VHS vs Beta

[edDV]

Betamax's minor performance advantages were swamped by other factors. Their consumer use assumptions were that customers would record and edit their own families or short TV segments one hour max. This was before affordable home camcorders existed. They crippled themselves when they sized the plastic cassette. JVC sized the VHS cassette with time shift in mind and had the 4 hour LP mode from day one soon followed by 6 hour EP mode. Betamax was always chasing record times. Sony also failed at developing partners and distribution. They were just too arrogant. All in all Sony bungled Betamax.

For Video8 Sony had 2 hour record time and camcorders from day one. The small cassette allowed for smaller camcorders. This time JVC was caught sleeping and had no VHS solution. The VHS-C cassette was a clunky answer to the more elegant and better performing Video8 and Hi8.

The reason Sony missed mp3 was their ownership of Colombia Records. They saw digital compression as a threat to CD rather than an alternate distribution. Again they retreated into high end production first with DAT. They ignored the digital Walkman until it was far too late. Laserdisc and DVD were natural extensions of CD that allowed better control of the media assets.

Looking back, iPod is the replacement for Walkman that Sony failed to risk. iPod was more about music distribution than technology.

[DereX888]

FWIW, IMHO German VCC format (aka Video 2000) was much better than VHS or Beta alltogether.
We had one in my family when I was a kid, and I didn't knew what people mean by "video ate the tape" until we got first stupid Sony's Beta VCR (and later VHS...)
(for me) it was huge step backward both in usability and quality.
Maybe I don't remember it now correctly, but I think picture quality of both Beta and VHS were worse than that of VCC.
Not to mention my biggest surprise I still *do* remember: that none didn't even rewind tapes at the end like VCC did (those "Please Rewind" stickers on rental tapes were there for a reason, LOL)

The first VCR that was finally better than our old Grundig VCC VCR was probably the "Home Theater Series" 4-head stereo hi-fi VHS VCR years later, 1990 or 1991 Philips VCR - because it was stereo, and it finally did auto-rewinding too
But I don't think it had any better picture.
To me, both Beta and VHS were crap anyways, if there was any difference between these formats it must have somehow escaped my usually sharp eyes I prefered LD for movies. You could clearly see the difference in picture quality between LD and VHS/Beta with your naked eyes.

[lordsmurf]

Video8 was better in some ways, but worse in others.

You can still play a misaligned VHS-C somewhat, but you're nearly 100% screwed when you get a misaligned 8mm tape.

The 8mm was better in terms of quality, as well as how secure the tape was in the plastic clamshell.

[Video Head]

Betamax's minor performance advantages were swamped by other factors. Their consumer use assumptions were that customers would record and edit their own families or short TV segments one hour max. This was before affordable home camcorders existed. They crippled themselves when they sized the plastic cassette. JVC sized the VHS cassette with time shift in mind and had the 4 hour LP mode from day one soon followed by 6 hour EP mode. Betamax was always chasing record times. Sony also failed at developing partners and distribution. They were just too arrogant. All in all Sony bungled Betamax.

For Video8 Sony had 2 hour record time and camcorders from day one. The small cassette allowed for smaller camcorders. This time JVC was caught sleeping and had no VHS solution. The VHS-C cassette was a clunky answer to the more elegant and better performing Video8 and Hi8.

The reason Sony missed mp3 was their ownership of Colombia Records. They saw digital compression as a threat to CD rather than an alternate distribution. Again they retreated into high end production first with DAT. They ignored the digital Walkman until it was far too late. Laserdisc and DVD were natural extensions of CD that allowed better control of the media assets.

Looking back, iPod is the replacement for Walkman that Sony failed to risk. iPod was more about music distribution than technology.

You skipped over Sony's breakthrough technology: MiniDisc. It had compression and was sold as "near CD quality". They even made AM/FM/MiniDisc in-dash car stereos because they arrogantly thought it would go mainstream.

If digital compression was such a threat in MP3 form, why was it not a threat in MiniDisc? Could it be because they owned it and could control it in a labratory style distribution to the public?

Sony's business logic is baffling at best. No wonder their C-Suite changes with the weather. It makes one question if they do not just blindly stumble upon a winner every now and again. After the aquisitions it appeared that the movie and music executives in California are actually controlling the whole company. No wonder they are stuck in the mud.

