Video History: V2000 - The format that came third in a two-horse race

Oh my god that Phirrips advert

Those machines look soooo good...

Firips...that took me a minute. Different times

A bit surprising how this never released in America since people took vhs over beta max just for longer recording time over picture quality I bet if this did release in America that it might have sold fairly well as of the fact that if you can get 16 hours of recording with an 8 hour tape and a player with the slower recording option it probably wouldn’t have been the biggest success but it still could have had good sales here

Ah so you can use "VCR player" in a sentence if you're talking about VCR tapes!

wasn’t laser disc also in the competition?

Being a strictly VHS/S-VHS adopter at the time, I have honestly never heard of V2000 until literally today. Thank you for this excellent introduction!

Our family recorder, from early to mid 80's up to the mid 90's !
IIRC, it was a used model, yet it was still quite expensive back in the days.
I even bought another dirt cheap, the first one gave signs of end of life.
Thanks for this video, it sent me back in time... I cannot count how many I've watched Blade Runner on this, over a hundred times for sure.

Great video

Perfect timing for the VR2023

I had Philips - some V2000 (the original basic machine, the two-part portable [though never a camera], and one other - I still have a stack of the tapes which I'll have a job finding something to play, if ever). And before that - no, not one of the stacked-reel machines: I had a Philips reel-to-reel video recorder! Looked very like their audio domestic machines of the time. (Not colour.)
Technically, I think V2000 and Beta had bandwiths of 3 MHz, and VHS 2½ MHz; as you say, probably not perceptible. What was really noticeable on the V2000 was the dynamic track following: on one of the machines, i could be in ×7 (IIRR) view in one direction, and switch to the same in the other (actually I think it was ×7 backwards or ×9 forwards), and it would slow down, passing through still, then speed up in the other direction - all without losing lock, any noise bars, or even I think losing colour.
I think the format did get hi-fi sound right at the end, though not sure if I ever had it.
They probably had to have the DTF, in order to achieve the recording on half the tape width; I think the linear tape speed was similar to the other two formats.

In 1986 a TDK VHS E180 cassette cost ATS 99,- a Video 2000 VCC480 Cassette cost ATS 299,- now we do the math. 99/180min.= ATS 0,55/min and 299/480min.= ATS 0,62/min now we know why it fail.

Everyone bangs on about Beta being better quality than VHS, or the tapes are longer. The only reason VHS won, was because of content, and the availability of machines at your local Radio Rentals shop. I'm not talking about porn, and video nasties, but blockbuster movies! In 1982 I watched Star Trek 2, E.T. and Rocky 3 just to name a few (without having to go to the cinema). I would invite my mates over and the novelty of watching a movie was the big pull. All my mates went out and got VHS machines and we started double taping them lol!

ZDF is the Zweite Deutsche Fernsehen or second German television and is one of the two bbc equivalents. Just that we pay GEZ which is a fee of 18€ something, that enables these two channels ARD and ZDF and their subchannels to broadcast. For comparison the public channels in germany have budget of 12 million € while Netflix has 16 million €

Ah... Those were the days with those racist commercials "from Phirips" 😂

Now what would happen if everything shut down media clouds . satalites music . everything that hold your stuff when you need it . shuts all down . and your left with silence . no music . no videos . . and no back ups . thats the future mr techmoan . relying on others . what a let down . sad future if you ask me .

Mes parents avaient choisi ce format en 1981 parce que bien meilleur que le VHS dans tous les domaines : avance et retour sur image sans parasite, arrêt sur image parfait, système de recherche par clavier numérique très précis ! Par contre très fragile, les têtes de lectures s'usaient très vite... / My parents had chosen this format in 1981 because it was much better than VHS in all areas: parasite-free forward and reverse, perfect freeze frame, very precise numeric keypad search system! On the other hand very fragile, the reading heads wore out very quickly ...

Mat, did you ever get Chewie properly working and take a look at all those tapes?

Wait...their system was called DTF??? No comment on that one?

apparently the Panasonic DMR-EZ45V DVD Recorder/VCR Recorder upscales vhs to 720 via hdmi can you look into this techmoan

How does he find these machines?

where are you deriving beeta? learn Spanish, the rest of the world didn't use those vowels

thanks for not saying beta the wrong way

VHS technology really didn't have the edge on recording time if you look at the format wars as a whole, that trophy would go to Video2000 (they did well in Germany, a distant third in the format wars), it allowed you to use both sides of the tape by flipping the tape it over! They were very cool, but it never really took off. VHS had the best business model. Along with the obnoxious licensing requirements, Sony would require distributors to carry the complete Sony line in order to sell their Betamax machines, another huge mistake. With compact size, commercially released Video8 takes the cake, they dominated the airlines, but we're a late arrival, but in my opinion a missed opportunity. VHS was the most well marketed, had the most open licensing and distribution policies and deserved to win the war. Though, Beta did have a better picture and this shouldbt be dismissed, it's easy through modern glasses to call the differences marginal, but in 1980 they were more impactfull but were just not enough.

Back in the 80s my grandparents had a VHS VCR much like your video 2000 you could split and run a separate video camera on to record your home movies. They used it when we went to the Alamo... most of the triplets recorded in the car because my dad was under the assumption that you push the button to record and let the button go to stop recording didn't work that way... One push on one push off we have 3 hours of what it was like to ride in the car.

What camcorders can use betamax tapes

What an absolutely crazy coincidence to wind up with two decades-old tapes on different formats, purchased months apart from the same original owner!

Technically your wrong, wheres the Philip's N1700

VR2023.... from firips. 2023... they knew.

Ever noticed how every two horse race has a third unknown competitor?

Please rewind this video before returning it to the shop.

what a ride

That was cool and informative. Did not know about the V2000.

Philips 1700 vcr was amazing spool on top of spool

I would like to know if you have ever done a video on commercial format wars. I imagine in the 70's and 80's TV stations also had to choose between formats. I know they called the tape player a VTR (Video Tape Recorder) but I don't know much else and would be very interested to see how that niche played out.

D T F means something entirely different nowadays. It’s quite sad. This does however seem like an ideal system for the home user so simply using it for profession isn’t really practical..

it was because of the limited record time of betamax and the awful quality of records. and the vhs gained terrain against Beta because they saw the need of the people to record tv while they were out and included the timer.And a big NO NO for Sony was the license--- they play Apple of their time.

DTF!
I'm dying here...

It was reliability - or the lack of it - that killed 2000. As an employee of Philips in the 70/80s I remember visiting the Philips repair facility in Purley Way, Croydon and seeing tens of thousands of faulty v2000 machines stacked floor to ceiling in acres of warehouse racking.

I loved the video 2000 system .
I started off with a piano key VHS then went to a Sony and then to a Philips video 3000 it had the remote and all the trick frame functions.
I then went to the grundig 24 super with the remote control box on the side.
And then finally the Phillips which was designed for a video camera and had a battery in one-half of it.
A brilliant system with brilliant functions and years ahead of its two rivals

bĀta or bĒta

I can hear the tappets rattling on those Talbots even now .

I remember as a kid we got a huge Grundig v2000 recorder from Radio Rentals! The first recorded tape had Animalympics and The Stage Door Theatre on it.

It wasn't Phillips fault for wanting to make it in the market, it was your governments fault for agreeing to force the VHS machines to be sold at the same price as the v2000 sets

Another great vid . thanks .