There was a guy in Manchester, Iowa who recorded everything. Every phone call, much of the four TV channels available in that area, and endless ephemera. Before computer audio compression, he would record on a C.Crane quarter-speed cassette recorder onto 120 minute tapes (that's 8 hours). He would then transfer these to a single track of stereo VHS tapes at a time in SLP mode, recording on the other stereo track on a second pass. He did this from late in the 1970's to his death in 2015, archiving these tapes on cataloged shelves in two houses he owned on a quiet side street. When he departed, nobody really knew what these tapes were or how to play them back, so they were piled into a huge construction dumpster and taken to the landfill. This is the same guy who designed the first Braille star map and had memorized the names of 3,000 stars visible to the naked eye in the night sky. Lots of flutter and a rather extreme low-pass filtering effect notwithstanding--the results were surprisingly audible. I was able to rescue somewhat less than a thousand of these cassettes, but the logistics of digitizing them was nearly too much for any normal person to undertake.

@maxx6095

Жыл бұрын

Thanks for saving some of his work ! Anywhere we can listen ?

@Operationalexcellence263

Жыл бұрын

I seem to recall this story. Thank you for returning this to memory.

@thevoidinclusive

Жыл бұрын

Wow. I’d love to read more about this and hear some tapes!

@skonenblades

Жыл бұрын

That also reminds me of Marion Stokes project. There was a movie about it in 2019 in called Recorder. She recorded unbroken streams of all the channels on her television, 24 hours a day, for 35 years from 1977 to 2012. That ended up in 71,000 VHS and Betamax tapes. As I understand it, they're currently being digitized.

@Tfor2show

Жыл бұрын

Whoa! I grew up in Worthington and passed through Manchester all the time growing up! I'd be thrilled to help digitize some of the tapes if you still have them!

In my college years, I ran a low-budget 4-track recording studio out of my parent's house. My dad happened to have a Sony Betamax HiFi VCR, and I mastered to that. It was very close to digital quality. Even all these years later I transferred some of that audio to my computer and it holds up. Amazing tech for it's day.

@terryenglish7132

Жыл бұрын

A sound man friend bought one for a similar reason when they first came out. It is interesting that because they were video, most high end audio enthusiasts never considered one instead of a Nagra etc.

@cjbani159

6 ай бұрын

I mastered to a VHS Hi-Fi deck for a time, but at SP, which I'm a little surprised David didn't address. It was cleaner and more colorless than my analog open reel deck ~

As someone who isn't a tech geek, you do an amazing job at suggesting what you mean by your magic words with your camera work on the open VCR. What many languages use dozens of words to convey, you simply achieve by adding a subtle zoom or tilt of the camera.

@earljohnson8851

Жыл бұрын

i’m so happy you found it authentic 😅😅😅😮😅😅 10:26 hours in and

@AndySalinger33

Жыл бұрын

Ratioed much?

@rasmusn.e.m1064

Жыл бұрын

@@AndySalinger33 what do you mean?

@duff3lB4g

Жыл бұрын

@@rasmusn.e.m1064 he's talking about the bot

@RockinEnabled

Жыл бұрын

Well, the author DOES seem a tech geek. In a good way, of course :)

That "subtle chorus effect" of double tracking is what Randy Rhoads did for his solos. Really broadens the soundscape.

I have never in my life done anything remotely with music publishing or just creation. Let alone the usage of a digital synth software, that allows for the creation of crazy sounds like these. And truth be told, I'm 42, I'm probably never going to be involved in this business. And yet, I enjoy these videos about the creation of these samples enormously. It's very satisfying to see this happen.

@themadsamplist

Жыл бұрын

You can do it just for fun. You don't have to be in the business. Age is not important.

@falkhammermuller9342

Жыл бұрын

@@themadsamplist well, I'm not the kind of guy who doesn't get life done because of age, am involved in too many projects of a completely different field. I don't think I'll ever venture in the music business, since my network and life sourounds a different aspects of life. But again, I really appreciate your content and my son plays in an Orchester, maybe he'll have something to do work synth work in the future, I'll recommend your software.

