Amelia Posted October 19, 2022 Share Posted October 19, 2022 If someone is still watching VHS tape cassettes on old players, I will be happy to give them dozens if not hundreds of cassettes with ballet recordings: Bolshoi, Kirov/Mariinsky, Royal Ballet and others. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
capybara Posted October 19, 2022 Share Posted October 19, 2022 Ditto. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zxDaveM Posted October 20, 2022 Share Posted October 20, 2022 most of the ones I had (not pre-recorded) went in the bin ages ago. I kept a few pre-recorded ones for sentimental value - though there is still a VHS player/recorder somewhere in the spare room, I doubt it will ever be put to use again. I'm guessing many are saying the same about their dvd/blu ray players and discs too - but I still get a lot of use out of mine (and CDs - I'm still 'old school') 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alison Posted October 20, 2022 Share Posted October 20, 2022 It should still, of course, be possible to get VHS tapes at least transferred to DVD, if the right equipment is available. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sophoife Posted October 20, 2022 Share Posted October 20, 2022 I have a number of VHS tapes containing ballet broadcasts from TV over the years, probably 60% of which (in Australia) were never commercially released. I digitised them all, burned them to DVD, and kept the digital copies on an external hard disk drive. I kept the original tapes for sentimental reasons (they are quite the signposts to my life), and a few years ago a friend built me a square glass box, to the interior six walls of which they attached the tapes, spines visible (must have been some sort of Jenga puzzle!). The box slots into a wooden frame (for safety), can be rotated, and is a kitschy but to me irreplaceable coffee table. 9 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
trog Posted October 21, 2022 Share Posted October 21, 2022 22 hours ago, alison said: It should still, of course, be possible to get VHS tapes at least transferred to DVD, if the right equipment is available. The equipment isn't difficult. You need a VCR, a SCART splitter lead, one of these and a computer with a DVD burner. I converted my VHSs to DVD, and any new recordings on DVD. DVD is proving to be less reliable than VHS, so now I'm keeping everything on hard disks. At the mo I juse use external usb h/ds but a NAS would be a better option. This posting has some further information about converting HDMI outputs (eg PVR and DVD players) to hard disk files. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alison Posted October 21, 2022 Share Posted October 21, 2022 Thanks, trog. Do you mean that DVDs are tending to fail in the long term? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
trog Posted October 21, 2022 Share Posted October 21, 2022 When transferring my DVDs to hard disk, I had one commercial DVD that failed (I have about 150). I had only watched it once. This was Pumping Iron II: The Women. No problem, I'll just buy another. Long out of print (if that is the right term), prices varied from £60 to £350 and I couldn't find a copy in the UK. I purchased one from Australia (funnily enough from Adelaide, which is where I'm from). It is missing the extra features, which is an interview with the director and some photo galleries. Seems mine was an extra rare pressing. I found a download DVD rip too at £12 - same story. With the DVD-Rs, I had 3 out of 620 fail. I was able to recover one using some software on the PC. This took 29 hours! Another I was able to download the episode concerned from the internet, but it is in a different aspect ratio to the rest of the series I recorded, which I find annoying. The other is gone forever - a documentary that I recorded off Channel 4 maybe 10 years ago. It was in fact, DVD-R no 1. It seems storage media is getting more fragile. I have cassettes of Hancocks's Half Hour that I recorded off the radio in the late 1970s which are still fine. In fact I would rather listen to these than the cleaned up MP3s I have. I have some very rare recordings. One of the MP3s I have, has clearly come from a copy of my radio recoding, which I swapped for some others. Dad was using his welder and this caused a few dropouts, which are present in the MP3 too. My VHSs are fine too. In the college where I work, teachers have VHS recordings that they have been using for 30+ years. I have been convert these to digital format. These VHSs weren't stored in the best of conditions, mostly in classrooms and often on the floor. After many years of use a few of the tapes were stretched a bit, but I had no failures at all and there were well over 1,000 tapes. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alison Posted October 21, 2022 Share Posted October 21, 2022 Oh well, then perhaps there's hope for mine, when I finally get them out of storage! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeannette Posted October 24, 2022 Share Posted October 24, 2022 If transferred correctly from tapes and stored in DVD liners that close, DVDs should be fine. The only two that I’ve lost out of 1,000s were incorrectly dubbed by others. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now