The last VCR will be manufactured this month
On July 22, 2016
- TV History
Remembering The VCR…RIP, The End Is Near
The last VCR will be manufactured this month
R.I.P., VCR. Funai Electric, the world’s last known VCR manufacturer, will cease production of video-cassette recorders this month.
Star transferring all you tapes to DVD’s now.
VHS can look fairly good if the Y/C output video is time-base corrected to remove jitter.
Awwwww!
Pretty much evicted VHS from the closed-circuit operation I run several months ago. Granted, I got moved into a smaller office and didn’t have room for the tapes….had to digitize them! Won’t miss it too much……
Mine is still on use
I followed here the story of the videotape and learn to respect this machine after learned about all the efforts to achive it in early 50’s
I have 4 Sony units from the early 90’s that work perfectly.
Doubt I will ever be able to transfer all my important VHS tapes to digital. Still own several Panasonic VHS var machines.
It does represent the end of an era. The concept of analog magnetic tape storage of video as well as audio has been well documented here. It was a revelation to have it first come to the consumer level, at all, then the camcorder replacing film etc. VHS was always barely adequate to it’s task, but I hate to see such a highly developed technology with moving heads etc just be forgotten. A lot of engineering from the first Ampex machines to the ultra miniature analog and then digital tapes.
What we have now with 4K on phones is just science fiction of just a decade or two ago.
On the other hand, analog audio reel to reel has hit a slight renaissance.
Tape is still being made and you can buy restored/refurbished machines and there are some rumors of actual new production of recorders.
Soon we will be forced to finally buy the updated Star Wars were Han did not shoot first.
Some VHS tapes are highly collectible
The last one should go into a museum. That invention really did change the world
I have repaired several 1000’s of them.
Wait, they still make VCR’s?
Still have some tapes. You can’t trade them in anymore, you might get a nickel a tape. What an important innovation the VCR was. My mother worked for GE in the early 60s and she talked about how they demonstrated a device that could ‘tape’ Johnny Carson and they played it back. It was mind blowing to think that the home TV didn’t have to be a passive instrument.
Only a matter of time till you can’t get tape anymore 🙁