[yoda313]

If digital compression was such a threat in MP3 form, why was it not a threat in MiniDisc? Could it be because they owned it and could control it in a labratory style distribution to the public?

Didn't minidisc have some kind of protection on it? I seem to remember it having something akin to macrovision for audio.

I have a audio cd recorder deck (physical macine that has an optical input as well as analog) and it has a limit on digital copies. I think with minidisc you can copy via analog all you want obviously via left/right anlaog jacks or simple headphone out jacks but pure digital copies via toslink fiber optic cables are limited to one (or one per session or something - not infinite or at least not easy to do).

Also sony did that ATRAC3 thing to counteract mp3. However I don't think atrac3 did anything. I think it was probably their response to microsofts WMA windows media audio system where they could embed drm in it.


------------------------------------

Regarding the original threads vhs/beta focus. My family started with Beta. In fact when I was four I could operate the "tank" without a problem. It was a Sanyo model if I remember correctly.

I don't remember much about picture quality and we had gotten rid of our original model sometime at the end of the 80s or early 90s, no exact date remembered of course.

One thing I always remember my dad talking about beta vs vhs was that he liked having just one show on a tape instead of more than one. For him he didn't like accidently recording over something that could happen on a vhs tape. The shorter record times on beta dictated that. So I guess some people did not see that as a factor.

I don't remember when we went to vhs only that we did.

Regarding LP recording speeds. I have never liked that. LP almost never works properly on a machine other than the one you originally recorded it on (or the same model series). The tracking was just to wacked out on the hybrid mode. Of course sp worked on virtually any player. And even though slp was always "weaker" in terms of visual quality (yes you can tell even on standard def tvs) it played more reliably on different brand machine, I don't know why but the tolerance was better for slp mode than lp for whatever reason. Maybe the 4 hour mode just wasn't "standard" enough.

-------------

I have a question of my own - it seems in the three different recording modes - sp, lp, slp, - when you fast forward or rewind the horizontal bands you see on the screen seem to be of different sizes. Is that in correspondence to the different recording lengths used and translates on the screen as the wavy lines you see during rewinding/fastforwarding? Or is that related to something else? Or could I be remembering something else from my last session with a vcr? (which was just the other week for some dubbing by the way)

[edDV]

Betamax's minor performance advantages were swamped by other factors. Their consumer use assumptions were that customers would record and edit their own families or short TV segments one hour max. This was before affordable home camcorders existed. They crippled themselves when they sized the plastic cassette. JVC sized the VHS cassette with time shift in mind and had the 4 hour LP mode from day one soon followed by 6 hour EP mode. Betamax was always chasing record times. Sony also failed at developing partners and distribution. They were just too arrogant. All in all Sony bungled Betamax.

For Video8 Sony had 2 hour record time and camcorders from day one. The small cassette allowed for smaller camcorders. This time JVC was caught sleeping and had no VHS solution. The VHS-C cassette was a clunky answer to the more elegant and better performing Video8 and Hi8.

The reason Sony missed mp3 was their ownership of Colombia Records. They saw digital compression as a threat to CD rather than an alternate distribution. Again they retreated into high end production first with DAT. They ignored the digital Walkman until it was far too late. Laserdisc and DVD were natural extensions of CD that allowed better control of the media assets.

Looking back, iPod is the replacement for Walkman that Sony failed to risk. iPod was more about music distribution than technology.

You skipped over Sony's breakthrough technology: MiniDisc. It had compression and was sold as "near CD quality". They even made AM/FM/MiniDisc in-dash car stereos because they arrogantly thought it would go mainstream.

If digital compression was such a threat in MP3 form, why was it not a threat in MiniDisc? Could it be because they owned it and could control it in a labratory style distribution to the public?

Sony's business logic is baffling at best. No wonder their C-Suite changes with the weather. It makes one question if they do not just blindly stumble upon a winner every now and again. After the aquisitions it appeared that the movie and music executives in California are actually controlling the whole company. No wonder they are stuck in the mud.

Walkman was attributed to Akio Morita himself. I like to think this is true. Late stage Sony is all about control by unique patents. They have been anti-standard unless they controlled it. Blu-Ray is their latest clear victory but it is somewhat hollow and very late.