@JasonKutchma

Жыл бұрын

I have a few friends who started at 40 and are now making a living from music. If you put in the time you can do anything my friend. Just decide to :)

@falkhammermuller9342

Жыл бұрын

@@JasonKutchma you didn't read my second response, right?

@showbread9366

Жыл бұрын

Wonderful story

I used to make just audio tapes on a Hi-Fi VCR. It was pretty good, better than cassette tapes and MUCH longer. Was a great way to have music playing for a long time without intervention.

@weaktearecords

Жыл бұрын

Same here, they were a lifesaver when you couldn't afford anything else and 2 hours of good quality was awesome!

@badbeardbill9956

Жыл бұрын

I wonder if any consumer “portastudio” like thing used VCR tech, probably not but could be cool

@Christian6.1803

Жыл бұрын

Same. It was cheaper than 1/4 for my little cassette 4track mixdowns.

@therealpbristow

Жыл бұрын

@@badbeardbill9956 There was an 8-track system based around VHS tapes, yes! We used one for a few years to record music at Filk conventions in the UK. There were also some early digital audio recorders that used VHS tapes to record 14-bit or 16-bit stereo audio. A whole load of classical music CDs were originally recorded on that system, back in the late 1980s/early '90s, as the system was very portable and could be taken to, say, a particular church to record the organ there, etc.

@cebruthius

Жыл бұрын

@@therealpbristow Techmoan has some videos on digital audio on VHS

Of all of the tape sounds, I think VHS might be the most nostalgia-inducing. I grew up tolerating that warbly audio. And now we're going out of our way to implement that characteristic.

Back in the early 90s, I used to master all of my 4-track cassette recordings onto VHS HiFi. Worked great for the most part.

I recall Techmoan saying that a HiFi stereo VHS tapes on long play used to be THE way to prepare a 6-8 hour playlist for a party, without having to micromanage it the whole time.

@nobodynoone2500

Жыл бұрын

Can confirm. Although more often used to record 8 hours of live dj sets in the 90s, than the other way around.

@themanfromvolantis

Жыл бұрын

I'm an audio micromanager. Sounds more impressive on a CV than im a DJ lol

@KewAnneOn

Жыл бұрын

I've done this before for a couple of house parties. Worked a treat 👍🏻

Watching and listening to your videos creates a "feeling like home" atmosphere.

@JSSMVCJR2.1

Жыл бұрын

In a Boards of Canada way.

How perfect for you to choose the infamous black Scotch VHS box for this video. That is the quintessential VHS to me, on display in almost everyone's living room. The colorful sun is always eye catching. Great video.

I worked in a big insurance call centre in the UK in the 1990s and all of our calls (literlly thousands of hours per week) were all recorded on VHS tapes, they could hold sometime like 12 hours of calls per cassette so they were quite an efficient and effective way of storing / retrieving audio. I forget who supplied the infrastructure now it might have been a US company called Cable and Wireless. Just a random memory this video brought up ! 😃

@DavidHilowitzMusic

Жыл бұрын

that is so cool! i love nonstandard uses for technology

@JCHaywire

Жыл бұрын

As per my comment above--apparently this was a widely used method of low-fidelity ephemeral audio storage.

@pharaohsmagician8329

Ай бұрын

Cool! I work in alot of Call Centers now, mostly in Sales. I'm pretty good at my job but I want to get better. Are there any pro tips for Call Center work that you can pass along especially those secret knowledge from the past??

I used a VHS HiFi machine as an audio recorder in addition to video in 1987 and it was so good, even on EP, that it sounded really close to a CD in quality.

Congratulations to you and Cameron on an outstanding library! 👏🙌 Will try out the free version tomorrow, but this is a definite buy! In the first few minutes I thought, “Boards of Canada”, and I was sold!

@JSSMVCJR2.1

Жыл бұрын

All of this is very inspired by Boards of Canada, indeed.

You and Cameron are 2 of very few YTers I watch regularly. Very cool that you got your (recording and playback) heads together on this one!

