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I think they made a mistake by changing to Hitachi. Hitach was very slow to change to a direct drive capstan motor. This limited the fast search speed to about 3 times normal speed instead of the 5 to 7 times that was typical on direct drive models. They were also a lot less reliable than Panasonic VCRs. Panasonics seemed to almost always last until the heads were worn out. Panasonic and Sony made a few VCRs in the 80's that were totally direct drive with no belts. Even the tape reels were direct drive. They weren't around long because of cost though.
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