They lost their dominant Betacam broadcast ENG market share to Panasonic's DVC-Pro. They are losing the premium HDTV market to Samsung. They have mostly lost HDV camcorder market share to Canon. The same trend is happening for AVCHD. The PS3 game share is in a fight for survival vs. Nintendo and Microsoft. Today it is not good to be Sony. I'm sorry to see the decline even though they harmed me in the past.

[Video Head]

Betamax's minor performance advantages were swamped by other factors. Their consumer use assumptions were that customers would record and edit their own families or short TV segments one hour max. This was before affordable home camcorders existed. They crippled themselves when they sized the plastic cassette. JVC sized the VHS cassette with time shift in mind and had the 4 hour LP mode from day one soon followed by 6 hour EP mode. Betamax was always chasing record times. Sony also failed at developing partners and distribution. They were just too arrogant. All in all Sony bungled Betamax.

For Video8 Sony had 2 hour record time and camcorders from day one. The small cassette allowed for smaller camcorders. This time JVC was caught sleeping and had no VHS solution. The VHS-C cassette was a clunky answer to the more elegant and better performing Video8 and Hi8.

The reason Sony missed mp3 was their ownership of Colombia Records. They saw digital compression as a threat to CD rather than an alternate distribution. Again they retreated into high end production first with DAT. They ignored the digital Walkman until it was far too late. Laserdisc and DVD were natural extensions of CD that allowed better control of the media assets.

Looking back, iPod is the replacement for Walkman that Sony failed to risk. iPod was more about music distribution than technology.

You skipped over Sony's breakthrough technology: MiniDisc. It had compression and was sold as "near CD quality". They even made AM/FM/MiniDisc in-dash car stereos because they arrogantly thought it would go mainstream.

If digital compression was such a threat in MP3 form, why was it not a threat in MiniDisc? Could it be because they owned it and could control it in a labratory style distribution to the public?

Sony's business logic is baffling at best. No wonder their C-Suite changes with the weather. It makes one question if they do not just blindly stumble upon a winner every now and again. After the aquisitions it appeared that the movie and music executives in California are actually controlling the whole company. No wonder they are stuck in the mud.

Walkman was attributed to Akio Morita himself. I like to think this is true. Late stage Sony is all about control by unique patents. They have been anti-standard unless they controlled it. Blu-Ray is their latest clear victory but it is somewhat hollow and very late.

They lost their dominant Betacam broadcast ENG market share to Panasonic's DVC-Pro. They are losing the premium HDTV market to Samsung. They have mostly lost HDV camcorder market share to Canon. The same trend is happening for AVCHD. The PS3 game share is in a fight for survival vs. Nintendo and Microsoft. Today it is not good to be Sony. I'm sorry to see the decline even though they harmed me in the past.

I also like to think that Akio did brainchild the Walkman. Why did he not drive what drove him to believe in such things into those who came later? Why? Management is such an important part of business or any other undertaking.

Control of unique patents has become the new stage for a technology (or any) company. Look at the break-up of Nortel in Canada. They hold many patents over ethernet and wireless technologies. The company name, its physical properties and resources are worth nothing. The patents it owns are worth millions or billions. It will all be sold to the highest bidder.

Another Canadian company, Research In Motion (RIM) (Basillie vs Badman of the NHL) does not hold significant patent rights. They do have significant cash holdings and large continous revenue streams. They will most likely want to aquire firms that hold patent rights over technologies related to wireless and the internet. This trend will continue as the developing nations of the world expand into industrial production centers and join the developed nations as mass consumers. As countries such as China and India join into the global economy they will want to ensure that trade is done in a fair and negotiated fashion...no more street market MS-Windows, at least for the ones making it big...patent rights over the few billion consumer product sales will be a railway tycoon's dream come true.

[raffie]

If theres one thing you can learn from AV-history, its that ppl arent interested in what is the best quality. Look at audio cassetes, look at MP3. The VHS/Beta argument, well, I think the difference wasn't big enough to be a factor in any case. I have Video-2000 recorders, and I do have to say I'm surprised that format didnt get appreciated more, because on top of very descent quality, it had 2 sides on a video tape (2x4 hrs), and recording time being an issue in the VHS/Beta format war and all.

