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Posted: Nov 16 2006 11:01 am

VHS, 30, dies of loneliness
The home-entertainment format lived a fruitful life

After a long illness, the groundbreaking home-entertainment format VHS has died of natural causes in the United States. The format was 30 years old.

No services are planned.

The format had been expected to survive until January, but high-def formats and next-generation video game consoles hastened its final decline.

"It's pretty much over," concurred Buena Vista Home Entertainment general manager North America Lori MacPherson on Tuesday.

VHS is survived by a child, DVD, and by Tivo, VOD and DirecTV. It was preceded in death by Betamax, Divx, Mini-discs and Laserdiscs.

Although it had been ailing, the format's death became official in this, the video biz's all-important fourth quarter. Retailers decided to pull the plug, saying there was no longer shelf space.

As a tribute to the late, great VHS, Toys 'R' Us will continue to carry a few titles like "Barney," and some dollar video chains will still handle cassettes for those who cannot deal with the death of the format.

Born Vertical Helical Scan to parent JVC of Japan, the tape had a difficult childhood as it was forced to compete with Sony's Betamax format.

After its youthful Betamax battles, the longer-playing VHS tapes eventually became the format of choice for millions of consumers. VHS enjoyed a lucrative career, transforming the way people watched movies and changing the economics of the film biz. VHS hit its peak with "The Lion King," which sold more than 30 million videocassettes Stateside.

The format flourished until DVDs launched in 1997. After a fruitful career, VHS tapes started to retire from center stage in 2003 when DVDs became more popular for the first time.

Since their retirement, VHS tapes have made occasional appearances in children's entertainment and as a format for collectors seeking titles not released on DVD. VHS continued to make as much as $300 million a year until this year, when studios stopped manufacturing the tapes.

Posted: Nov 16 2006 12:35 pm

*Dusts off the old trumpet and plays the Last Post*

Posted: Nov 16 2006 05:30 pm

Sad.

Posted: Nov 16 2006 05:44 pm

VHS can't be dead... after all, INTELLIVISION LIVES!

Posted: Nov 16 2006 06:08 pm

We can only hope that all those who die may live in the sky. ~T.I.

I remember when the DVD came out.. They were just like Blu-Ray players nowadays... Ah.. 1997, coolest year ever.

Another fallen hero we should mention is ROM Cartridges. Remember the days when you could slip in the cartridge? It was much more fun to put on all the different parts... Sonic 3 on top of Sonic and Knuckles.. It made your system look cooler in some way. With the death of the Nintendo 64, that was the last time we ever had fun with our consoles. Now we have DVD discs that can damage at the slightest touch, and fall into disuse over time, if you're really wreckless (like me) then that $50 bucks you plunked on Burnout Revenge isn't going to go a long way. I hate discs. If it were up to me, I'd bring cartridges back on consoles.

I will forever miss ROM Carts in the same way I will forever miss VHS. Because It's fun.

Gomen for going off topic a little bit.^^

Posted: Nov 16 2006 06:23 pm

Don't fret, Mr. Bomberman. DVDs and other discs will soon be rendered obsolete when things are put onto flash memory. That will be very similar to the cartridge days of old. I also hate how discs are either broken or not. When you got a cart to work after it hadn't for a long time, you experienced a sense of accomplishment.

Posted: Nov 16 2006 07:58 pm

Mr. Bomberman wrote:

We can only hope that all those who die may live in the sky. ~T.I.

I remember when the DVD came out.. They were just like Blu-Ray players nowadays... Ah.. 1997, coolest year ever.

Another fallen hero we should mention is ROM Cartridges. Remember the days when you could slip in the cartridge? It was much more fun to put on all the different parts... Sonic 3 on top of Sonic and Knuckles.. It made your system look cooler in some way. With the death of the Nintendo 64, that was the last time we ever had fun with our consoles. Now we have DVD discs that can damage at the slightest touch, and fall into disuse over time, if you're really wreckless (like me) then that $50 bucks you plunked on Burnout Revenge isn't going to go a long way. I hate discs. If it were up to me, I'd bring cartridges back on consoles.

I will forever miss ROM Carts in the same way I will forever miss VHS. Because It's fun.

Gomen for going off topic a little bit.^^

I was just thinking the other day, that with increasing size and falling cost of flash media, it could become a viable medium for video game systems. You can buy 1-4 Gb sticks for $20-$100 each, and that is writtable, if you were to manufacter Read Only Flash Memory or ROFM, it would probably be even cheaper. Just think, Nintendo "Next", could use cartridges that are the size of gameboy carts. (Or whatever they call it. Hell, they should keep with the old naming sceme and call it the Ultra Super Nintendo Enterainment System, or USNES. ) Parents would be much happier because they wouldn't have to worry about replacing discs that their children sratch up over time, not to mention it was much easier and safer to loan cartridges to your friends then discs. Trust me, I have last countless CDs, DVDs, and CD-Roms over the years to careless friends.

