> >> I can't agree with that.  Since when did the quality of the 
> >> engineering have anything to do with sales ?  Just look at the old 
> >> Betamax vs. VHS story.
> 
> >> These days it's marketing that drives sales.  Good 
> engineering just 
> >> puts the price up.
> 
> > Bad example, Beta sucked.
> 
> That's moot - as you will possibly be widely informed by 
> others any time now :-).
> 
> BUT if it's true it just means that VHS sucked worse as it's
> (almost) universally accepted that Beta was/is superior to VHS.
> 
> 
>         Russell


Pffft.  'Universally accepted'.  Right.  'Universally accepted' by those who
never ever had one, or don't have one any more, or can't find it even if
they do.  I wonder what the proportion of Beta losers* on PicList is.  Above
that of the general population, I'd wager.  Funny that.

Anyhoo, dust off that old Beta player (which no-one actually has), and set
it up to record episodes of 'Top Gear', 'Mythbusters', and 'Lifestyles of
the Rich & Famous' for the week.  

Oh, how happy you'll be on the weekend when you sit down to watch them.

Oh, right, you're trying to record three hours onto a two hour tape.  "Ha
Ha!"  You should have brought a VHS instead.  There ya go, that's why Beta
sucks, it's because it doesn't do what the customer wants.  (The customer
really wants 100 hour tapes, but never mind.)  You'll just have to put up
with VHS 3/4/5 hour tapes + slow play + extra slow play then.  (5 hour tapes
may be a figment of my imagination and/or dodgy memory)

Every 'Beta was better' proponent I've encountered has come up with the same
answer when asked "Just why was that anyway?".  "Errr, mumble mumble mumble
the wotsit in Beta had 0.2% more grommet oil than VHS, so the diagonal
stabilisers had better damping blah blah".  All bollocks, technically, there
wasn't much difference.  It's like saying .WAV is better than .MP3.  Well
yeah, but MP3 takes 1/10th the space and sounds the same.

Bluntly, Beta had shorter tapes, and didn't really do slow play to get more
recording time.  Lose.

VHS sucked too, which is why we have DVD players to watch pre-recorded
stuff, and PVRs to tape stuff off the telly.  (There's your 100 hour tape,
btw.)  Still, at least you could watch 'Lord of the rings' and other 'geez I
need a pee now' epics on VHS without changing tapes.

For the record, I haven't played a vinyl record for about 20 years,
cassettes for a bit less, CDs for a few years (bar ripping to MP3), and VHS
for about 4.  I had a Super-VHS player for a short while, that got sold to
some sucker once I realised it was a dud (not backwards compatible).  I'll
toss in 'radio sucks' as well.

A friend's grandfather once said "The best thing about the good old days is
the good old days are gone".

Tony

* To move out of Beta status, you need to hook up the audio to your tube
amp, thus maximising that Beta warmth.

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