My oldest VHS tapes are from June, 1983, when I rented a Sharp VC-9500 VCR to tape my brother's high school graduation in Reston, VA. We attended the ceremony, & our local cable company played the tape of this several times over that weekend on the public access channel.
The tapes cost me about $10 EACH(Maxell T-120s), & I filled up the second tape with Looney Tunes & Walter Lantz cartoons off of WDCA. I have always used the SP speed for best picture quality, & those tapes look quite good today. The sound is only average, as VHS Hi-Fi hadn't been introduced yet(that came in 1984) & the Sharp had the usual mono linear audio track.
I have found that nearly all of my circa 1,000 VHS tapes play well today, for the simple reason that there are too many of 'em for any one tape to get played too often-so wear is minimal. And I do burn various VHS tapes to DVD-R for friends & family, on my Pioneer DVD recorder. I have no illusions about any DVD-R or CD-R discs lasting 20-50-100 years, regardless of any "aging tests" by the manufacturers. This why I still use a VHS Hi-Fi VCR for tapings off of TCM, IFC, etc.(as well as 'events' like the recent election). I feel IF you get good tape stock(current fav is Sony), a viewing copy on DVD-R will suffice for distribution & the VHS "master" gets stored away til needed again. I had wanted to get a nice JVC SVHS VCR for better picture resolution, knowing that digital TV & DVD-Rs would take over, but by the time I started waving money around retailers no longer had any in stock
