- please keep up the good reportage!
I may have just gotten even luckier than that! I showed my wife this post (ya know the old "Honey I think it would be a good idea if we spent the money to..." conversation) and she informed me that one of her co-workers was bragging that he has been converting his old vcr tapes to dvd's just this past week. He also happens to be the guy that lost his license (too many tickets) so he has been carpooling with her to work so he owes her!
As to your last comment, I will try my best to keep y'all as up to date as me crazy work schedule allows!
Nice -- you get to get the job done by effectively using OPM (other people's money). You'll need to use DVD "Recordable Audio" discs. Sometimes these aren't clearly labeled; buy a small amount (a 6-pack or the like) to see if they'll not only record on your friend's converter/burner, but will play on whatever DVD player you're using in your home. Stick with a major brand (Sony, TDK) -- and make sure the vendor you use has a liberal refund/exchange policy! Good luck!
Quote from: sparker on July 26, 2016, 05:21:28 AM
Betamax produced a much better quality of recording/playback because of one thing: 3 times the tape-to-head contact. Unfortunately, that came with a much more complicated tape-threading mechanism that actually bent the tape in a C-shape around the head. VHS simply pushed the tape up against the rotating head; only about a 1 1/4-inch section of tape contacted the head at any point. The Betamax format was a consumer-grade derivative of the industry-standard Sony "U-Matic" commercial video tape system, while VHS was strictly a consumer-grade concept from the get-go. Eventually VHS won the format "war" when most of the major recorder vendors signed on (RCA, Samsung, Philips, Matsushita/Panasonic); by 1983 or so Beta ceased to be a viable format, and production ceased for pre-recorded Beta tapes -- although, as has been stated earlier in this thread, blank tape production from Sony, the format originator, continued through mid-2015.
None of that is true. Both Betamax and VHS pull the tape out of the cassette and wrap it around the head. What made Betamax negligibly better at quality was its higher tape speed. That's it. Betamax died because the cassette was too small to hold enough tape to record anything with that "superior" image quality. Slowing down the tape to fit more onto it, well that just brought the quality down, so what's the point in paying all that extra money for a Betamax if the quality is no better?
Since the drums on which the actual heads are located were the same diameter (about 2.5") on both Beta and VHS (no one wanted to re-invent the wheel here), there was the same potential for intimate tape contact. With about 7.8 linear inches available, the Beta format maintained contact with the head for about 5.4 inches of that due to the tight-C tape path. VHS, on the other hand, used a "W" configuration, with the center portion pressed against the head; at any time there was about 2.8 inches of tape available for recording purposes; but the tension against the rotating head was less than that of the Beta format. It is true that both methods drew the tape out of the cassette itself to contact the heads, but the advantage of Beta is that the tape path was much more controlled and the tape subject to less lateral "play" than with VHS; as a derivative of a professional format, precision was deemed more important than serviceability -- which WAS a Beta drawback -- the machines were much more costly to repair than VHS units. And that was a Sony marketing mistake -- they had sold virtually every U-Matic pro unit to TV stations and production companies, which tended to have internal service departments -- so they had unrealistic expectations as to Beta serviceability -- not wise when dealing with consumer products. So the simpler -- and more serviceable -- VHS became the consumer standard, despite the visual superiority of Beta (I've seen the formats side-by-side over the years, and the definition of the Beta format -- at the same rate of speed -- was noticeably more pronounced).
By the way, I never personally owned a Beta machine; had about 5 different VHS machines over the years (mostly Magnavox/Philips; I knew the local distributor, and could get a deal!). VHS was more than adequate for my purposes, which was simple time-shifting of otherwise missed broadcasts.
Damn, that sucks. I've got a bunch of tapes that my dad used to record WWF wrestling PPV's from September 2000-January 2001 and a handful from 2002-2004. Plus, I also have WCW Starrcade from December 2000. Seeing as WCW hasn't existed since March 2001, it's quite the collector's item! :awesomeface:
In case you haven't noticed, I was a huge wrestling fan back in the late 90's-early 00's (Stone Cold Steve Austin was my favorite, with The Rock being a close second). And no, I don't watch today's crap, but I still pop in an old classic match from time to time, such as Stone Cold vs. The Rock for the WWF Championship at WrestleMania 17 on April 1, 2001 from the Reliant Astrodome in Houston. :bigass:
Oh well. Time to go VCR hunting. Funny that VCR's are finally given the ol' heave-ho when the Roses Express store on US-29 near Chatham not far from me still sells brand new Sony blank VHS tapes.
Well, maybe now's the time to look for closeouts on VHS recorder/players; I'd be surprised if a lot of audio/video chains don't have some NOS (new-old-stock) pieces laying around to be had on the cheap (get 'em before demand outstrips supply!). Check the online stores (ebay, amazon, etc.); probably find players well under $100! There's always the used/refurbished market, but you're buying the proverbial pig in a poke! They're certainly not in the collectible category as of yet!
I'm old enough to remember watching many VHS tapes; I think it was 2002, when I was 7 years old, when we got our first DVD player.
Quote from: LM117 on July 31, 2016, 05:19:14 AM
WWF wrestling
(https://www.aaroads.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fmlkshk.com%2Fr%2FNBX&hash=37a3e893b1434f3cce0b95cf5d7dddce1ffcb9e1)
http://www.homemediamagazine.com/retailers/iconic-vidiots-video-store-closes-its-doors-now-39614
Here's an update the Vidiots store has closed. I didn't even realize video stores still existed too up to 2017. They cited DVD's and Blurays lower sales as the cause here.
