How digital TV will kill off the VCR
Filed under: Budgets, Home, Shopping
Start transferring your VHS tapes to DVD if you want to watch all of those old movies you have when the nation's analog TV signals change to digital transmissions in mid-June.
Unless you can pop for a new VCR with a digital tuner or can find some way to jerry-rig your old VCR, those video tapes will be as useless as Betamax tapes were in the '80s, according to a Contra Costa Times story.
DVDs replaced video tapes years ago at video rental stores, but 72% of U.S. households with a TV also have a VCR, according to the research group Nelson. Just 24% of TV-owning households have the new way to record -- the digital video recorder, or DVR.
DVD recorders are expensive. DVRs usually work with pay TV systems and require a monthly fee.
Only the latest VCR models have digital tuners. So most of the VCRs that are in homes can't be used to tune in digital signs, either from the airwaves or from a cable provider. To continue recording TV, most VCR owners will have to use a cable set-top or broadcast converter box to translate digital signals into analog ones that the VCR can understand.
That will create more hassles, such as not allowing one program to be watched while another is recording, and the converter device won't allow particular channels to be recorded at specific times.
There are work-arounds, such as having a second converter box hooked up to the TV instead of the VCR, or splitting the incoming video signal. Either way, it's going to be a hassle.
In my house, we have a VCR that is almost never used anymore in one room, and a DVR hooked up to a newer TV in the living room. Once the digital conversion happens, I suspect we'll just throw those old movies away that we have on video tape. We rarely watch them anyway.
Maybe that's the best upside to this digital conversion: Less junk.
Aaron Crowe is an unemployed journalist in the San Francisco Bay Area. Read about his job search at www.AaronCrowe.net
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
2-17-2009 @ 11:19PM
holly said...
I would think that you wouldnt have to throw away vhs tapes if you're not recording on them. So you can keep your kids' fave vhs copy of 101 Dalmations and then trash the blank tapes if you dont want to buy a converter box.
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2-18-2009 @ 3:30PM
DADU said...
This article is a LIE ! I have digital TV and I still record off cable but not in digital. Run a cable from your wall outlet directly to your recorder, bypass your digital box. You will be able to record most channels but not in Digital...You can use a splitter in your cable input line. One side to your digital box and the other side to your recorder. Mine works fine.
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2-18-2009 @ 6:51PM
ehopkins said...
I have an analog/digital Tv now connected to a VCR/DVD combo and an antenna. Can I somehow use a set top box, which I also have, to run the VCR to record the digital shows? How?
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2-22-2009 @ 11:30AM
Angelo Campanella said...
TVO is a nice thought, but the repetitive charges make it economically infeasible.
The popular media and blogs are so far behind reality and feasibility, it's pathetic. I have known clearly for almost a year the the solution to the switch to air DTV only requires buying a new VCR (or two) that has DTV engineered into it, At the rate of new product evolution these days, this is no more a challenge that was the addition of tail fins to autos in the 1960's.
I have been surveying the electronic stores literature for that product type for several months. So far, I found only one... a Motorla model in Wal-Mart, asking price, about $188-$220 depending on who you talk to. When I went there, there was only one - the shelf display unit, no products in boxes to sell. I asked to run my old tape in it just to investigate its true functionality... they said it was not hooked up to run... Something a little fishy, but then again, if I am right, this type of product is selling like hot-cakes... if it exists.
A caveat about DTV VCRs is that their switching from station to station and record-start-up is sluggish because of the digital synchronization required. This is brought on by the fact that the only devices being produced at the moment are "combo" DTV-DVD-VCR units. The DVD function is finicky and requires sometime a minute or more to tune and synchronize for good recording . I have not switched yet to DVD's since I have tamed the beast of VCR tapes... I get years of life from a cassette by never rewinding them on a VCR, only rewinding with a separate Radio Shack re-winder.
I have a DTV single-channel converter... just running it this morning on for VCR recording of the one local channel that truly shut down alalog transmission of live (Fox) media. I use the direct A/V feed ("Line 2") into one of my old analog VCRs. It works well. Said analog VCR will still capture the remaining analog signals as long as they last...
2-22-2009 @ 11:51AM
Angelo Campanella said...
Correction.. The wal-aMart unit was a Magnavox, I think.
2-18-2009 @ 7:48PM
ehopkins said...
Correction -- I mean I have a digital box.
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2-21-2009 @ 2:00PM
Scott said...
The transition to digital TV broadcasting has no effect on your ability to watch VHS tapes. There's no need to throw anything away or transfer anything to DVD.
This article is correct about timer recording on a VCR becoming more of a hassle. But the DTVPal converter box has a multiple event timer to aid recording programs on different channels.
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2-22-2009 @ 11:51AM
Angelo Campanella said...
And, remember:
1- The government furnished $40-off converter has to be manually tuned to each station. This enslaves you to mentally track when to switch your analog VCR for the next program to be recorded that day. The new DTV-VCR and the new DTV-DVD recorders of course all shall have automatic DTV station tuning as you may program them.
2- One wonders - your should test for - whether these new DTV recorders can be programmed to also receive and record analog signals, as not all analog TV signals will necessarily die, any more than has AM broadcasting!
3- When buying one of those $40-off units, be sure to get one that also has "Analog Pass-Though" so that when the converter is switched off, the old analog air signal is restored to your old analog TV and VCR air antenna input... This is seriously needed in this transition period that will last at least all of 2009, I suspect.
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