Color TV on tape (Popular Mechanics April 1954)

[Aussie Bloke]

G'day all.

I've just bought from my local antique store a couple of 1954 issues of Popular Mechanics and the April edition had an article entitled "Color TV on tape" which was about the early prototype videotape recording machine made by RCA which can record television in both colour and black & white. From what I learned about these, they used up so much tape to record only a few minutes of video in which they were not practical for commercial use. Below the article and photos is a pictorial demonstration of the obvious advantages the videotape machine had over the standard kinescope process.

I really wonder if it has actually been documented that this videotape machine and tapes were destroyed or not after RCA were done with the experiment? If not, I wonder about the possibility of the tapes still being out there somewhere?

Anyways I've uploaded the article to photobucket for you all to see:
http://i837.photobucket.com/albums/z...anicsapr54.jpg

[Sandy G]

Wow...Talk about "Genesis"...An' a $125 El Crapco VHS machine from '85 or so woulda blown 'em away...

[Pete Deksnis]

An expanded article on the subject appears in the January 1954 issue of RCA's "Radio Age" magazine. It indicates that the "...present laboratory equipment [tape reels] are 17 inches in diameter and will record 4 minutes of a television program." Not to worry though, as they speculated a 19-in. reel would play for 15 minutes.

[Eric H]

Originally Posted by Sandy G

Wow...Talk about "Genesis"...An' a $125 El Crapco VHS machine from '85 or so woulda blown 'em away...

Heck, the average Cell Phone can do better today with no tape at all!

[old_tv_nut]

only 5% as expensive as film since the tape can be re-used - makes me cry, because that's exactly what was done with early tapes, making a lot of programming that went onto tape unavailable now.