VCR's

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may63

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In 1980, we were one of the first families on the block to get a VCR (or VTR's as The Buggles sing in their one-hit wonder). It was a large and heavy thing made by JVC. It was a top loader with manual push-down buttons...cost = $1,000.00. (Yes, I still have it, but it needs some repair.) One fun feature it had that today's VCR's don't have is that it could do a X2 play with sound. We could whip through "All My Children" in half the time because soap operas move so slowly!

Anyways, the reason I'm bringing up VCR's is to ask the group: What rare footage do you have laying around on ancient VHS or betamax (betamax...what's betamax?) tapes? My oldest tape is The Wizard of Oz from CBS's 1981 annual broadcast (it's fun to watch the commercials). I also found footage of TBS's homespun "Down To Earth" mid '80s sitcom, and a cut of American Bandstand from 1986 (omigod the clothes and hairstyles!)

Jim
 
Unfortunately I got rid of my older VHS movies when I replaced my movie watching equipment first the VCR was replaced by the Laserdisc machine-in fact got the Laserdisc machine before my first VCR.The Laserdisc machine was a top loader Pioneer with a gas tube laser.Then the laserdiscs got replaced by DVDs. My only VHS tapes at this point are appliance "ownwers manuals" recorded on them from the appliance maker-or "home Movies" of me and my friends at various radio stations and their equipment.Some pictures of vintage transmitters,consoles,other radio station gear.Saved those tapes.The first VCR I had was a "Fisher" one.when I first got the VCR-did rent lots of movies-If I liked it bought it.There were several of those Video rental tape "library" stores in the area at the time-again Marlow Heights MD.Got the VCR at the Circuit City store that was there.
 
Old tapes

Got our first VCR in 1984, a Hitachi-built RCA VJP-900 2 piece machine. Would record linear stereo. Never got the camera for it, though.
 
The first VCR we got was around 1987 and it was a Quasar. It lasted many, many years but finally died sometime in the late 90s.

I think the oldest tapes I have where I recorded something is of In Living Color or The Simpsons. The oldest tape that I have where it was store bought was of The Monster Squad.
 
The Virtual Museum of Vintage VCRs

Here's an interesting link for people interested in the history of the VCR. Sort of a sister site of ours.

My brother and SIL were the first to have a VCR in the family, it was in the early 80's and it was a Video2000 system. Very sophisticated machine but also expensive.

Total Rewind

The virtual museum of home video technology. Weird and wonderful old video recorders, and the surprising story of the development of the humble home VCR.
www.totalrewind.org
 
The first VCR I had was an Emerson from Wal-Mart, I think in 1985. Had a wired remote, 3-event timer.

Then I got an Akai with hi-fi stereo (helical) sound, but I think it also did linear stero. I believe this was in 1988. It had slow-motion, and adjustable audio record levels. Every one since then has been hi-fi stereo.

Through the years, I've also had a Sharp, a JVC (which I still have, 10 years old by now, virtually bullet-proof), a Panasonic (had a programming wand which was scanned over a barcode sheet, it didn't last long), a Sony (still have), and a Toshiba that was my grandmother's (still have, not stereo). Favorites are the Akai and JVC.
 
first vcr and 80s programming

my first vcr was 1993 from Best Buy for about $400. It was stereo and made by GoldStar. It worked great, was heavy, gave off alot of heat, and was bigger than any vcr you buy today.

I have had my best success over the years with JVC.

I never had any recordings from before 1993. However a friend of mine who is 10 years older bought his first VCR in 1983 and used it mainly to record (and record over the same) "As the World Turns" while he was at work. When I met him he still had all the tapes he ever bought(about 36), and still does. He let me use his tapes and I couldn't wait to down load the material for the sake of the commercials and programming.
He had tapes with commercials from 1982 and 1983 plus some stuff from the late 80s and early 90s. It was like a treasure. I downloaded into my DVD-R (which has a hard drive) edited, sorted and tranferred the good stuff to DVD.
You have to love 1980s programming. So Upbeat, so progressive. The fashion was great! Vibrant colors yet tastful and fun. The movies were done tastefully and professionally. The music was being refined from the disco era but still had a beat and it was everywhere. Interior decor also was soft yet modern, color matched items. Upbeat colors yet tasteful.

And you have to remember that this was the EARLY 80s and president reagan and company had the need to spur our country or maybe distract it while the rust belt was being abandoned, we ran up massive deficits, we looked away from environmental destruction like never before (the love canal and 3 mile island for instance)and we perpitrated massive crimes on countries like Iraq. Don't forget Jim and Tammy Bakker and their recreational park!