Budget VHS decks very seldom had hifi stereo heads. If a system is marked 4 head, the second pair is used primarily to produce cleaner pause and forward scan. Hifi VHS tended to be on the higher end decks so more usually had 6 heads, 4 for video and a pair for audio. The audio had a very wide and flat 20-20000 Hz frequency response. On a good quality of deck it was pretty much the best audio quality recording medium available outside of a studio at that time.

@MVVblog

8 ай бұрын

It's true, Hi-Fi VHS recorders were top of the line and had 6 heads. Those produced later in the '90s and early 2000s were just a pale shadow of the true VCRs from the previous decade. However, even a piece of junk like this Quazar has had its moment of glory today.

For audio you want to find a VHS player that specifically says "VHS Hi-Fi" on it. They are capable of quite high quality recording and can record 4 tracks diagonally across the tape instead of using the standard audio track like is found on a typical video VHS. The tapes degraded too quickly to have ever made them really practical in the pro market, and their inputs/outputs were usually far from ideal but you can still do some neat stuff with them.

@badbeardbill9956

Жыл бұрын

I wonder if a cracked multiplex audio head assembly could have done multitracking on professional tape, and how it would sound. Probably too crazy to ever be used outside of experiment, but could be interesting if it actually has decent quality… not VHS technology but using a similar idea as the quadruplex video head

@DarkGloComics

Жыл бұрын

Essentially a four track recorder. I appreciate the work they did, but how could anyone think that four tracks exist, and somehow, VHS couldn’t do this simple task? 🤷🏽‍♂️ I used cheap VHS tapes to multitrack record using ADAT machines all the time when I couldn’t afford ADAT tapes. (LA 97-99)

@urbanrunoff

Жыл бұрын

yes. i bought a top of the line Hifi VHS in the mid 90's to duplicate my demo tapes (film/video editing)i was never happy with the video quality but the audio was great :D

The top down view with the top off the VCR is a lovely subtle touch to this video that will mostly go unnoticed. I would binge VHS tapes as a kid (especially Disney). These videos you an Venus Theory made was a real blast from the past. Great work as always 👊🏼

You got me at 70's educational videos. That touches my childhood memories.

I love every video you make and use Decent Sampler super often. Please keep this up

I was in college in the early to mid 90s and I remember a music professor telling our class that we didn't know how good a VHS could be for recording audio. I was intrigued by the notion but never looked into doing any audio recording with VHS myself. This is the first time I have seen this process in action- almost 30 years later! I love the sounds you came up with by the end of this video. It sounds so 80s to me in the best of ways! It reminds me of a video company's logo that would appear at the beginning of a pre-recorded video. Thank you for making me retrieve a memory that I had long forgotten about.

FYI (if it hasn’t been said) there’s a song on “the fish that saved Pittsburgh” that was sampled as the main horn on Lords of the Underground’s “funky child”.

this is absolutely my favorite sample pack you’ve compiled. the sounds are all incredible!

Took me back to 1999 where I was searching for high grade tapes so I could record the metal channels on Music Choice overnight and then hook my cassette tape recorder up the next day and go through and transfer the songs I liked.

My father is a huge fan of Jazz and Big Band music. There was a local station when I was growing up that ran a one-hour show on Saturday afternoons playing lots of music that he liked. He used to record the show to his late-60s reel-to-reel deck, then transfer songs -- minus ads and DJ blather -- to cassette for playback in his car. When his reel-to-reel deck finally died, he began using the VCR instead. It had the advantage that he could program it to record at the appointed hour, freeing him (and the rest of the family!) to do other things on Saturday afternoons. It worked like a charm, and he claimed that the quality was as good or better than the reel-to-reel deck. I hadn't thought about that in years...

In the days before stand alone digital recorders this is what we would use to capture rehearsals. Just ran the tape out of the Mackie mixer into it, and set it to EP mode. We even recorded a few bands live records this way using SP mode instead.