Quote from: bing101 on February 21, 2017, 07:48:52 PM
http://www.homemediamagazine.com/retailers/iconic-vidiots-video-store-closes-its-doors-now-39614
Here's an update the Vidiots store has closed. I didn't even realize video stores still existed too up to 2017. They cited DVD's and Blurays lower sales as the cause here.
Yeah -- with Netflix and other services expanding, owning a batch of DVD's doesn't have the same level of urgency as well as cachet that it used to. The only exception would be "niche" films that are unlikely to be included in a distribution queue -- or maintaining a library of all the films in a series (like all the James Bond flicks, etc.).
Quote from: sparker on February 22, 2017, 04:19:05 PM
Quote from: bing101 on February 21, 2017, 07:48:52 PM
http://www.homemediamagazine.com/retailers/iconic-vidiots-video-store-closes-its-doors-now-39614
Here's an update the Vidiots store has closed. I didn't even realize video stores still existed too up to 2017. They cited DVD's and Blurays lower sales as the cause here.
Yeah -- with Netflix and other services expanding, owning a batch of DVD's doesn't have the same level of urgency as well as cachet that it used to. The only exception would be "niche" films that are unlikely to be included in a distribution queue -- or maintaining a library of all the films in a series (like all the James Bond flicks, etc.).
We are frustrated every so often by series and movies having been removed from the Netflix or Amazon library. There have been times when we had company over to watch a movie, only to find that it had been removed from the library. Then, another time, we were making our way through a series, episode by episode, in the evenings; then, partway through the series, we found that the series had been removed from the library. As a family, we sometimes like to watch Food Network shows on Netflix; the other day we we searched for some, and it appears all the reality-type ones we like have been removed and only a handful of mediocre ones are left. It's also happened with kids' shows, which my wife plays not only for our own kids but also kids she takes care of in home daycare.
There is still no substitute for hard copies, in my opinion. And VHS tapes, in my experience, last longer than DVDs before wearing out. The only reason we don't still regularly watch VHS tapes is because our VCR makes noise.
Then there is the issue of streaming itself. I suspect the wireless card in our Blu-Ray player is going out, because the Amazon and Pandora apps can't buffer fast enough to keep up with the play of the show we're watching; although Netflix is doing OK so far still, no other wireless devices in our house have any issues, even with the same Amazon shows, plus we recently switched out our modem and router with little to no effect. And, backing out to the menu and going back in again, I can watch the connection speed tick down to near-zero before the show even starts up again. My Blu-Ray player has no Ethernet port and the USB port is being used to power an HDMI-to-composite signal converter, so I have no way of hard-wiring it in to know for sure that it's a wireless card issue. Basically, I'm stuck unless I buy a a new device, hoping my diagnosis is correct.
Quote from: kphoger on February 22, 2017, 04:44:55 PM
There is still no substitute for hard copies, in my opinion. And VHS tapes, in my experience, last longer than DVDs before wearing out. The only reason we don't still regularly watch VHS tapes is because our VCR makes noise.
If you're experiencing problems with DVD's or CD's "wearing out", they might just need ultrasonic cleaning and/or demagnetization. I'm using an ultrasonic cleaner (model CD7800) from Hammacher Schlemmer; if you also need demagnetization, a company called Bedini (based in Idaho) makes a "Clarifier" that does that as well (if a little pricey); if you have a large DVD/CD collection, this might be a solution. Just keep your discs in their cases and free of dust & scratches if at all possible.
You do realize that DVDs aren't made of any ferrous material, right? They can't hold a magnetic charge.
Quote from: bing101 on February 21, 2017, 07:48:52 PM
http://www.homemediamagazine.com/retailers/iconic-vidiots-video-store-closes-its-doors-now-39614
Here's an update the Vidiots store has closed. I didn't even realize video stores still existed too up to 2017. They cited DVD's and Blurays lower sales as the cause here.
Apparently Family Video is still doing OK in some parts of the country.
http://www.chillicothegazette.com/story/news/local/2017/02/13/family-video-chain-survives-chillicothe/97748432/
Quote from: NJRoadfan on February 22, 2017, 09:42:07 PM
You do realize that DVDs aren't made of any ferrous material, right? They can't hold a magnetic charge.
Normally, that's supposed to be true. But some discs, generally made in Asian factories, utilized aluminum alloys that contained a small amount of chromium dioxide -- and those could become partially magnetized via the motor assemblies of some CD/DVD transports -- particularly those in inexpensive players with little or no component shielding. While the slight stray magnetism didn't affect the optical reading of the disc, it did occasionally affect the servo-drive circuits that propelled the laser-bearing sleds or arms across the disc, causing mistracking. Most of the affected discs, generally from the earlier CD production lines in the '80's and early '90's, were manufactured in plants that also made magnetic recording tape; it was surmised that stray oxides from the tape production made their way into the CD plating process inadvertently. Some discs were affected to the point that most transports wouldn't read the CD's table of contents (the mostly plastic transports made by Philips and Sony and used in entry-level CD players were particularly vulnerable).
Some enterprising soul back about 1987 or so discovered that using a tape-head demagnetizer on CD's seemed to work at ameliorating the problem -- so some firms cobbled together CD demagnetizer units, which were more often than not a series of bar magnets built into an oversized CD box. Some of these worked, some did not; more high-end companies (including the Bedini company mentioned in an earlier post) started combining ultrasound cleaners with the magnets to "cover all the bases", so to speak. Most later CD and pretty much all DVD production is now done in dedicated plants without significant contaminants; the problem of disc magnetism has all but disappeared. Nevertheless -- at least in my experience -- an ultrasound cleaning does remove some built-up airborne contaminants on the disc surface (many of my CD's were with me in my L.A. years -- and smog is a culprit here!). Magnets -- not so much anymore. Some disc cleaning products still employ magnets -- probably to burn through inventory!