Betamax
Sony's
Betamax is the 12.7 mm (0.5 inch) home
videocassette tape recording format introduced in 1975 and derived from the earlier, professional 19.1 mm (0.75 inch)
U-matic video cassette format. Like the video home recording system
VHS introduced by
JVC in
1976, it had no
guard band, and used
azimuth recording to reduce
cross-talk. The "Betamax" name came from the fact that when the tape ran through the transport it looked like the Greek letter "
Beta".
Sanyo marketed its version as the "Betacord", but it too was referred to as "Beta" for the same reason Betamax was. As well as Sony and Sanyo, Betamax video recorders were also sold by
Toshiba,
Pioneer,
Aiwa and
NEC. The
Zenith Electronics Corporation and
WEGA Corporations contracted with
Sony to produce VCRs for their product lines. Department Stores like
Sears in the US and
Quelle in Germany sold Beta format VCRs under their house brands as did the
Radio Shack chain of electronic stores. Sony introduced the Betamax home video system in
1975 with the LV-1901 Trinitron/Betamax console. The format was most popular in
1983, gaining almost a third of the UK video recorder market, while
Sanyo celebrated the VTC5000 being the top selling UK video recorder. However, by 1985 the market had turned sharply towards VHS.
The world's first
camcorders were of the Betamax format and were labelled "Betamovie."
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The world's first camcorder, 1983 |
The VHS format's defeat of the Betamax format became a classic
marketing case study, now identified with the verbal phrase "to Betamax", wherein a
proprietary technology format is overwhelmed in the market by a format allowing multiple, competing, licensed manufacturers. Sony's confidence in its ability to dictate an industry standard backfired when JVC, and parent Matsushita, made the tactical decision to forego Sony's offer of Betamax in favour of JVC's VHS technology. They felt that it would end up like U-Matic deal: Sony dominating, and they get the scraps. By 1984, forty companies utilized the VHS format in comparison with Beta's twelve. Sony finally conceded defeat in 1988 when it too began producing VHS recorders. However, Sony may be said to have had the last laugh in this saga as its
Video-8 small-format videotape is essentially a scaled-down version of the Betamax, and Video-8 dominated the home camcorder format for the next 15 years with the rival
VHS-C format only gaining a small market share.
The real reason for the success of VHS is RCA, who asked Matsushita for a 4 hour VHS machine. RCA had earlier discussed this with Sony during Beta's development phase, but Sony's engineers felt that by slowing the tape speed from 4 to 2 cm/sec and narrowing the video track, the picture would be of such poor quality that it wasn't worth it at that point in time. Matsushita, despite protests from JVC, delivered Long Play, exactly what RCA wanted. RCA in turn would offer their 4 hour VHS decks at a suggested retail of $995. RCA's pricing and marketing of their 4 hour mode VHS machine would be crucial.
One other major consequence of the Betamax technology's introduction to the U.S. was the lawsuit
Sony Corp. v. Universal City Studios (1984, the "Betamax case"), with the
U.S. Supreme Court determining home videotaping to be legal in the
United States, wherein home videotape cassette recorders were a legal technology since they had substantial non-infringing uses. This precedent was later invoked in
MGM v. Grokster (2005), where the high court agreed that the same "substantial non-infringing uses" standard applies to authors and vendors of
peer-to-peer file sharing software (notably excepting those who "actively induce" copyright infringement through "purposeful, culpable expression and conduct").