I knew what to expect simply because I've read and reread the Wikipedia pages on pretty much every popular format of tape media, but I am still blown away by how clear it sounded. I wonder how much of our nostalgia for these lo-fi sounds actually came from the perhaps more rudimentary quality or the wear and tear of the built-in speakers we had in our TVs and audio devices. I grew up watching TV, VHS movies, and playing video games on a small Panasonic TV from the early 90s, and this was in the early 00s. 10-15 years of being the daily driver surely took its toll on all of those components. I'll miss you, little black Panasonic.

2:37 thanks David, now we know how they did the regular show intro theme !

Oh wow, my two favourite KZread musicians collaborating! That’s great news. And thank you for the video; the sound you realised does indeed sound warm and easy on the ear.

Fascinating and masterfully produced. As an audio/video producer and child of the 80s, this was Reading Rainbow level comforting.

your music and videos are so incredibly warm and comfortably captivating in a way i really cannot describe

When I saw the VHS I immediately could smell the plastic and that hot feel those tapes used to give off after playing. Thanks for the nostalgia!

This could not have come at a more perfect time. I'm working on producing content shot on VHS, and these samples are absolutely perfect for the score. I purchased it before this video was even released. It's awesome!

in 1997 I used a Sony Hifi stereo VHS recorder/player to mix down all my songs for a CD I was working on. when I brought it to the mastering engineer, he was very skeptical at first, but soon realized how good the sound quality was.

@beetooex

Жыл бұрын

I was looking for this comment. All the guides for bedroom studio type recording used to say this was the best way to master. Was your initial recording/mixing done on a 4 track cassette portastudio? Did you bounce tracks temporarily to the VHS when you ran out of channels?

@andrewbogner

Жыл бұрын

@@beetooex Hi beetooex, I used a fostex model 80 8 track reel to reel tape recorder w/ a mackie 1402 vlz mixer. all my final mixes went to my sony hifi vhs recorder/player. I never bounced out tracks to the vhs, just mastered to it.

what a heartwarming work you've done, aside from the beautiful result, the process was already a treat. thanks again for that colorful palette you've been creating.

The sample library is so good! Could play about with it all day, really inspiring stuff. Thanks for making it!

if lofi was a person, i'd be deep in love

@therealwhite

Жыл бұрын

Now I'm going to have to Google Fi

@JSSMVCJR2.1

Жыл бұрын

I just got the idea of you and Lo-Fi having a Family.

@hennydarmse

Жыл бұрын

The equivalent is probably an older person!

@JSSMVCJR2.1

Жыл бұрын

@@hennydarmse But not old enough. That would be an Eldely Citizen, and that's not *A E S T H E T I C*

@CLOYO

Жыл бұрын

@@therealwhite Hello this is Patrick. Fi means Fidelity. Google Patrick out.

I'm so excited to watch this! I have always been entranced by the unmistakable but seemingly irreplicable chorussy warbling of vhs audio! Obsessed ever since I was a kid and you would hear chewed up strings and warbling pianos on well-worn videos played on tired classroom players haha

One of your best! Loved the overhead shots of the naked VHS and how informative it was, historical perspective and all.

your videos always brighten my day, thanks David

I used to mix my 4 track demos into VHS tapes, they sounded great! Hi-fi and four heads went a long way

@mikethebloodthirsty

Жыл бұрын

I wish I'd have known about that... I did record music on s VHS and remember thinking how good it sounded, but never thought to master on to one. Back in the day you had to find out for yourself almost.

@brainjellyTV

Жыл бұрын

@@mikethebloodthirsty and btw it was analog

I love writing lofi, never considered using vcr. I have to try it some time.

@DavidHilowitzMusic

Жыл бұрын

It's really fun! Make sure that you get one that does not have "Hi-Fi Stereo" because that...sounds too good. :)

@billypilgrim1

Жыл бұрын

@@DavidHilowitzMusic You mean the tapes or the actual VHS recorder?

The quality of your content always astounds me. So cozy and entertaining.

