ampex: VR 1000 description

In 1957 Ampex introduced its VR 1000 video recording system that soon appeared to be the real breakthrough in the television recording. Until that date all the video materials had to be picture recorded on film, since no magnetic tape recorder offered the required bandwidth.

Film recorders were very complex equipment in order to pull-down the film to the next frame during the field-blanking period. A storage CRT was required to recover the lines lost during the film advance. A major drawback of film recording techniques was the need for a further development process. Some experimental works were in progress on magnetic tape recorders to separate the video signal in two or more frequency bands, recording each band in a track of a tape running at very high speed. The most relevant result of this recording technique was the Vision Electronic Recording Apparatus (VERA) developed at BBC in the same years. Here the video signal was split in two sub-bands and recorded on a ½ -inch tape running at 200 inches per second. A third track was used for the audio channel.

The winning idea was to move at high speed a set of four rotating heads against a magnetic tape advancing at relatively low speed. Due to the relative motions, a series of transverse segments of track were written on the tape. Sound and sync tracks were then added along the top and the bottom of the 2-inch wide tape, where the video signals of successive tracks were overlapped. The resulting relative writing speed was as high as 1500 ips, even at tape advancing speed of only 15 ips.

This video recorder was the forerunner of the many home video recorders appeared on the market and using helical scan, as the VHS sets, so popular until few years ago.

Although prototypes were running since 1956, the production just started in 1957. I loaded the full article dedicated to this innovative recorder by Electronics in April 1957.

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