Also both technologies kept improving, so it's very hard to make a good comparison.

I liked Beta when I was 15 because I could buy 2 of them for no money second hand . Those decks have long since died, but I still love Beta and I have a couple of Sony SuperBeta recorders that show very nice results especially with the Pro-X tapes, I'm afraid tho that every piece of analogue video-equipment will have to be retired soon. With analogue tuners becoming obselete, with HiDef video becoming the standard. The Superbeta could still compete up untill now and show better picture than normal VHS machines and even comparable with digital recorders, but compare it with high definition and everything else looks like crap

[Video Head]

If digital compression was such a threat in MP3 form, why was it not a threat in MiniDisc? Could it be because they owned it and could control it in a labratory style distribution to the public?

-------------

I have a question of my own - it seems in the three different recording modes - sp, lp, slp, - when you fast forward or rewind the horizontal bands you see on the screen seem to be of different sizes. Is that in correspondence to the different recording lengths used and translates on the screen as the wavy lines you see during rewinding/fastforwarding? Or is that related to something else? Or could I be remembering something else from my last session with a vcr? (which was just the other week for some dubbing by the way)

It has to do with the tape speed and number of playback heads on the drum. In SP mode the tape runs fast, in LP mode the tape runs slow. At a slower speed there is less data per inch of tape passing past the drum, thus in slow motion or fast read, less data is available to display, producing bigger waving lines between the heads on the drum. A 2 head and 4 head machine would also make a big difference. More heads = more data. My Mitsubishi ceramic 4 head displays very clear during fast forward and rewind. Slow motion and pause are almost flawless - except for NTSC dot crawl. That is if the heads are clean...and someone has given me a VHS tape to play...and I have dragged it out and plugged it in...then I have to pull the bottom panel and lube the eject belt because the thing sits so long between plays and the belt is getting old, dry and slips on the drive wheel and I am not paying for a replacement to play 2 tapes a year. Tape...it's what drove me to go digital in the first place.

C:/Windows/Files/VHS/Make_My_Tape_Play_Now.exe

If life were that easy...

[MJ Peg]

Minidisc was brilliant for its time, basically something like MP3 quality audio at 256kbps (?) it sounded so close to CD that the remaining difference didn't stop me enjoying the music if I ever noticed - which wasn't often. Sometimes a particularly sudden crescendo of percussion would upset the encoder and it wouldn't record that peak well, but apart from that it was wonderful. It was like being able to record my own CDs, but little tiny ones well protected in robust cases like a floppy disc. The Serial Copy Management stopped you making a digital copy of a copy but I stuck to analogue mode and never encountered all that.

Sony blew it with Minidisc by not pushing it forward as a computer floppy replacement. It could have been the great standard way to fits a 100 floppy's worth of data onto one disc, but they lost out there. Still, that's ancient history now that internet file transfers and USB drives have taken over on that front.

[BD_SC]

I can give you some information about why VHS won the format wars. I completed a course in radio and TV servicing in 1988 and though the war was over by then we covered the two systems from a field servicing point of view.
You have to realise that when the two systems came onto the market in the mid 1970's (at least in the UK) they were horrifically expensive, maybe two thousand pounds a go in todays terms.
So many people rented them, this puts bulk purchasing of the kit into the hands of rental company service managers. The purchase decision was apparently made on the basis of servicing costs; how much servicing and repair in hours did each system take up.
As you know the major item in video tape repair is the rotating video head assembly. In both systems the head assy had to be desoldered, then unbolted, lifted off and the replacement put back, however the VHS heads were pinned into place so that the new head assy was in very close alignment with the original unit. In the Betamax system the heads were not pinned and the newly installed heads had to be set up with an eccentricity gauge. After that both systems would be set up electronically.
the setting up on a Betamax machine could take up to an hour longer; it was quite fiddly.
In my opinion the extra hour per machine per head change was enough to put off the business customer and when the machines came down in price that went for home buyers as well.

[jagabo]

Minidisc was brilliant for its time, basically something like MP3 quality audio at 256kbps (?) it sounded so close to CD that the remaining difference didn't stop me enjoying the music if I ever noticed - which wasn't often. Sometimes a particularly sudden crescendo of percussion would upset the encoder and it wouldn't record that peak well, but apart from that it was wonderful.