In the late 80's my friends and I would DJ our high school and private events. We would often grab brand new music that we couldn't buy yet from MTV via VHS recording, then play them back at dances and such. We weren't thinking much about fidelity, because tape was the air we breathed back then. The sound was always great for pumping through high end amps and loudspeakers. Little did we know how edgy we were. :P Excellent video - I love experiments like this!

I have t picked up an instrument in a decade, and I’ve never tried working with synths, but damn I think I might look into it as a hobby. I’m already in a different creative field so I don’t have a lot of money to put into this hobby as my craft also requires a lot of funds, but synths as well as creating arrangements really grows on me as a hobby I’d love to pick up little by little over time. I’m glad I found your channel ❤

@kaitlyn__L

Жыл бұрын

There’s free software instruments and free DAWs you can use to get started at no additional cost with your existing computer :) I hope you take a look into it! Music is an important part of human expression

@LR-jo7ci

Жыл бұрын

@@kaitlyn__L thanks ! I’ll look into it

Alesis made an 8 track "digital" recorder that used VHS tapes as the media.

@delta-9969

3 ай бұрын

ADAT was digital.

Amazing as always. Some of my favorite content on YT. Thank you for your time.

It sounds so beautiful, great work!

Some years ago I got a vhs player with lots of tapes, and it impressed me the quality of the sound. Not only the audio quality was great but the mixing was also superior to modern stuff.

@ryanjacobson2508

Жыл бұрын

Audio mixing on 80's/early 90's home video was very well done. At some point standards started slipping (I would assume due to budget cuts/tighter deadlines for the home video divisions of the studios).

I definitely used my VCR as a child to record audio. Hi-Fi VCRs had really good audio quality, similar fidelity to CD at SP speed, despite being analog.

@althejazzman

Жыл бұрын

It wasn't just analog though. VHS Hi-Fi Stereo was FM encoded underneath the video signal, so it wasn't bound by the frequency restrictions of tape head gaps like linear audio tape. It was more like an FM Stereo radio broadcast.

Smiled when I saw this video pop up in my feed. Thank you for the thoughtful content.

I definitely plan on using a VCR in this way, but I picked up the library because of the work you both put into this. Thank you!

Lots of people have mastered to Super VHS over the years. Sounds great.

The vcrs labelled HIFI from the early- mid 90s record really well. Try and find one with manual record gain control. I recorded some Lps and it was almost impossible to distinguish between the source and the recording. They used to call it poor man's DAT. :)

Your videos are just so perfect, David. Great storytelling, visuals, ideas. You're an amazing content creator. Please keep going.

I love that you share the process of creating these samples and then make them available for people to use. The VCR sound is very nostalgic for me 💛

"The Fish that Saved Pittsburgh" is my friend's favorite movie of all time! I know you touched on the capabilities of VHS HiFi, but it is important to note that the HiFI VHS has incredible sound quality... it's comparable to CD, and many people say it's even better since it is still analog. There is also no tape noise. I used to use HiFi VHS to master my recordings, and some people still do as it's as good as any reel-to-reel recording out there.

@alicev1500

Жыл бұрын

Is it still easy to get blank tapes? Or do you overwrite other tapes?

@Youtube.Commen-tater

Жыл бұрын

@@alicev1500 I'd say it's pretty easy to find them at thrift stores and various other second hand shops, they were mass produced for like thirty years

In the late nineties my friends were using the digital audio track on S-VHS tapes as a mixdown format for their basement EM productions. This was not becuase they thought it sounded cool and retro but because it was their only affordable digital option. I was still using cassetes or maybe DAT. Of course it's not the same as the analog audio track on VHS but this video reminded me of that anecdote .

These videos make me so so happy. Thanks a lot!

As a separate comment, when growing up in the 80s/90s, it used to really make us upset hearing that dissonance of the audio warble and it felt like it ruined the movie experience. For some strange reason, it always reminds me of the 80s and how much I loved life back then. It’s a warm, nostalgic feeling. Thank you!

I’m really surprised that ADAT wasn’t mentioned in this clip at all. It was a really popular format in the ’90s and a number of gigantic hits were recorded with it. It essentially was VHS audio used for mastering.

