Metropol

Santa got me a DVDR machine ... which BTW was only £210 quid from Richer Sounds. You can pick up the discs for around £1 each so I now record most stuff on DVD ... the quality is much better than VHS - the worst quality (which on my machine means 6hours on one disc) is about the same quality as LP on VHS. I'm sure DVDR will become more and more popular as the price of machines and discs comes down just like CD and MD in the past.

The region thing is very annoying - am I right in thinking that it's done to stop you buying foreign DVDs cheaply and then watching them here? It seems that this has been overridden anyway, as DVD manufacturers will sell more DVD players if they boast a "regionless" player.

That's exactly why it's done, manufacturers were terrified of loosing the consequential regional locking that exists on VHS with differing NTSC/PAL formats etc, and so built an artificial restriction into DVDs to stop cheap imports.

but I broke it as the top thing fell off when I dropped it on the floor.

That doesn't break the tape in itself, the top flap is only to protect the tape, it will work fine without it. All you had to do was support the machine door when inserting the tape to prevent the tape from catching on the door.

You can also usually open up tapes (amazingly, even in this day and age of ultra-cheap VHS, most tapes are still screwed together) and transfer the tape reels to another cassette which isn't damaged. VHS is a surprisingly resiliant format, as long as the tape itself has sustained no (serious) damage, you can usually do something to retrieve the recording.

The one thing I'd worry about with having a DVD-exclusive collection is scratches on the DVD's playing surface. My younger bro has "Remembrance of the Daleks" on DVD, and there are a few scratches on the surface, that slightly interfere with the smooth playing. VHS is fine as I don't have to worry about that.

I'm a CD scratch obsessive anyway, and I insist on checking the playing surface of any CD I buy from a shop sale or from a charity shop to see if it is relatively free of scratches. I can see myself becoming a DVD scratch obsessive, so I've since lined any DVD case I have with velvet which minimises risk of scratching.

I use VHS mostly for timeshifting, so I'd either wait for cheap DVD-RW or get a TIVO.

what is it with you and bringing dead topics back to life? Are you really that pathetic that you have to sepnd your entire life on this site trawling through the back pages looking for stuff to reply to?

Maybe we should have a locked forum for old threads to be moved to and kept for reference . . .

I made a valid point about the viability of VHS for programme timeshifting.

What's so wrong wit dat?

James Martin wrote:I made a valid point about the viability of VHS for programme timeshifting.

What's so wrong wit dat?

The point, oh thick one, is that the thread is SEVEN MONTHS OLD. Why could you not add your point in February when the thread was active, or did it take you all that time to come up with that response? :roll:

I have every right to post in the thread whilst it's still active.

If my post causes any offence I'm sure the mods can remove it.

And don't call me thick.

James Martin wrote:I have every right to post in the thread whilst it's still active.

Justify to me how a thread can be defined as "active" when the last post made to it (before you stuck your arse in) was done seven months ago.

If my post causes any offence I'm sure the mods can remove it.

You have missed the point. Who said anything about "offence"?

And don't call me thick.

Oh I'm sorry, is it an offensive term for you or is "thick" too hard a word for you to understand?

The thread doesn't really have a shelf life as such so I don't see the harm really. We'll always end up with topics croping up again, the only difference is usually they come up as a new topic.

Just so long as people aren't bumping them up to the top without a valid response or reason.