I bought one when they first came out in the USA. I found it was very poor at recording solo piano. It had terrible breathing (hiss that's louder on the attack and fades with the decay) on each note. Although the hiss at its peak was lower than even a good cassette recording the fact that it wasn't constant made it much more distracting to me.,

[Bix]

Maybe at their best (at least after BI was removed, I've never seen it myself but heard about how wonderful it was), VHS and Beta weren't that different in terms of picture quality, but at slower speeds, Beta was certainly superior. Generally speaking, the BIII recordings (both off-air and dubbed from commercial releases) that I've seen are far superior to similar VHS SLP/EP recordings and comparable to VHS SP.

[DereX888]

Today it is not good to be Sony. I'm sorry to see the decline even though they harmed me in the past.

Yeah, I feel the same.

But Sony is not really in decline generally as a corporation.
It just has moved on from being primarily electronics/hardware manufacturer into many other businesses.

[Video Head]

Today it is not good to be Sony. I'm sorry to see the decline even though they harmed me in the past.

Yeah, I feel the same.

But Sony is not really in decline generally as a corporation.
It just has moved on from being primarily electronics/hardware manufacturer into many other businesses.

As at fiscal year end (March 31, 2009) Sony Corporation reported a 1 billion dollar loss for the year. They posted a 390 million dollar loss for the first quarter of this year and the only good news has been that the second quarter was only a 290 million dollar loss. That is still 780 million dollars in loss at the mid-point and Sony is not reporting good news looking forward.

Their latest CEO, Howard Stringer, has vowed to rattle the cage within the ranks of Sony. They are reducing the number of manufacturing plants from 57 to 49 and eliminating 8,000 jobs. The scary part is that every business segment is experiencing declines in revenue and profit due to increased competition and a slow adaptation to the new global business order. We know what the movie and music executives will blame the decline on, because it could never be their fault. Maybe they need to do another one of those root-kit backdoors to help instill consumer confidence in their products and business practices.

[DereX888]

@Video Head
There are many companies Sony owns (wholly or partially) reporting gains, not losses.
i.e. just from the top of my head IIRC
MGM = $500M as of middle of the 2009 (although they have to pay ~$300M in interest for their $3.7B debt or so)
SPE = $178M as of September
and so on, you just gotta read around...

Yeah, another rootkit certainly will help them

As much as I avoid anything-Sony, it would be sad day if they would flip over. Bunch of bad CEOs and their anti-customer initiatives and products they enforced on this company in past 10-15 years wouldn't justify loss of one of the best innovators on the market. CEOs can be changed, entire company's strategy can be changed, but once it's gone is gone and that can't be changed...

C:/Windows/Files/VHS/Make_My_Tape_Play_Now.exe

If life were that easy...

hahaha, this is great

[Video Head]

@Video Head
There are many companies Sony owns (wholly or partially) reporting gains, not losses.
i.e. just from the top of my head IIRC
MGM = $500M as of middle of the 2009 (although they have to pay ~$300M in interest for their $3.7B debt or so)
SPE = $178M as of September
and so on, you just gotta read around...

Yeah, another rootkit certainly will help them

As much as I avoid anything-Sony, it would be sad day if they would flip over. Bunch of bad CEOs and their anti-customer initiatives and products they enforced on this company in past 10-15 years wouldn't justify loss of one of the best innovators on the market. CEOs can be changed, entire company's strategy can be changed, but once it's gone is gone and that can't be changed...

C:/Windows/Files/VHS/Make_My_Tape_Play_Now.exe

If life were that easy...

hahaha, this is great

The data I gave is what Sony Corporation, Japan reported (in Yen, converted to USD). They are the parent company and I would assume that it includes all sub's and wholly owns, but maybe not. Who knows what is going on inside these companies these days.

I too would not like to see Sony go away. I have owned, and still do own, their products. I was even a share holder for a while back in the 90's. But they appear to have lost their way and do not hold the same values and direction that they once had. The one thing I do know about business is that if one entity fails, and end user demand still exists, the void left by the failed will quickly be filled by someone new or an existing competitor.