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A rare Japanese market Betamax TV/VCR combo - Model SL-MV1. |
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The early form of Betacam tapes are interchangeable with Betamax, though the recordings are not. |
In the professional and broadcast video industry, Sony's
Betacam, derived from Betamax as a professional format, became one of several standard formats; production houses exchange footage on Betacam videocassettes, and the Betacam system became the most widely used videotape format in the
ENG (Electronic News Gathering) industry, replacing the 3/4" U-matic tape format,(which was the first practical and cost-effective portable videotape format for broadcast television, signaling the end of 16mm film -- and the phrase "film at eleven" often heard on the six-o-clock newscast, before the film had been developed). The professional derivative of VHS,
MII, and RCA's RECAM, faced off against Betacam and lost. Once Betacam became the
de-facto standard of the broadcast industry, its position in the professional market mirrored VHS's dominance in the home-video market. On a technical level, Betacam and Betamax are similar in that both share the same videocassette shape, and both record linear audio tracks on the same location of the videotape. But in the key area of video recording, Betacam and Betamax are completely different. (Unlike Betamax, Betacam uses a
component-video encoding system.) BetaCam tapes are mechanically interchangable with Betamax, but not electronically. BetaCam moves the tape at 12cm/sec, with different recording/encoding techniques. Betamax is a colour-under system with linear tape speeds ranging from 4cm/sec to 1.33cm/sec.
Sony also offered a range of Industrial Betamax products, a Beta I only format for industrial and institutional users. Basically cheaper and smaller than U-Matic. The arrival of the Betacam system reduced the demand for both Industrial Beta and U-Matic equipment.
Betamax also had a significant part to play in the music recording industry when Sony introduced its
PCM (Pulse Code Modulation) digital recording system as an encoding box -
PCM adaptor that connected to a Betamax recorder. The Sony PCM-F1 adaptor was sold with a companion Betamax VCR SL-2000 as a portable
Digital audio recording system. Many recording engineers used this system in the 1980's and 1990's to make their first digital master recordings.
Originally Betamax only features were BetaScan, a high speed picture search in either direction, and BetaSkipScan, a technique that allowed the operator to see where he was on the tape by pressing the FF key (or REW, if in that mode) and the transport would switch into the BetaScan mode until the key was released. Sony believed that the M-Load transports used by VHS machines made copying these trick modes impossible. BetaScan was originally called "Videola" until the company the made the Moviola threatened legal action.
Sony would also sell a BetaPak, a small deck designed to be used with a camera. Concerned with the need for several pieces, and cables to connect them, an integrated camera/recorder was designed, which Sony dubbed a "Camcorder". The result was Betamovie. Betamovie used the standard sized cassette, but with a modified transport. The tape was wrapped 300 degrees around a smaller, 44.671mm diameter head drum, with a single dual-azimuth head to write the video tracks. For playback, the tape would be inserted into a Beta format deck. Due to the different geometry and writing techniques employed, playback within the camcorder was not feasible. SuperBeta and Industrial Betamovie camcorders would also be sold by Sony.
Betamax introduced high fidelity audio to videotape, as Betahifi. For
NTSC, Betahifi worked by placing a pair of FM carriers between the chroma (C) and luminance (Y) carriers, a process known as audio frequency modulation. Each head had a specific pair of carriers, in total four individual channels were employed. Head A recorded it's hifi carriers at 1.38(L) and 1.68(R) MHz, and the B head employed 1.53 and 1.83MHz. The result was audio with an 80dB dynamic range, with less than 0.005% wow and flutter.
Prior to the introduction of Betahifi, Sony shifted the Y carrier up by 400 kHz to make room for the 4 FM carriers that would be needed for Betahifi. All Beta machines incorporated this change, plus the ability to hunt for a lower frequency pre-AFM Y carrier. Sony incorporated an "anti-hunt" circuit, to stop the machine for hunting for a Y carrier that wasn't there.
Some Sony NTSC models were marketed as "HiFi Ready" (with a SL-HFR prefix to the model's number instead of the usual SL or SL-HF). These Betamax decks looked like a regular Betamax model, except for a special 28 pin connector on the rear. If the user desired a Betahifi model but lacked the funds at the time, he could purchase an "SL-HFRxx" and at a later date purchase the separate Hi Fi Processor. Sony offered two outboard Betahifi processors, the HFP-100 and HFP-200. They were identical except that the HFP-200 was capable of multi-channel TV sound, with the word "stereocast" printed after the Betahifi logo. This was possible because unlike a VHS hifi deck, an NTSC Betamax didn't need an extra pair of heads. The HFP-x00 would generate the needed carriers which would be recorded by the attached deck, and during playback the AFM carriers would be passed to the HFP-x00. They also had a small "fine tracking" control on the rear panel for difficult tapes.
