Some VHS tapes will not play (player works fine)...need help!

[jacothedog]

Hi there.
About a year ago, and old friend and bandmate of mine passed away. A bunch of stuff was left to me: guitars, misc. musical instruments and a box of VHS tapes. The tapes are marked with names of our band and later bands he was in.
Because of this, I bought a VCR yesterday. I have an old tape and put it in the VCR and it worked perfectly.
The problem is, when I put in the tapes left to me from my friend, I get no audio or video. In fact, the TV states that "there is no signal" when I hit play for those tapes.
The tapes may have been used for audio only recording.
Anyone know what can be going on here?

[lordsmurf]

Did you buy a random VCR?
Random decks from Goodwill/wherever can ruin tapes this way.

[Cornucopia]

The vhs/svhs cassette can be used in digital audio recording via

1. Old Technics format, rarely used
2. Sony PCM-F1, 1610 etc format common in 80s & 90s (but actually encoded the dig audio AS video signal)
3. Multitrack digital using common Alesis ADAT format (but should be labeled as such)

Doubt it was #1. #2 would show what looks like digitally pixellated/blocky snow video. #3 would not show a video signal.

Could also be that they are video but are bad/out of calibration so won't properly play. Or wrong national system/format for your machines.


Scott

[dellsam34]

Hi there.
About a year ago, and old friend and bandmate of mine passed away. A bunch of stuff was left to me: guitars, misc. musical instruments and a box of VHS tapes. The tapes are marked with names of our band and later bands he was in.
Because of this, I bought a VCR yesterday. I have an old tape and put it in the VCR and it worked perfectly.
The problem is, when I put in the tapes left to me from my friend, I get no audio or video. In fact, the TV states that "there is no signal" when I hit play for those tapes.
The tapes may have been used for audio only recording.
Anyone know what can be going on here?

With this little infos no one will be able to help you, Post pictures of the tapes for members to identify what format the tapes are, VHS comes in several flavors, the VCR model, the way you are connecting it.

[Eric-jan]

Maybe something like this ? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WVDCxTtn4OQ
well if there wasn't used a camera at any time…..
Also.. dont know if it's possible to decode the video signal with external DAC , because these PCM players are very rare

[dellsam34]

PCM encoded tapes will display a video of the PCM pattern with a normal VCR, again unless the OP gives more info about the tapes it is a dead thread.

[darkknight145]

Could possibly be a SVHS tape, which will not play in a standard VCR ..... Is your VCR a SVHS model?

[dellsam34]

A VHS machine can playback both HiFi and linear audio from a S-VHS tape, and video too to some extent, except for the bright spots that clip into black strakes.

[Eric-jan]

If there's no info written on the cassette about recording format, it's hopeless, could be even wiped tapes.

[victoriabears]

I do not know if this will help-can you post a couple of photos of the tapes? Is it possible they were recorded in /on another countries format?

[Eric-jan]

I do not know if this will help-can you post a couple of photos of the tapes? Is it possible they were recorded in /on another countries format?

There lies a bit of the problem, the OP did not give any info on his tv or vcr, so it's unknown for now, if these are multiformat tv system devices, so far the OP did not respond also.

[JVRaines]

It's highly likely that these are Alesis ADAT digital audio recordings. The format used SVHS tapes to record up to 8 tracks and multiple units could be ganged together. It was a "poor man's multitrack." You might be able to find an ADAT deck on eBay.

[Eric-jan]

Or a transfer service, https://thegreatbear.co.uk/project/alesis-digital-audio-tape-adat/ if these tapes are SuperVHS ones that is.

[dellsam34]

That's why posting pictures of the tapes is very important, but it seems that the OP just landed here through a google search, created an account just to post the question and now he forgot what forum he posted on.

[Eric-jan]

That's why posting pictures of the tapes is very important, but it seems that the OP just landed here through a google search, created an account just to post the question and now he forgot what forum he posted on.

No image is available to capture because it's no PAL or NTSC format, so there is no sync. better close this post also, since it is not about video.

[Cornucopia]

We don't KNOW that it's not about video. Neither did the OP in the 1st post. That remains to be determined.


Scott

[Eric-jan]

Plus the OP did not respond to anyone, and not any details on these vhs tapes, next move = OP !