That is part of Sony's problem right now - competition. Their products are not industry leading anymore, their name no longer carries the same weight it once did and now they need to get up in the morning, fight like dogs and hopefully gain a small advantage and then do it all over again the next day. I do not know if they have that fight in them anymore. When the movie and music industry guys came in they brought a huge culture change with them. Those guys are usually too busy yelling at car wash attendants about a finger print left on their CLK to be bothered getting in the furball. This CEO has his work cut out for him...

[MJ Peg]

So long as they're too busy putting their IP 'rights' ahead of their consumers, obsessed with DRM because they own so much content as well as trying to produce the means to watch/listen to it while locking down what we perceive to be our rights to fair use, then Sony gets a boycot from me.

That and their misguided efforts to set standards of their own where more open standards would benefit us far more (like MemorySchtick) - they're not getting any of my hard-earned unless they come up with something so compellingly far ahead of anything the competition comes up with.

Every sector Sony competes in usually has very healthy competition and I see no need to lock myself into non-standard tech. I find it very easy to dismiss them as irrelevant these days.

[Video Head]

[quote="DereX888"]@Video Head
There are many companies Sony owns (wholly or partially) reporting gains, not losses.
i.e. just from the top of my head IIRC
MGM = $500M as of middle of the 2009 (although they have to pay ~$300M in interest for their $3.7B debt or so)
SPE = $178M as of September
and so on, you just gotta read around...


[quote]

I read around...do you believe that MGM would survive Chapter 11?

Does not look good for those involved...anyone for a KrispyCream? Sony Corporation has a 20% stake...45% of common...they do not have to report until realised...that's gonna hurt like a 330lb offensive linebacker stepping on your hand...with cleats.

[kimco52]

All I know is my experience. The Beta deck mechanics are more reliable than the VHS decks. I still have all the beta decks I have owned, starting with their "portable" camcorder with the separate tuner, deck, and camera. and 4 more decks that I acquired over time as they came out. All are Sony and they all still work. They were my workhorses, delaying programming from TV shows and recording some shows for keeping. I have some feature flicks which were bought and all were at Beta 2 speed on one tape. I have since used the tapes and recorded over the flicks. The Beta Hi-Fi audio was way ahead of VHS audio. The picture quality, to me, looked better, which is why I used them ..... Super Beta was good.

I have had 4 Super VHS decks. Sony SLVR5 and 3 JVC's. All were top of the line at the time I got them. The Sony still works but the JVC's have all died. Different problems. I have not had any tape thread or crinkle problems with the beta decks. Did I mention they all still work, 20 years later? I have had problems with transport problems with the VHS decks. Tape not going back in allthe way when the cassette comes out, crinkling the tape. I did have a problem with the Sony R5. A plastic guide part fell off it's mount but I put it back.
I used to do some editing with the Sony Beta 900. It could slave a separate deck and sync roll and do inserts. I also modified the deck so that I could record in Beta 1 speed and that looked good. I found the instructions on line way back in the 90's. I used the S-VHS decks to make some video masters when I was making some tapes for reproduction but not anymore since I do that in the computer and burn DVD's, now.

For better quality, I went to laserdiscs, but that format did not last long. Particularly when I could not rent them anymore. Luckily, I worked with a guy that loved the format and he bought the deck and discs I had. I had moved on to DVD playbacks for rented movies and building personal libraries. I do have one VHS movie (It's a Mad Mad World) and that took two VHS tapes......It was a purchased movie. I since have it on DVD.

I don't use tape much anymore for obvious reasons. I moved to H-8 for camcorder, migrating to Digital 8... all Sony's. They are still used. I also moved to Canon for Mini-DV. I have a problem getting rid of stuff. I seem to keep everything, except the failed VHS decks.

A colleague gave me two professional S-VHS decks. Different models. They both have problems. The TBC on one of them doesn't work and I haven't had time to figure it out. The other one has tape guide problems at times.

Why bother, you ask? Good question. I dunno. Just Because.

Just my experiences.

[orsetto]

Not only is the "90% looking for porn" statistic fake...
... but porn had nothing to do with the win or loss of the format.

That's a revisionist myth. It's more false than "Beta was better than VHS".