For
PAL, however, the bandwidth between the Chroma and Luminance carriers was not sufficient enough to allow additional FM carriers, so depth multiplexing was employed, where the audio track would be recorded in the same way that the video track was. The lower frequency audio track was written first by a dedicated head, and the video track recorded on top by the video head. The head disk had an extra pair of audio only heads with a different azimuth, positioned slightly ahead of the regular video heads, for this purpose.
Sony was confident that VHS could not achieve the same audio performance feat as Betahifi. However, to the chagrin of Sony, JVC did develop a VHS hi-fi system on the principle of depth multiplexing approximately a year after the first Betahifi VCR, the SL-5200, was introduced by Sony.
In 1985 Sony would introduce a new feature, High Band or SuperBeta, by again shifting the Y carrier, this time by 800 kHz. This improved the bandwidth available to the Y sideband, giving 290 to 300 lines of horizontal resolution in this mode, on a regular grade Beta cassette. A typical videocassette recorder was 240-250 lines. The heads were also narrowed to 29 microns to reduce crosstalk. Later, some models would feature further improvement, in the form of BIs, a high band version of the Beta I (BI) recording mode. There were some incompatibilities between the older Beta decks and SuperBeta, but most could play back a high band tape without major problems. SuperBeta decks had a switch to disable the SuperBeta mode for compatibility purposes.
JVC would counter SuperBeta with VHS HQ, or High Quality, a series of improvements to their VHS format. Originally, an HQ branded deck would have a luminance noise reduction circuit, a chroma noise reduction circuit, white clip extension, and improved sharpness circuitry. The effect was to increase the apparent resolution of a VHS recording. The majour VHS OEMs resisted HQ due to cost concerns, eventually resulting in JVC reducing the requirements for the HQ brand to
white clip extension plus one other improvement, either those by JVC or another circuit proposed by RCA.
JVC would introduce their SuperVHS, at 400 lines, a few years later. Due to the lower writing speeds inherent to the VHS design, Super VHS required a special high grade tape, unlike SuperBeta, which used the regular formulation Beta cassettes. Sony would also offer SuperBeta in their Industrial Beta line.
Sony would again push the envolope with ED or "Extended Definition" Betamax, capable of up to 500 lines of resolution, using a metal formulation tape from the Betacam. They also incorporated some improvements to the transport to reduce mechanically induced aberrations in the picture. Sony introduced two ED decks and a camcorder in the late 1980s. The top end ED deck was a very capable editing deck, rivalling much more expensive U-Matic setups for it's accuracy.
Despite the sharp decline in sales of Betamax recorders in the late 1980s and subsequent halt in production of new recorders by Sony in 2002, the format is still being used by a small number of people, most of which are collectors or hobbyists. New cassettes are still available for purchase at
online shops and used recorders are often found at
flea markets, thrift stores, or on
internet auction sites.
A multitude of technical drawbacks along with the proprietary nature of the Betamax format have hurdled sales since VHS lacks some of the drawbacks albeit Beta has superior video quality to VHS. Other proprietary formats from
Sony such as
MiniDisc and
UMD have also been criticized.The main issue with the Beta format was recording time. The original prototypes shown to Matsushita used a linear tape speed of 40 mm/sec. The technology of the day needed that speed due to the 60 micron heads employed. Sony engineers and management had decided that since one hour was acceptable to the U-Matic's buyers, it was acceptable for Beta too. So the Beta format had a smaller, one hour cassette called a K-60. (The designation would later change to L-500). The cassette was loaded with 150m of tape.
RCA had discussions with Sony, and RCA felt the recording time was too short. Sony engineers knew that the technology available to manufacture heads wasn't up to the task yet, but halving the tape speed and track width was a possibility. Unfortunately, the picture quality would be degraded severely, and Sony engineers felt it would not be worth it, at that time. (RCA had cancelled their videotape project upon hearing about Beta, and was looking at Sony as an OEM for an RCA branded VCR.)