I've also found stuff on Ebay that contained commercials.

I would share some of these here but I don't know to upload movies or commercials yet.

One of my favs is the commercials for Tide
"Tide Country""... claim your spot, Tide gets it clean"
or how about the commercial for Oxydol
"...so get Oxydol, and you won't get afraid to show it --- whites!!"
And yes, appliances came in Harvest gold, Avacodo, Coffee, Platinum (dove gray), Toast, Almond, and high gloss Black. Dishwashers with black glass fronts. refrigerators had smudge proof textured steel finishs. computerized controls for all even vacuums.
Ah the good days.
 
I've got one of those old RCA Selectavision VCR's like you describe May63. It's a pretty cool industrial/professional unit that I got from the high school I went to. I believe it is the same thing as a Panasonic OmniVision deck. The thing is a HUGE top-loading unit with all sorts of belts, pulleys, gears and stuff underneath. The play button moves mechanical components down below and starts a host of mecanical stuff in motion below deck taht plays the tape. I took the deck with me to college back in the early 90's when VCR's were still sort of expensive. I always had people at my door with video tapes in hand wanting me to tape shows...so I started "renting" the deck for a dollar for me to set the MECHANICAL timer and record a TV show.

The oldest, and most enjoyable VHS program I have in my collection is some footage my friends and I made when we were in the 8th grade for school. We made several series of shows that were a takeoff of the David Letterman show. It's fun to get them out and watch every so often. Gosh, it doesn't seem like it's been 20 years since we made those tapes!!!
 
Interesting Topic!

Our first VCR was actually the first VHS machine offered on the market. It's an early '78 model RCA (though they were really Matsushita/Panasonics) with SP and LP speeds and a corded Pause remote. This is before the pushbutton tuners, they're turret type for UHF and VHF. My dad worked 3rd shift so he saved up 3 months pay to buy it to record all his games. It still works and I have no idea what footage we have on tape, though we have all the early ones. I seem to recall Steve Martin on the red sleeved "VideoCassette" in the pic. Cost $25 for a 4 hour tape in 1979 dollars!

I'm more a Beta guy myself, though lately I've been on a LaserDisc spree; just picked up a Sylvania toploader with industrial gas laser that many consider "the best" at playing everything and it doesn't cut the freq range like the Pioneers. Handles GM discs and DiscoVision titles too!

Of course Ben and I could go on and on about CEDs!
-Cory
 
I still have my first VCR from 1984, a Zenith, that calls itself "Hi Fi" still works fine. I have one of those Panasonics with the scanner as well. I will have to dig around and see what old dusty tapes I have, I never thought of checking those out, should be fun.

Scott
 
Our first VCR was a Hitatchi purchased as a gift for my birthday in 1980. It had electronic tuning, but required a manual adjustment. You had to turn a knob, kinda like "fine tuning" until the station came in clear for your selected station and then "lock" it into a pre-selected button on the front of the unit. It had a set of black station number gels you could put in the front so that the actual "Channel Number" would light up when selected.
It was top loading and the only remote control it had was a hard wired "pause" button. You could program it via lights on the top of the unit, no on-screen programming here. It did a pretty good job recording, but you had to have a very strong input signal to get the best results. I was living in MSP at the time and "cable" was just beginning to make inroads into our area. Using an outdoor antenna with this VCR didn't produce very good results while recording. This unit bit the dust around 1987 or so. It cost $899.00 new.
The very first program we taped was a TV Movie named "Topper", with Kate Jackson and Andrew Stevens. We still have the tape, however it has deteriorated so far it is almost unwatchable. I also remember the first blank video tapes you could buy were Memorex, and they cost $24.99 for a T-120.
 
I was coerced into buying our first back sometime in the mid 80's for about $600. It was an RCA Selectavision as well with the corded remote. I don't think we ever used it more than 5 times and about two years ago I did go to use it but it didn't work so I turfed it and picked up a new JVC for probably less than $100, it sits in the cabinet with the stereo and tv and still hasn't been used yet. Now I read in the paper the other day that 2006 is the last year for VHS tapes being made. Still don't have a DVD either. I've never had any interest in recording anything or renting movies, zilch.
 