@0bsolet

Жыл бұрын

I worked with one. It was 6 tracks if I remember...

@thecritic2084

11 ай бұрын

The guy is a composer and records music and I think he's really trying to focus here on using the analogue audio tracks as a sort of lofi signal processor to give it that "warm analogue sound" or whatever.... I'd be surprised if he weren't aware of the ADAT standard, which leverages the entire S-VHS tape on a completely different head mechanism. Even more than that, this issue was really solved in 1982 with the Sony PCM-F1, an A/D-D/A that can encode digital audio (Linear PCM) onto a video tape recorder's video tracks. It also led to the emergence of the ADAT optical I/O standard.... Some modern professional interfaces still use the ADAT lightpipe I/O, though it has largely been replaced by Dante.

@delta-9969

3 ай бұрын

ADAT is digital. It was the total opposite of "warm" and "analog." Technically CD quality but the converters at that time were horrible and were notorious for a flat and lifeless sound that you'll hear on a lot of CDs from that era. Of course it wouldn't surprise me if hipsters develop a sudden "nostalgia" for it and start laboriously bouncing everything down to an ADAT machine lol

Good timing. I’ve been hunting for VHS HIFI machines at the local Goodwill after watching a KZread video on this. Found one and it ate the tapes. Oh well. The hunt continues.

@njm1971nyc

Жыл бұрын

Most old VCRs will eat your tapes, but it's usually a very simple repair. 99% of the time it's because the tape is being pulled out by the capstan /pinch roller (as it should be) but not collected on the right hand take-up spool in the cassette. So the tape pools inside the VCR, and it shuts down. Most consumer VCRs have a swinging idler wheel that swings left for rewind, right for FF/Play. The grease on the swinging arm turns to tar, and it no longer swings 🫤 Older designs use a rubber tire on the swinging idler, which can become shiny and non-grippy. You can roughen it up with fine sandpaper. Usually a dab of grease and/or a piece of sandpaper will fully cure this problem. You're welcome. 👍😉

@michaelkonomos

Жыл бұрын

@@njm1971nyc thank you!

@purpleghost4083

Жыл бұрын

@@michaelkonomos The channel 12voltvids does repair videos on audio & video equipment including VCRs. Good and useful reference vids even if you don't need to fix the type of equipment in a particular video.

Hi-Fi VHS is one of the highest quality analog tape formats you could get at the time as a normal consumer without a padded bank account. I recorded hours of music on Hi-Fi VHS because of that back in the day.

Your ability to combine beautiful cinematography and wonderful music discussion is amazing

You are both a scientist and a musician. Really admire your brilliant mind. You create really interesting content.

This video is incredible, like you I've been pretty deep in the tape world recently. Thanks David!

This is an awesome library. Thank you!

Always amazing work!

Yes! My favorite youtuber!!

To this day, i still make some mixtapes and record my mixes on HiFi VHS. They sound absolutely amazing and can easily hold 3 hours of audio.

@dr.darkroom

Жыл бұрын

Ok this is an incredible idea

As always ever so fascinatingly presented as the topic itself is, great job man!

Really enjoy the results you produced with this process, very nostalgic 💭

I just love your channel. anything you pick up is so damn interesting! And all your inside on the technical devices is just wonderful

that was... so neat. i literally never thought to use a VCR like this. anyone know the name of the Korean(?) movie or show that was sampled at the beginning of the video? aslas googling "boy flies on a whale" and plugging in different decades yeilds nothing. thanks for a truly stellar video!

@Andyyy982

Жыл бұрын

I was also wondering. I speak Korean so I can confirm that it's not Korean. I'm fairly sure it's Japanese as I also know a smidge of Mandarin and it's almost certainly not chinese.

Absolutely wonderful video and sounds. Thank you!

Very cool to see the process of how you create the samples here. I just bought the library and am already using it in a track.

the file is unavailable :(

Those test samples are gorgeous!

This channel is amazing. Pure wonder and discovery.

