On Wed, 2 Apr 2008, Herbert Graf wrote:

> 
> On Wed, 2008-04-02 at 17:13 +0100, sergio masci wrote:
> > Beta came standard with 4 heads, VHS with 2. The picture looked much 
> > better on Beta than the equivalent VHS.
> 
> That's like saying a Honda Civic sucks since it's base model doesn't
> come with power windows, but a base Subaru Impreza does.

Hmm, I thought it was more like saying: a car with a two litre engine 
costs more than a car with a one litre engine but it has more power.

> 
> Obviously 2 heads didn't have as high a quality, but consumers didn't
> care.

As you stated in another post "given the sets people had"

But then not everyone is stuck with an NTSC set :-)

> 
> Better VHS players had 4 heads, did those look much worse then Beta?
> Compare apples to apples.

Ok so comparing apples with apples, the better 4 head VHS VCRs were MUCH 
more expensive than the 2 head VHS models and on a par with Beta in terms 
of price.

> 
> > > 
> > > Bluntly, Beta had shorter tapes, and didn't really do slow play to get more
> > > recording time.  Lose.
> > 
> > Ah, VHS slow play - ultra sucky incompatible mode. I made the mistake of 
> > recording some stuff I wanted to keep in long play once. Then I tried 
> > playing it on a new VCR. Yep - didn't work!
> 
> LP was a format that most VCRs would play, but few would record.
> 
> The "standard" modes were SP and EP.
> 
> The tapes were labeled for use in SP mode, so a T-120 tape recorded for
> 2 hours.
> 
> EP mode was VERY common, and pretty much universally compatible. It had
> a recording time of 3X SP, so a 120 tape would record 6 hours, a 160, 8
> hours. I've also heard of 10 hour tapes, but I felt that 160s were
> already pushing tape thinness a little far. 

I've not seen an EP setting on a VHS VCR, only SP and LP. After being 
bitten by the incompatibilty of recording in LP on one machine and being 
unable to playback on another I stopped using LP altogether.

I actually tried playing these tapes on other peoples machines and the 
playback quality varied greatly from extreamly bad to poor - never saw 
playback that could be described as adiquate.

> 
> These times were FAR more then Beta. Yes, the quality sucked, but
> consumers didn't care, at least with VHS you had the OPTION of recording
> for 8 hours.

Yes but once the beta manufacturers saw the way the market was going, 
there was no reason for them to try to improve their VCRs and introduce 
LP. So comparing apples with apples, a beta VCR in standard play on a PAL 
TV produced a MUCH better quality picture than a VHS 2 head VCR in SP on 
the same TV.

IMO the only reason VHS won out over beta was because of price. The masses 
saw "cheap" and went for that.

Regards
Sergio
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