A post from 2001 good for a laugh: Why VHS is better than DVD!!!

[Aragorn]

I found this user posting on Adaquacy.org (whatever that is), and it was good for a few laughs. It was posted on Aug. 24, 2001, and the user stopped posting there in 2002 so I guess we'll never get a follow up. And DVD was already a few years into its lifespan when he posted this.

What was funny to note is that in the response section there's one person doesn't think DVD quality matters until he upgrades to HDTV! Sound familiar?

Anyway, the four things he attacks DVDs on are picture quality, sound quality, physical preservation and special features. A highlight from each of his four points:

Evidence about the alleged superiority of DVD picture versus VHS is largely anecdotal and suspicious, given the fact that it mostly originates from the DVD manufacturers themselves. In fact, the actual peer-reviewed evidence tends to point the other direction. In a recent study by Brown University, one hundred students were shown a clip of the movie "Big Momma's House" on VHS and then were shown the same clip on DVD. The students were not told which clip was which format. They were then asked which of the two clips had better video quality, or if they were about the same. Nearly two-thirds of the students (63%) thought that there was no difference. Of the remaining students, 19% thought that the VHS tape looked better! In other words, the students with a preference (narrowly) favored the image quality of the "inferior" VHS clip!

Finally, it's worth mentioning that all of these high-end sound formats such as "Dolby Digital 5.1" and "DTS" are pure junk. Scientists have demonstrated that the human brain is not capable of separating out more than four simultaneous sound channels at once. Coincidentally, four channels is what you get with the tried-and-true Dolby Surround technology (an analog technlogy that is available on VHS tapes.) Digital formats that claim to offer five, six, or even seven channels might sound tempting, but remember that your brain cannot process this much information anyway, so the point is moot! (And beyond that, it's all compressed digital sound, so it's garbage to begin with.)

VHS tapes, on the other hand, are virtually impossible to destroy. If a part of the tape gets dirty or crinkeled, you may have to put up with a few lines of static for a few seconds, but that's it. Unlike a DVD, it is not possible to easily destroy an entire movie, since doing so would require you to destroy an extended length of magnetic tape. Even in severe cases where defective players "eat" the video tape, all that one needs to do is wind the tape back up into the cartridge. Compared to their fragile digital brothers, VHS tapes are invincible.

The fact of the matter is that VHS movies have higher-quality special features because there is less room for them, and they must be placed at strategic points (usually, at the beginning of the tape.) This means that VHS movie designers are forced to pick the best features .. the cream of the crop, if you will .. and leave the rest of them behind. When DVD zealots brag about having "more features", they might as well be bragging about having "more crap." Any special feature that is worth anything is going to also be included on the VHS version of the movie. The added extras on the DVD are discarded table scraps.

 

[BigFoot]

Now all we need is a "why DVD is better then Blu-ray" thread. Oh wait, we've already had a couple of those as well.

 

[ITL]

It's nice to know that all of those tapes of mine that got chewed up in the machine or were mangled, broken, torn, stretched and generally rendered less than useless were, in fact, impossible to destroy...

 

[FordSVT]

Yeah, that post has been passed around here before, and I think I even saw it linked to on Digg.com or something like that. Guy is a moron.

 

[Pingfah]

One can only imagine how much money that guy must have spent on VHS tapes to bring on such a severe bout of cognitive dissonance.

 

[Goliath]

VHS tapes, on the other hand, are virtually impossible to destroy.

The only reason I still own a VCR is because my TV is so old: it has just one jack in the back, for the cable. As a result, I have to run my DVD player and game consoles through the VCR.

 

[ITL]

VHS tapes, on the other hand, are virtually impossible to destroy.

The only reason I still own a VCR is because my TV is so old: it has just one jack in the back, for the cable. As a result, I have to run my DVD player and game consoles through the VCR.

My old TV is knackered in the reception-of-signal department, so I have to use my old VCR to pick up TV. I haven't used it for playing anything since I got the Godfather box set on DVD to replace my crappy old tapes....

 

[Goliath]

Heh--I just checked. I have exactly six VHS tapes that I have yet to replace with DVDs.

One of them is too expensive (The Naked City, 35.99 USD from the Criterion Collection) And another (Minority Report) hasn't aged well.

Not sure why I haven't replaced the remaining four yet. Just not paying attention, I guess.

 

[Zulu Romeo]

The VHS tapes on my shelf have succumbed to extreme exposure for sitting near a south facing heavily sunlit window on a second floor room. Even the plastic covering over the sleeves is now flaking off.
Thankfully I've replaced all of them with DVDs now, and protected away from the sunlight.

 

[B.J.]

I have far too many VHS tapes to try and replace them with DVDs. Most of them are kids' movies and shows though, so I'm not exactly trying to replace them, either.

Now that I think about it, that's one advantage tapes have over DVDs - they're much more kid friendly. I don't mind them putting the tapes in by themselves, and they start automatically. You have to be more careful handling DVDs, and have to know how to work the menus and such.

 

[CorporalClegg]

The reminds of when (around that time) I asked the guy at the local rental place if they'd be getting more DVDs soon. (The selection was very small.) His response:

"We aren't. DVDs are just a fad."

 

[Aragorn]

^ Is that person still working at your local rental place? You can ask him if Blu-ray is a fad.

 

[CorporalClegg]

I don't know. I don't live there anymore. I bet he does; he looked like a lifer.

And honestly, he's probably still clinging to his Betamax. He was really into that sort of thing.

 

[Aragorn]

Hey, technically Beta was better than VHS.

 

[CorporalClegg]

That was my point. He was the home movie equivalent to an audiophile. (Whatever it's called.)

He would even claim a film projector was the ONLY way to watch a film. I have no idea where he got the projector ... Or even the film, for that matter.