Sorry, LS: you may be the single greatest technical resource on this site, but I doubt you worked in video software retail as early or as long as I did. Anyone who worked a video store counter in 1980-81 will verify the "90% guys looking for porn" (or at least R-rated titillation movies). It was a cliche joke among store clerks. Perhaps small conservative towns in the midwest had a more balanced client base, simply because "mature" material was frowned upon and not readily available, but in big cities the "mature audience" absolutely drove the market. By 1981 VHS was so entrenched in its "more easily available exploitation rentals" legend that the vast majority of customers browsing a dual-format store had no idea what Beta was or thought it was long-since discontinued. Nearly all would ask "why do you carry Beta?", because they could see for themselves it would collect dust on the shelves while every VHS title in the store would turn almost every day. The early video store era seems unbelievable if you weren't actually there working at one: its almost impossible now to conceive a 1981 where the sheer novelty of a video rental was so powerful you could rent every single rotten T&A movie on your shelves every single day for months on end. You can't imagine the garbage these guys would eagerly rent over and over again. The exploitation and adult crap was way more successful than feature films at first, because that was something you couldn't get elsewhere. It wasn't until 1983 or so that the tide turned and the mass market began replacing their movie theater habit with rentals of new releases. Before that, you could count on one hand the number of women who came into the stores each day, compared to the hordes of men.

But it was definitely format-dependent. By 1982 the Beta rental market had contracted to a more "upscale" client base looking mostly for foreign films or artsy flicks. In VHS you could rent anything, any day, to anybody. In Beta, you were lucky to turn a dozen or so titles a day: it really was that bad, at least in the USA (Beta had much greater success in other countries, which helped it survive longer than expected). Between 1980 and 1984 I worked every type of store, from fancy Manhattan emporiums to blue-collar Brooklyn. The "horny guys/VHS" factor ruled in every locale except the store across the street from Carnegie Hall, which was mega-upscale and sold more tapes than it rented. Here, Beta held on at about 30% share, especially with foreign tourists and celebrities (I still have the charge slip carbons signed by Mick Jagger, Frank Sinatra, Empress Farrah of Iran, etc). In late 1985 I raised enough money to open my own store in brownstone Brooklyn, where even the affluent customers had moved to VHS, so I dumped my Beta stock at a loss in 1986. I replaced Beta with LaserDisc rentals, which did surprisingly brisk business for a few years.

All I know is my experience. The Beta deck mechanics are more reliable than the VHS decks. I still have all the beta decks I have owned, starting with their "portable" camcorder with the separate tuner, deck, and camera. and 4 more decks that I acquired over time as they came out. All are Sony and they all still work.

That wasn't until later, with the nifty 2000-series Sony portables and the slimline front-load models with direct drive mechanics. The original, popular, huge, piano-key 8000 and 5000 Betamax designs broke down constantly, as did the later large size front-loaders like the first BetaHiFi 5200. While its true Beta breakdowns rarely damaged tapes like the more-insidious VHS breakdowns did, when a Beta tanked it was completely useless and generally required an expensive overhaul that only held up for a few months. A repaired Matsushita-based VHS usually stayed repaired, the ever-disgusting JVCs were always a lost cause and the later Hitachi-based RCAs were almost as bad.

[DereX888]

The "horny guys/VHS" factor ruled in every locale except the store across the street from Carnegie Hall, which was mega-upscale and sold more tapes than it rented. Here, Beta held on at about 30% share,

My first VHS "original" tape I ever bought was in my teens, a movie that probably would be censored even on a Playboy channel today
And I do remember there was no porn on Beta.
Although I don't think "the porn factor" could have been such a big factor in Beta's demise.

One other (personal) factor:
I've been collecting music on CDs and VHS since I was kid. To me VHS was a winner (albeit I didn't like it) simply because of availability of concerts and music videos on VHS, while there was basically no choices on Beta (or Video2000).
One of my oldest VHS videos I still have - I just had a look - was released in 1987 *in stereo* (and with Dolby NR). I really can't recall having any stereo Beta music tape or concert. And I don't think I have to emphasise difference between stereo and mono to those who like music

I think if VHS VCRs were cheaper than Beta VCRs than *that* was a main reason why VHS won (which I don't know what prices were back then, but considering Beta was a S*ny product I think I can easily assume Beta VCRs were outright more expensive than VHS VCRs, right? )

