Happy 50th Birthday, VCR!

[thewayne]

On April 14, 1956, Ampex unveiled the first video tape recorder at the National Association of Broadcasters trade show in Chicago. It was made by six men, one of whom, Ray Dolby, made a bit of a name for himself later in the audio recording field.

http://tvtechnology.com/features/news/2006.04.12-n_the_video_tape_02.shtml

http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/04/15/0537200

Comments

[cardigirl.livejournal.com]

LOL! You really are quite the geek -- ya know that, doncha Wayne?? (we like ya anyway)

[thewayne.livejournal.com]

Yeah, but look at the ways the video recorder has changed our culture, it's been a major force for change. And I thought the story was rather well done, informative without being too technical.

I'm not going to argue the good vs bad aspects of it, like just about any tool, it has both positive and negative applications. But it has certainly created change, a sea of change that is in use almost daily in most American households.

I sold them when they first came out in mass quantities in the late 70's/early 80's. I remember the Sony Betamax machines: the SL-540, SL-560, SL-580. I remember all the junk VHS ones. There was one machine where the speed has hard-coded to the physical switch on the unit: you could slow down or speed up playback (depending on the mode it was recorded in) by changing that switch. And they ran $300-500+, whereas now you can walk into Best Buy with $50 in your pocket and walk out with a decent deck.

Lots of people were working on recording video at that time, but Ampex was first with the best technology.

[greyweirdo.livejournal.com]

A relative had one the first commerically avaliable VCRs. I forget what kind but it was a beta player I remember that.