And, on the original topic, just because media companies say that VHS is dead, doesn't make it so. How many thousands of movies are ONLY AVALIBLE on VHS, even to this day?

Posted: Nov 16 2006 08:14 pm

Knyte.. If we can actually do what you described, 8th generation systems could as small (or even smaller) than the PC Engine, the smallest console existing.

Posted: Nov 16 2006 08:37 pm

This is true, because you could eliminate the room needed for a drive, not to mention all motors, sensitive lasers, and other moving parts inside the console that could wear out. (Other then maybe a cooling fan.) Sizes could be shrunk, and costs could be cut. Hell, look at a Slim PS2, now cut out the DVD-ROM section. Look it's half the size!

So, basically, NEC had it right with the HU-Cards, (And SEGA with the MEGA-Cards on the Master System.) It would be the same thing. Here's an excerpt on the qualities of flash memory:

"Flash memory is non-volatile, which means that it does not need power to maintain the information stored in the chip. In addition, flash memory offers fast read access times (though not as fast as volatile DRAM memory used for main memory in PCs) and better kinetic shock resistance than hard disks. These characteristics explain the popularity of flash memory for applications such as storage on battery-powered devices. Another allure of flash memory is that when packaged in a 'memory card', it is nearly indestructible by ordinary physical means, being able to withstand intense pressure and boiling water."

"In March 2006, Samsung announced flash hard drives with a capacity of 32 gibibytes*, essentially the same order of magnitude as smaller laptop hard drives, and in September of 2006, Samsung announced 32 gibibit chips produced using a 40 nm manufacturing process."

"For some flash memory products such as memory cards and USB-memories, as of mid 2006, 256 MiB and smaller devices have been largely discontinued. 1 GiB capacity flash memory has become the normal storage space for people who do not extensively use flash memory, while more and more consumers are adopting 2 GiB or 4 GiB flash drives. Hitachi (formerly the Hard disk unit of IBM) has a competing hard-drive mechanism, the Microdrive, that can fit inside the shell of a CompactFlash card. It has a capacity up to 8 GiB. BiTMicro offers a 155 GB 3.5" Solid-State disk named the "Edisk".
*1 gibibit = 2 to the powr of 30 bits = 1,073,741,824 bits = 134,217,728 bytes = 131 megabytes. (If a kilobyte is measured as 1,024 bytes.)

The E-disk can hold 20.3 Gigabytes! That should be more than enough for any current or next generation game!

Posted: Nov 17 2006 12:23 am

I remember my first VHS...The Wizard of Oz.... Crying

*wipes away tear, and stounds out on old hill playing Amazing Grace on bagpipe*

Posted: Nov 17 2006 02:52 am

Actually, if games do move back to solid state medium, you won't even need cooling fans. Heat is primarily generated by moving parts, don't need any moving parts to read a solid state drive or ROM.

Posted: Nov 17 2006 09:29 am

It will be awesome.

2010 SLF Tag Champ Joined: Jun 07 2006 Posts: 12294

it costs liek thirty four cents to burn a DVD. how would moving to flash memory cut costs? tehy would still sell the games for fifty bucks, because it's been proven that people will pay that much for the games.

Posted: Nov 17 2006 05:33 pm

Eh, Beta was better.

When are vinyls making a comeback? Cool

Joined: Feb 24 2006 Posts: 2578

Tebor wrote:

When are vinyls making a comeback? Cool

Constantly, but mostly in fabric stores. Wink

Posted: Nov 17 2006 06:47 pm

I'm not arguing the price point, I'm arguing that flash memory isn't as easily damaged. I too have been fucked over by scratched discs. Sad

Posted: Nov 17 2006 07:47 pm

I wish vinyl did make a comeback, I have soooo many records, and if vinyl didmake a comeback, so would the ability to buy better turntables and needles...

man, you should see my records

Posted: Nov 18 2006 02:31 am

ross_rifle113 wrote:

I wish vinyl did make a comeback, I have soooo many records, and if vinyl didmake a comeback, so would the ability to buy better turntables and needles...

man, you should see my records

What are you talking about? Vinyl IS back, because it is RETRO. The only problem is, since it is retro, that's means it TRENDY, which means that it is EXPENSIVE.

Here:
http://www.guitarcenter.com/shop/home/navigation?q=Turntables

Lot's of turntables that cost more than most DVD recorders..

2010 SLF Tag Champ Joined: Jun 07 2006 Posts: 12294

go to a yard sale like a normal human being.

Posted: Nov 19 2006 10:57 pm

knyte-touche
JEW-touche