[Dave A]

Just returned from a trip to the attic to dig this beast out. I gotta stop reading these threads. Too much stuff re-appearing around here.

This was a high-end RCA VCR somewhere in the early 80's...my poor years. It is a slim-style, not a tank. I think I paid around $700 for it. About half the price of that used Chevy Malibu wagon I owned then. It has not seen a volt for over 10 years and powered right up. The only thing not working is the channel select on the remote and I cannot set the clock. When I last ran it, it had a head bearing noise that is now gone. Time will tell.

It is a SP-SLP only machine and is working like a champ. Not sure if it plays LP yet. It's claim to fame is it has an early digital frame buffer of some sort, probably field rate, that all playback goes through.

If you do a manual tracking adjustment in any mode and go too far, it mutes the video to black. Too much sync garbage for the frame buffer. It does a true digital freeze frame, pic in pic and pic move from corner to corner, and two useless DVE (their early term for this) functions...pixelated and solarization to amaze your neighbors with. About the same functions we had at the TV station I worked at then.

It has a true digital slow function with tracking adjust and speed adjust. They are perfect after using the remote tracking adjustment.

I bought it for the freeze frame and slow function. It was useful in my early 3/4" productions where I needed a freeze or slow-motion. I would loop the video through it and get my freeze on the fly. Or I would copy to VHS to get the slow. Don't look too closely at the blanking width or the digital artifacts at the top of the screen. The client never knew.

I may add it to the old VHS to DVD dubbing system I am running to clear the house of all those old tapes. It will be perfect for the problem tapes that look nasty on the current VHS decks I am using.

And to help another question, Macrovision was disabled on Beta copies because Beta inserted a new sync pulse which is where Macrovision is hidden. Not sure if early VHS did the same trick.

Thanks for the trip down memory lane and a prod to get this beast running again.

Dave A