man@bocar.UUCP (M Nevar) (05/15/85)
I have a question about LV players using digital soundtracks. In order to use a digital soundtrack, do you have to have one of those combination LV/CD players ? Or will the cheaper ones suffice. Any advice on the purchase of a LV player will be appreciated. Mark Nevar
brown@nicmad.UUCP (05/17/85)
> I have a question about LV players using digital soundtracks. > In order to use a digital soundtrack, do you have to have > one of those combination LV/CD players ? Or will the > cheaper ones suffice. Any advice on the purchase of a LV player > will be appreciated. > > Mark Nevar Yes, you will need a LV player with the digital sound decoding circuits. I believe that, for now anyway, only the combination units that play the regular 12" disk, 8" mini single and audio CD have the digital sound circuits. The regular cheapy LV players will only give you the regular sound. It is like VHS Hi-Fi. There are three choices; 1) regular mono, non-Dolby, non Hi-Fi; 2) Dolby Stereo and 3) Hi-Fi Stereo (most of the time with Dolby Stereo). If get your hands on a VHS Hi-Fi tape, choice one will only get you mono sound, choice 2 will get you Dolby Stereo sound and machine choice 3 will get you the Hi-Fi sound. The Hi-Fi soundtrack is still there when played on all three machines, but only choice 3 has the circuitry to play it. The same goes for LV Digital Stereo. A regular unit is like VHS choice #2. The extra is there on the disk, but the machine doesn't know anything about it. Sorry about the long speal. The answers to your two questions are: 1) YES 2) NO -- |------------| | |-------| o| JVC HRD725U Mr. Video | | | o| |--------------| | | | | | |----| o o o | | |-------| O| |--------------| |------------| VHS Hi-Fi (the only way to go) ({!seismo,!ihnp4}!uwvax!astroatc!nicmad!brown)
arcorp@utcsri.UUCP (Alias Research Corporation) (05/17/85)
> ... Any advice ... > will be appreciated. > As far as digital sound goes these days, the only players that offer it are the combination players built by Pioneer and sold under TEAC and NAD labels. I haven't heard of a LV only player that can handle digital sound, but I suspect that one will come out by Christmas. That's just as well, since it will, no doubt, take some time to release a better selection of digital LV discs. Question: Do any discs contain digital sound even though they are not marked as such? Super Beta HiFi Department: --------------------------- The first stories I read about super beta was of a recorder offering resolution of 350 to 400 lines. I was definitely interested in such a vcr. Surprise! When these things finally did show up, they were rated at only 270 lines. Their excuse was that to shift the carrier by more than 800 KHz would have made super beta tapes unplayable on regular Beta vcrs. Sony chickened out! The reviews of super beta say that "there is not much difference in picture to the untrained eye", etc. What good is that? Personally, I could care less if my tapes did not even fit, let alone play in, regular Beta vcrs. Is there any reason why they cannot build a 350 line res. Beta vcr that has a *switch* that would allow regular recordings to be made or played back? I have seen audio cassette decks with double speed (incompatible) switches which got good reviews. I did not expect such things from the maker of LaserMax! Stephen Y. Trutiak Alias Research allegra! utcsri! alias! steve
caf@omen.UUCP (Chuck Forsberg WA7KGX) (05/20/85)
When you go to your friendly high end video botique to check out the LaserDisc player with Digital Audio, listen to "Cotton CLub" and "Star Trek III". THEN flip the player's ANALOG-DIGITAL sound selector back and forth while listening and you'll find the analog LV sound isn't all that bad! The difference is most noticeable on "Cotton CLub" which was recorded digitally. One can find CX equipped LV players for as little as $200-$300 .vs. >$1000 for the Digital model, so make that A-B comparision carefully. -- Chuck Forsberg WA7KGX ..!tektronix!reed!omen!caf Omen Technology Inc 17505-V NW Sauvie IS RD Portland OR 97231 Voice: 503-621-3406 Modem: 503-621-3746 (Hit CR's for speed detect)
ben@moncol.UUCP (Bennett Broder) (05/22/85)
> Personally, I could care less if my tapes did not even fit, let >alone play in, regular Beta vcrs. Is there any reason why they cannot >build a 350 line res. Beta vcr that has a *switch* that would allow >regular recordings to be made or played back? I have seen audio cassette >decks with double speed (incompatible) switches which got good reviews. You might not care, but it is VERY important to maintain compatability. Probably the primary reason that the audio cassette has become the number one selling recording medium is that Philips would only licence manufacturers who adhered to their very strict guidelines for compact cassette specs. It wasn't until the Philips patents expired that manufacturers were able to do things like double speed. And if you'll notice, there are no double speed decks being manufactured today. Record stores only carry one type of cassette, and it will work any deck built to the original Philips specs. (Dolby encoded, chrome and metal tapes are all playback compatible with the older decks, in fact, they spruce up the high frequencies, a noted weakness of the original machines) Sony has been trying for years to get the public to buy Beta, but it continues to lose ground against VHS. Even the latest development, HIFI sound, which Sony claimed could only be added to Beta, has also been adapted to VHS. The result is that tape retailers and rental outfits must keep two separate stocks of each movie, one for each format. Should Sony add a new format, it would mean tripling costs for these merchants. I believe that proliferation of formats has been one of the biggest reasons for the marketing failure of video disks, and may have done irreparable harm to the industry. Who wants to shell out big bucks for a machine, gambling that it won't be obsolete in 2 years? By the way, if you are not interested in prerecorded tapes, there is a format called U-matic available from professional distributers. It uses 3/4" video cassettes and provide quality far superior to either VHS or Beta. Ben Broder ..ihnp4!princeton!moncol!ben ..vax135!petsd!moncol!ben
hunter@oakhill.UUCP (Hunter Scales) (05/22/85)
In article <165@omen.UUCP> caf@.UUCP (Chuck Forsberg WA7KGX) writes: > >One can find CX equipped LV players for as little as $200-$300 .vs. >$1000 >for the Digital model, so make that A-B comparision carefully. >-- *** Where can I find LV players for $200-$300. I have not seen them for less the $700. True, CED players can be had for cheap but I'm not interested. -- Motorola Semiconductor Inc. Hunter Scales Austin, Texas {ihnp4,seismo,ctvax,gatech}!ut-sally!oakhill!hunter (I am responsible for me and my dog and no-one else)
sdyer@bbnccv.UUCP (Steve Dyer) (05/24/85)
> Where can I find LV players for $200-$300. I have not seen > them for less the $700. True, CED players can be had for cheap but I'm > not interested. Pioneer has a LD660 for $299 which is a basic playback unit (no chapter/frame search, no remote control.) They have a new unit for about $450 which has a remote control. -- /Steve Dyer {decvax,linus,ima,ihnp4}!bbncca!sdyer sdyer@bbnccv.ARPA