Tim: >> We had a bit of fun tripping down memory lane resurrecting a VTR to play >> back something from 1974 just a few weeks back. That's a year before we >> officially had colour TV in Australia, though I can see that some of the >> recordings did have colour sub-carrier present. Somewhere I've got >> another half-inch open-reel tape with "Apollo mission" written on the >> box. It's old enough that it might be a live off-air recording, rather >> than some documentary after the fact. But it's a different format, so >> I'll have to do some scrounging for another machine. Gene Heskett: > The Apollo tape sounds interesting! 1974 would probably have been a > 3/4" sony u-matic. Quite common in the day, but that was early in > that era too. Only in the stations. It would be the early-mid-1980s before Umatics were seen outside of them, over here. Beta and VHS came out a lot later here, than overseas, too (mid-late-1980s). So, in the 70s, it would have been reel-to-reel equipment in schools, and the like. There'd be very few home VTRs. > No idea what the 1/2" format would have been, there were several false > starts before u-matic took over the field for 20 years in the smaller > markets. If I remember correctly, it was one of the Sony machines with the larger head drums. I had two of them [1], but they were knackered long ago. I gave them away to someone who collects junk television equipment, and didn't really care if they worked or not. He's got more space than me, and if I find the tape, I can always pay him a visit with the VTR's service manual and a CRO. I've still got two other VTRS that had the smaller head drums, one of them plays fairly well [2], the other has bad servo hunting and the pinch roller doesn't grip [3]. The pivot point for the arm that swings it back and forth is stiff, and several hours of lubing and wiggling hasn't helped. But I don't think the tape played on these machines. Of course it's about twenty years since I tried to play that tape. And the only thing I can remember about the pictures on the tape was the rather chunky flashing super over the picture (that it was very chunky, not what it said, nor what the pictures were). Someone else's pictures of the same model VTRs: 1. http://www.oldtechnology.net/images/sonycv2100.jpg 2. http://www.rewindmuseum.com/images3/nv3030.gif 3. http://www.oldtechnology.net/images/sonyav3620.jpg I've got the service manuals, still, for 1 and 3. Never had one for 2. I used to have one of the portable recorders, but I gave that to a friend about twenty years ago. Yeah right, it's got a handle, a shoulder strap, and uses 12 volt batteries, so it's portable, never mind that it weighs ten tonnes... You young people and your DVDs and MiniDVs don't know how easy your have it. One of my cameras weighs as much as I do. ;-) -- [tim@localhost ~]$ uname -r 2.6.25.11-97.fc9.i686 Don't send private replies to my address, the mailbox is ignored. I read messages from the public lists. -- fedora-list mailing list fedora-list@xxxxxxxxxx To unsubscribe: https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-list