Got it just because it is such a cool idea and you guys worked hard for this so I need to support your work! Sounds pretty cool indeed! 🙂

It’s a well-known fact that a lot of audio engineers use VHS to master audio. They did make hi-fi VCRs. They make a great mastering track

@dougllewellyn4620

Жыл бұрын

I used a hi-fi VHS recorder as a backup master 2 track recorder in the 80s. I would mix down to 1/4" half track at 15 ips, and to the VHS deck. Worked like a champ!

@solarbabies9682

Жыл бұрын

Beta was more common

@dougllewellyn4620

Жыл бұрын

@@solarbabies9682 Beta was the better format, but VHS was way more common

@carlwinslow5905

Жыл бұрын

Thats ADAT. It's not analog. I'd just 0s and 1s on tape. Like a hard drive

@dougllewellyn4620

Жыл бұрын

@@carlwinslow5905 ADAT used the same principle and hardware, but VHS/hi-fi wasn't digital.

It would be great to run an impulse input through the VCR in order to get a filter for the "quasar lo fi" sound that could then be applied to any sample. Similar to what they detailed in this NPR piece about recreating the sound inside the Hagia Sophia: kzread.info/dash/bejne/k3mAx6epl8y3n9Y.html

An awesome collab by two amazing sound designers! Venus Theory is great.

This is fantastic and is exactly the type of content I have been looking for on KZread.

Well this was fun! Also: Love that you're using Reaper in this video. That's a DAW that doesn't get as much love as it deserves.

I think you are one of the few treasures on youtube, I love the editing style and your ideas are so creative. Keep it up ♥

Absolutely beautiful. Here I was thinking you were going to try and write to and decode audio from the video channel but this turned out way cooler. I had no idea the Hi-Fi system had a backup decoder. Amazing!

This video is amazing, I think you just gave me inspiration on how to improve my Lofi sound with VHS sound, I had no idea you could do this!

Dual mono FTW, I love this vibe so much. Great work and inspiring as always!

This was an absolute delight to stumble onto. Cheers!

Amazing work Dave and such a fun video as always

Excellent video. The samples sound fantastic!

Been working on VCRs for years and learned something. Thank you❤

Back in the early 90s I purchased a Panasonic NV-FS90, 6 head stereo S-VHS Recorder with separate left and right audio level meters and audio level gain controls. It cost me around £1200 back then as it was one of the best, most feature laden models on the market. It was also an edit machine with frame by frame search with near perfect motion and stillness and a separate music track could be recorded on the machine to accompany home videos or presentations. I too used the machine as an audio recorder, as it could obtain better results than most dedicated cassette decks, ( Nakamich being the obvious exception), and didn't require any type of noise reduction, (Dolby B, C, S or dbx), as its recordings were virtually noiseless. I archived around 10 180 minute cassette's worth of music and used them for parties or family/friend get togethers. Sound quality was terrific but couldn't stand up against my pair of Nakamichi RX-505's, (they were exceptional and sadly missed), however, it was far more than acceptable and it never chewed a tape! I used that machine up until around 2012, (how many other machines have lived this long that have had so much use?) It survived 3 kids and their tapes, plus a jam sandwich posted through its cassette slot by my daughter, awaiting collection by the unseen postman. Cleaning and maintenance is vital to this calibre of a/v products, especially if you have kids using them, too. I retired it back to it's original box, sealed it and there it resides, STILL IN WORKING CONDITION, in the attic.

Fantastic idea and execution! Super outside-the-box thinking. Love it!

This is absolutely inspiring!! Fantastic Idea!

Yor videos are so pleasing / relaxing. Its always a joy and i learn intersting stuff! Thanks!

THANKS FOR CREATING AWESOME INSTRUMENTS!

Your explanation of helical scan, saying “almost as if the tape speed was higher” was really good for the uninitiated

Thanks for this! I have an old Casio mini keyboard I found @ a thrift store a couple decades ago and I adore the tones on it but it has freaky white noise during silence; now I can sample them and retain some lofi magic using this method. Love sounding like no one else.