What to do with collection of VHS Trek tapes??

[Kevin G. Chapman]

Does anybody have a suggestion about what to do with a collection of Star Trek VHS tapes recorded off live TV over many years? I'm cleaning house and have a collection of just about every episode of TOS, TNG, DS9, Voyager, and Enterprise, taped with contemporary commercials. (Yes, I also have an index.) Some of the older tapes (from late 80s) are in pretty bad shape, but it's an interesting time machine to go back and watch the commercials as well as the episodes as they appeared in first run or syndication. I'm going to throw them out, but if anyone has any use for them, I'm happy to give them away. They represent a lot of hours of work and I've watched them all over the years (great for treadmill time). I'm sure I'm not the only person with relics like this.

Meanwhile, I'm glad to find this forum and will look forward to being a contributor.

Cheers!

 

[TribbleFeeder]

Hey! Glad you made it here. Welcome

I would suggest putting the lot on eBay. I think there would definitely be interest in them. I love the commercial bit of it. As someone who wasn’t around for the original air date, I’d love to see them!

 

[Kevin G. Chapman]

(The Gritty avatar is scarier than any Star Trek monster . . . ) I looked around on Ebay and it does not seem like there's much of a market. I'd rather find a home for them with someone without having to bother trying to sell them. The quality of some of the old tapes is not saleable. If somebody makes a hobby of tinkering with old VHS tapes, this would be a project.

 

[TribbleFeeder]

(The Gritty avatar is scarier than any Star Trek monster . . . ) I looked around on Ebay and it does not seem like there's much of a market. I'd rather find a home for them with someone without having to bother trying to sell them. The quality of some of the old tapes is not saleable. If somebody makes a hobby of tinkering with old VHS tapes, this would be a project.

Haha thanks! I’m a lover of the Gritz. <3

This is definitely a good place to start. I would also suggest posting it on Reddit in some of their threads (I don’t know what they’re called over there, but I’m sure there will be a place for this type of thing too!)

 

[Agony_Boothb]

Does anybody have a suggestion about what to do with a collection of Star Trek VHS tapes recorded off live TV over many years? I'm cleaning house and have a collection of just about every episode of TOS, TNG, DS9, Voyager, and Enterprise, taped with contemporary commercials. (Yes, I also have an index.) Some of the older tapes (from late 80s) are in pretty bad shape, but it's an interesting time machine to go back and watch the commercials as well as the episodes as they appeared in first run or syndication. I'm going to throw them out, but if anyone has any use for them, I'm happy to give them away. They represent a lot of hours of work and I've watched them all over the years (great for treadmill time). I'm sure I'm not the only person with relics like this.

Meanwhile, I'm glad to find this forum and will look forward to being a contributor.

Cheers!

Maybe try searching for a collectors forum or you could post an ad on craigslist? I'm sure there would be some trekkie who would appreciate having the episodes as they aired on television.

 

[Lord Garth]

I'm probably the wrong person to ask. Back in 2006, I threw out almost every VHS tape I ever had.

I used to have a collection of over 400 tapes. "Why did you throw them out?!", I was asked. I said, "If I had a DVD player all along, I never would've bought them." For about five years (2001-2006), my VHS and DVD collection overlapped. By 2006, everything I had on VHS that I still wanted, I had a DVD version of. The rest was just stuff I taped over the years that I didn't want anymore. Some stuff I thought to myself, "What was I thinking when I recorded this?!", questioning my younger self's tastes.

I don't see myself ever getting rid of my DVDs. From a practical standpoint, I like having physical copies of something. As a videographer, my philosophy is: always have three copies of everything: downloadable online, as a digital file stored offline, and on a disc. So, if I lose it one way, I still have it two other ways.

 

[Doom Shepherd]

The only stuff I still have on VHS is stuff that hasn't come out yet on DVD. Sadly, a lot of that stiff probably never will, like the "Alien Voices" productions on Syfy from back in the day, or various memorial shows. Or the later seasons of "Whose Line?"