Sony would introduce an "X2" speed of 20 mm/sec for a "2 hour Betamax." Unfortunately, this led to confusion in the market, as some decks only recorded in X2, and others didn't even play X1 tapes. Later models would have the capability to handle a thinner tape that ran for 90 minutes in X1 mode, but many decks only recorded in X2.
Recording time was everything, with Beta managing 5 hours at BIII (13.3 mm/sec) on an L-830 cassette, and VHS achieving 6 hours with Extended Play on the standard T-120 cassette. Of course, slower tape speeds meant a degradation in picture quality, but the consumer didn't seem to mind. Sony was never able to overcome the disadvantage of the 1 hour recording limit when Beta was introduced.
Contrary to many accounts, Sony had offered Beta to Matsushita. They had previously co-operated with the development and marketing of the "U" format videocassette. (Sony sold theirs under the U-Matic brand). Sony was very annoyed to later see a VHS prototype from Matsushita subsidiary JVC beside their Betamax prototype at a meeting to discuss the future of home video. Sony management were too close to production to compromise, and felt their generosity had been taken advantage of. Thus, the stage was set for a battle between Sony and Matsushita in the arena of home video.
*Betamax is commonly shown on the television series
The Simpsons as being the format of choice for the Simpsons family and most likely the rest of the town of
Springfield. The family has been shown renting videos at The Beta Barn on a number of occasions, although it later became VHS Village. Also, in one episode,
Snake breaks into the Simpsons family's home, steals the VCR and exclaims "Oh no, Beta!". In more recent episodes, the Simpsons have been shown using
Laserdiscs rather than the popular DVD format. When they finally got a
DVD player, it was actually a gift.
*The Betamax was also used by the Bundy family in the television series
Married... with Children.
*In an episode of the sci-fi
anime series
Cowboy Bebop, an unlabeled Betamax video tape is delivered to the main characters. Because the technology is so ancient, they go through a hellish process to swipe a player from an abandoned technology museum in order to view its contents. However, they end up swiping a
VHS player by mistake. Near the end of the episode, the characters receive another mysterious delivery in the form of a Betamax player.
*In an episode of the
BBC comedy
The Mighty Boosh, a villain made of tape is called
The Betamax Bandit. He is referred to several times as 'an obsolete format'.
*In
The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy, where Billy thaws out
Fred Flintstone trapped in ice, he describes the caveman's time with the usage of betamax tapes.
*In
Malcolm in the Middle, where Francis finds a dead janitor, he finds a pornographic film and remarks, "Damn, Beta."
*In an episode of
The Red Green Show, Red Green uses old Betamax tapes as laundry rope, and utilizes the VCR to bring the clothes back and forth between the house and the field.
*
Beastie Boys music video
Sabotage was filmed with Betamax cameras.
*In an episode of
That 70's Show, Red buys a Betamax.
*In the
2006 series Doctor Who episode
The Idiot's Lantern, the
Tenth Doctor created a makeshift video recorder with 1953 technology to trap an energy being on a Betamax tape. He jokingly claimed to have invented the "home video", "thirty years early". This was somewhat of an exaggeration on his part.
*In the comic strip
Get Fuzzy they have used the word Beta or Betamax humorously several times in some of the strips.
*The
Adult Swim cartoon
Harvey Birdman, Attorney At Law features an episode where
The Jetsons travel "back in time" to sue their ancestors for destroying the planet. When
George Jetson presents video evidence to Judge Mentok the Mindtaker, the Judge asks if anyone knows where they can find a Betamax machine.
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Videotape format war*
Peep search A picture search system pioneered with Betamax and available on most video formats since.
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The Ultimate Betamax Info Guide - covering the Betamax format in the North American market*
Betamax PALsite - over 350 pages of Betamax information, running since 1997*
The 'Total Rewind' VCR museum, covering Betamax and other vintage formats*
The Betamax format in the UK, including technical information on servicing Sanyo Beta machines*
"Daily Giz Wiz" Podcast discussing the Betamax
