>> 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.

We've got something like 4 VHS VCRs in our home, all recording  
"stuff" in 3x mode (what you call EP and some of the recorders call  
SLP.  Six hours per tape.)  Tapes move "ok" between machines (some  
loss of quality; especially: "audio sounds odd.")  We don't save  
anything; all those machines are for time-shifting.  Presumably, if  
"quality" were an issue, we wouldn't need 4 VCRs; no tape technology  
is capable of improving the quality of much of American Television!   
(I won't speak for other countries.)
A beta recorder with 2H recording capability would never have been a  
starter (the TIVO upgraded with a 300GB drive is nice, though!) (Of  
course, by the time I bought my first VCR, Beta was pretty much  
gone.  It's all my wife's fault.)

So Beta had higher "quality", but VHS had longer record time and  
lower prices.  Seems like there's room for a lot of argument on which  
was "better engineered."

BillW

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