[joecass]

The so-called "porn" industry was indeed a firestarter for VHS, most young men in those days went to video stores to rent porn tapes. After VHS machines came down in price, movie rentals were the main reason for it's success. It only took a few years for VHS to overtake Beta, simply because of the 6 hour tape speed. 6 hours equals 3 two-hour movies, or 6 one -hour TV programs. I owned both formats in the early 80's, the Beta picture was always superior, as was the transport and loading mechanism. Don't remember any problems with Beta mangling tape, or getting distracting video noise on the screen, but with
VHS those symptoms were common. VHS tracking from what I remember..... was a big pain until they came up with auto-tracking. Even today, though I rarely use videotape, tracking on VHS machines is shaky.

Sorry to see so many people trash Sony, to me they were an innovative company that made reliable products. I still own a
1970's vintage open reel Sony tape machine, works just like new. Ditto for a 1990 Sony VHS machine, the internal calendar expired in 2008, but it still works pretty well. Also own a Sony Mini Disc recorder, the sound quality rivals anything I've ever heard, and that from someone raised on analog sound dating back 50 years. Had a Sony DAT machine, sold it after 10 years, still worked like new. The only thing I refuse to buy is a Blu Ray player, IMHO they should be $100, not $300.....

Maybe the decline of Sony products can also be attributed to the manufacturing shift to 3rd world, and former 3rd world countries like China..... or Indonesia, Singapore, Mexico, etc. etc. Electronic products Made in Japan were .... built to last,
not like the throwaway market we have toay

[Video Head]

The so-called "porn" industry was indeed a firestarter for VHS, most young men in those days went to video stores to rent porn tapes. After VHS machines came down in price, movie rentals were the main reason for it's success. It only took a few years for VHS to overtake Beta, simply because of the 6 hour tape speed. 6 hours equals 3 two-hour movies, or 6 one -hour TV programs. I owned both formats in the early 80's, the Beta picture was always superior, as was the transport and loading mechanism. Don't remember any problems with Beta mangling tape, or getting distracting video noise on the screen, but with
VHS those symptoms were common. VHS tracking from what I remember..... was a big pain until they came up with auto-tracking. Even today, though I rarely use videotape, tracking on VHS machines is shaky.

Sorry to see so many people trash Sony, to me they were an innovative company that made reliable products. I still own a
1970's vintage open reel Sony tape machine, works just like new. Ditto for a 1990 Sony VHS machine, the internal calendar expired in 2008, but it still works pretty well. Also own a Sony Mini Disc recorder, the sound quality rivals anything I've ever heard, and that from someone raised on analog sound dating back 50 years. Had a Sony DAT machine, sold it after 10 years, still worked like new. The only thing I refuse to buy is a Blu Ray player, IMHO they should be $100, not $300.....

Maybe the decline of Sony products can also be attributed to the manufacturing shift to 3rd world, and former 3rd world countries like China..... or Indonesia, Singapore, Mexico, etc. etc. Electronic products Made in Japan were .... built to last,
not like the throwaway market we have toay

Nobody is "trashing" Sony Corp. They are making observations of the current day struggles of a once great company lead astray by a late coming, and highly influencial group of individuals who do not appear to have the long term survival of the company at heart. And yes, agreed, Sony has been slow to adapt to the new world business order.

[Video Head]

The "horny guys/VHS" factor ruled in every locale except the store across the street from Carnegie Hall, which was mega-upscale and sold more tapes than it rented. Here, Beta held on at about 30% share,

My first VHS "original" tape I ever bought was in my teens, a movie that probably would be censored even on a Playboy channel today
And I do remember there was no porn on Beta.
Although I don't think "the porn factor" could have been such a big factor in Beta's demise.

No porn on Beta?

Ginger Lynn (mid 1980's): "Sony and Beta backed me into a corner once. I said NO! and NO! means NO! these days! No one should have to do the things they wanted, exactly the way they wanted...their demands just made me feel confined and yucky".

Ginger probably doesn't recall that interview...she and Charlie where probably a little wacked that day...

The porn industry supported Beta as long as Beta could support itself...then on to the new thing...just like Ginger, Jenna and so on and so on...