jdg@ncrcae.UUCP (Jim Griggers) (02/20/85)
The SuperBetas are coming. The following is a summary of an article which appeared in the February 4th issue of Electronic Engineering Times. The original author was Richard Doherty. * The Beta group of VCR manufacturers, Aiwa, Sanyo, Teknika, NEC Sony, Pioneer Electronics, and Toshiba hope to improve their second place sales status by producing low-cost VCR picture enhancement. While Sony is continueing to investigate digital TV enhancements, for the time being they will utilize an analog-resolution improvement which takes advantage of the Beta design edge. * The Beta design edge is that the revolving video head in the Beta VCRs are larger, hince the head-to-tape writing speed is higher in Beta that VHS. This faster writing speed gives Beta format about 20 percent more headroom than VHS. Until SuperBeta, Sony had not taken advantage of this extra bandwidth. * The SuperBeta decks will displace the color-burst marker by 800KHz allowing additional luminance information to be put on the tape. This additional information gives increased resolution, or more pixels per single scan line. * SuperBeta will have an "Edit" switch which will flatten the response curve during playback. The result is that "a fourth-generation video copy looks sharper than a present second-generation one, and SuperBeta second-generation tape looks better than present first-generation VHS tape". * It looks as if VHS will have severe problems trying to match SuperBeta in performance. VHS has a slower write speed and a problem with tape-movement smoothness that may prohibit a great improvement in resolution. * SuperBeta will be offered, at least at first, on only the top of the line Beta machines. They (the manufacturers) estimate the price increase may be as low as $25 to $50 at retail. The SuperBetas should hit the market sometime this Spring. -Jim Griggers NCR Corp.
jeh@ritcv.UUCP (Jim Heliotis) (02/24/85)
: : > * The SuperBeta decks will displace the color-burst marker by > 800KHz allowing additional luminance information to be put > on the tape. This additional information gives increased > resolution, or more pixels per single scan line. > : : > -Jim Griggers This makes me think that Beta and Superbeta are incompatable, although the NEWER machines could have a compatability switch. Anyone know? Jim Heliotis {allegra,seismo}!rochester!ritcv!jeh rocksvax!ritcv!jeh ritcv!jeh@Rochester