For a while, I had a VHS-to-DVD dubbing machine, but that gave up the ghost years ago and now that I have a Blu-Ray I'll probably never replace it - I don't really have time to do the copying anyway.

 

[Toby Meyer]

Pull out all the magnetic tape and redecorate!

 

[Kevin G. Chapman]

Thanks for the suggestions. Many years ago when the SyFy network aired their special 90-minute episodes of TNG with all the original footage along with interviews with the cast members, I taped all of those and transferred them to DVD, so at least I already have those on DVD, but I didn't have the energy to transfer all the individual episodes of the other series that I had on VHS tapes, which I still watched. I should have started. Oh well, at least the full-series DVD boxed sets are now cheap.

 

[johnnybear]

I had to bin all my VHS TV recordings and the wife sold my Trek sets on E-bay! It was very funny because a guy turned up on our doorstep for the VOY sets and when he saw my TOS he wanted those too! I took him at his word because he didn't have enough cash on him and I helped him carry the lot to his car and the following day he sent the money to her account! The guy was a bit of a nut case and I found him easier to deal with than most people! I'm not sure what happened to my TNG and DS9 VHS videos, it's that long ago!
JB

 

[JirinPanthosa]

Well, one thing you could do with them is, first youSKREEEEEEEE BEEP...BEEP BEEP...BEEP SKREEEEEEEE This has been a test of the emergency broadcast system. If this had been a real emergency, instructions for how to proceed would follow. We now return to your regularly scheduled broadcast. BEEP...BEEP...SKREEEEEEEE BEEP and that’s how you put your VHS tapes to good use.

 

[Kevin G. Chapman]

LOL -- as always, the secret is obscured . . . .

 

[Push The Button]

I bet someone would love to collect all the old commercials and station breaks together and put them on YouTube.

 

[Kevin G. Chapman]

That would be a legitimate reason to want these old VHS tapes. Who wants 'em????

 

[Kor]

See if there is a business in your town that specializes in video transfer/duplication/backup, that would be able to convert it all to DVD (or maybe electronic files). But since it's copyrighted material, they might not be willing to take on such a project.

Kor

 

[Kevin G. Chapman]

Way too expensive! I just the full set of DVDs as a holiday present -- no need to convert bad quality VHS tapes.

 

[hbquikcomjamesl]

When I accumulated the TNG season sets, I released my off-air VHS tapes for re-use (and at 2 episodes per T-120, recorded at full speed, that's a lot of tape), but most of them haven't actually been reused.

I still have my commerical VHS copies of selected TOS episodes, and my off-air tapes of DS9, VOY, and ENT. Since I don't have any Blu-Ray hardware at this time, and (at least so far as I'm aware) the remastered TOS episodes are a Blu-Ray-only product, (1) I don't have much sympathy for the people screaming for Blu-Ray DS9 and VOY, and (2) I won't be discarding the VHS TOS episodes anytime soon.

As long as you have a functioning VHS transport (or Betamax, 3/4, 3/4 SP, Betacam, or Betacam SP), your tapes are not obsolete (although even full speed VHS quality, particularly off-air, pales in comparison to DVD or any of the broadcast tape formats).

At any rate, Mr. Chapman, welcome to the squirrel-cage, and look out for the nuts.

 

[Jayson1]

It would be neat to kind of check these tapes out but who even has a VCR these days to even play them?

Jason

 

[JirinPanthosa]

I still have a VCR. Mostly for the two movies I have that never got DVD release. (Minnie and Moskowitz, La Belle Noisseuse)

I can still remember exactly which episodes in my TNG VHS collection had the emergency broadcast system test. Home Soil and Ethics.

Oh, Al Kaprelian. You were such a fun oddball weather man.

 

[Kevin G. Chapman]

I had three working VHS players two years ago, then I got down to zero and had to go out and by one used. It's very hard to find! Some of the most interesting things are the commercials -- for long-distance phone services and AOL dial-up internet access, to name a few. I have one tape where there was a promo for upcoming coverage of the OJ Simpson bronco chase and other such "coming up next on PIX news at 10 . . . "