My first VCR (bought while in college) was a JVC, which lasted for ages. Replaced it with another JVC only two years ago, but this unit though operating perfectly well will be replaced with a combo DVD/VCR also by JVC later this year. My "old" JVC CD player (also bought when in college) is really out dated so rather than just buy another CD player will get a DVD player as they play CDs as well, so killing two birds with one stone and eliminating some clutter.

Yes, VCRs are a dying breed along with the tapes. At appliance recycling areas in Europe where people go to dispose of used appliances and entertainment equipment/computers one sees lots of VCRs. Between TiVo and DVDs, especially those with a built in hard drive really are streets ahead for home entertainment/television watching today. Consider several DVDs can replace a long row of VCR tapes. Also it is much easier to locate a program recorded onto a DVD than VCR tape. A boon for those like myself who never seem to have gotten the knack of indexing what is exactly on various VCR tapes.

Oldest VCR tape? Probaly a recording of "Swan Lake" made on my first VCR. Thing is as VCR tech has advanced over time, playing "old" tapes on newer VCRs gives a pretty bad quality. IIRC VCR tapes also degrade over time which could also have something to do with it.

Launderess
 
My deck looks just like the one in your picture there Cadman! The only difference is that it had one of those "flip chart" clocks, and the cabinet was woodgrain, instead of brushed alumnium. I probably have a lower end model, or because it was an "educational grade" model, it had a few subtle differences from the home model. Does yours have BNC connectors for the video output lines?

Remember when VCR repair was a big business for a TV shop to get into? As solid-state televisions dispensed with the need for tuning and ajustments, VCR service kept the service departments busy for another 10-15 years. Just about all VCR's back in the 70's and 80's needed frequent tuning up and repairs. Most repairs were mechanical, and involved cleaning and aligning heads, replacing belts, lubricating gears, sometimes replacing heads, and of course dislodging foreign objects that children placed in the drives. Dropping $50-$100 to service a $800 machine was not balked upon. Alas, the advent of stepper motors and automatic tracking systems meant that VCR's now had direct-drive motors and didn't need belts, gears, and all that other stuff that caused them to malfunction...and be expensive.

I still do this type of work in the professional end. I service most of the new DV-CAM and HD-CAM, and DVC-PRO formats that many of the TV studios are using. This service business is starting to dry up too, as most TV studios switch to non-linear digital editing systems on computers, that have no moving parts. Some of the vintage TV studio equipment is quite fascinating as the home units!

Okay guys, time to start "scarfing" up those old VCR's sitting around in trash piles and scrap bins. I bet we'll be able to get some good deals on those old "boat anchors" that will end up being collectible someday!
 
the dreaded old vcr

My first was a GE back in the mid 80's. OMG it was awfull! I had to tune it, fuss with those numbers to slide in the front. It was always broke. Next came the fisher, no more tuning, cable ready, but it was always broke. The first good one I bought wasnt til 1990. The sony 575. I have never seen anything like it since. Like an idiot i sold it to upgrade to a newer model, the 595. The newer one worked quite well but lacked some of the features the 575 had. I now have a sony 750 that I got in 93'. It has been repaired once, the loading basket decided not to come back up. It is still working but I dont use it that much any more. The timer goes til 2008, if it last another year i'll be happy. If it last til 08' i'll be beside my self. But......it wont be replaced.

Oldest tapes? Probabaly some wonder woman episodes when the FX channel was showing reruns of it back in the early 90's

Scott
 
Our first VCR was a Sanyo Beta model with a wired remote control. I think all you could do was pause. Maybe FF. This was in 1983-4.
It had that awful tuner that required first turning a teensy knob (there was a little tool provided to do it) to some setting or another. Then you had to turn this teensy thumbwheel to the correct station. All this was sort of by guess, as none of the stations had the "bugs" in the corner back then.
Yes, Veg is quite an old man.
Our next was a Toshiba, also Beta. My dad died shortly thereafter and then it became up to me to buy the VCRs. Naturally, I cheaped out, first getting a VCP. Can't even remember the brand. Had a Singer for a while there, a Symphonic and some other NoNameO brand.
Ended up ditching all the Beta tapes when we moved (the Toshiba had died years earlier.) But oh, what was on those tapes--all the Charlie Chan movies, "Matinee at the Bijou", lots of old BW flicks, just tons of good stuff. Lots of copies of VHS tapes, too, since Beta always made nice copies. I still think that's why the format went out of business, so to speak.
Now I'm transferring all my VHS tapes to DVD. Wonder what format I'll get next?

veg
 

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