CED VideoDisc and Player Discussion

[planetcadillac]

I found myself watching an old disaster flick from the 1970s, Airport `77, it was shown right after the original Airport which debuted in 1970. Anyways the moral of the story is such that about 1/4 of the way through the movie, as the passengers are getting acclimated to the plane, one of the stewardesses opens a cabinet door revealing a panel video screen and out slides a videodisc player. No not an RCA model (this was 1977) but one that was identical to the one featured on the cover of the Feb. 77 issue of Popular Science. Not much is shown, the stewardess pulls out the cabinet tray, opens the video unit, inserts a disc (metallized both sides like on the cover of Popular Science), closes the machines, pushes a button, slides it back into the wall and a video begins playing on the screen. Nothing more of the device is shown throughout the movie, and except for the Popular Science magazine, the only known (to me) physical existence of these early players. I know that Airport is available on CED, although I do not think any of the other Airports though.

I am sure I am not the first person to notice this, but given I have seen all of the Airport movies, sometimes many more times than once, I have only noticed this the other day. The movie was released in 1977 however in production mostly in 1976. So the player had to have been one of the earliest to be created.

[cedmagic]

This brief segment form "Airport '77" has intrigued me for a long time, because it gives DiscoVision collectors an example of a DiscoVision player being used in an actual DiscoVision movie, something we don't have with CED. But at least we do have the background appearance of a Sanyo VDR3000 player in the CED movie "Max Dugan Returns."

The DiscoVision player in "Airport '77" is a Magnavision prototype notable for having a transparent lid over the disc, as this area was opaque on the production system. And if you look carefully at the segment, it's apparent that the LaserDisc is "floppy" in contrast to the rigid LaserDiscs that were later marketed.

I made a QuickTime clip of this segment for Blaine at the DiscoVision site back in 1997, and he's still got it up, although the clip is now from a widescreen DVD rather than the original DiscoVision title:

http://www.blam1.com/DiscoVision/Multimedia.htm

The above page also has the DiscoVision fanfare, which generally can only be played from the start on early top-load LaserDisc players using a HeNe tube laser. Later front-load models with a diode laser start playing the disc in the middle of the fanfare.

--Tom Howe

[planetcadillac]

Had anyone determined that it was Jimmy Stewart that actually appeared on that DiscoVision disc and not just a simulated video? I am not an expert on DiscoVision and only casually perused the Blam sight, it would have been necessary for MCA to have done a one-off pressing for production of that movie only. Of course back then, DiscoVision was only a prototype medium, and the movie was produced before the Popular Science article came out when very few people even knew of the technology's existence. The player used in the movie looked virtually identical to the 8000 model player that MCA-Philips Magnavox marketed ads with pictures of the units are on that Blam site.

I simply do not remember those early DiscoVision players. What is interesting, however, is that that DiscoVision technology basically led to what we have now, DVDs or optically read media. All that while when the Discovision players came out that were utter disasters. Both in terms of marketing and in terms of product quality. When they worked they were great but the players were junk and the discs themselves even more so. RCA was leaps and bounds over MCA-Philips when the CED system was introduced in 1981. However as The Videophile magazine wrote in 1981, CED technology was at the very peak of its form when it was introduced. Even if CED was a hit, it is always a curious discussion as to how far CED would have actually gone, since it was the 'record' function that original sold people on the VCR. Nowadays its hard to find people that actual tape using their VCRs. Now VCRs are fading fast like casette tapes. Everything is going to 3.5" CDs. Perhaps that was the ultimate evolution of technology anyways. As much as I enjoy my SKT400 as part of my home entertainment system, we recently signed up for Netflix, the mail-order DVD rental service and have begun watching all sorts of movies. Yes I realize that the CEDs are 20+ years old now and the DVDs are state-of-the art but most of the movies have been remastered into surround and Dolby DTS 5.1 audio. You simply cannot top that experience.

[Reinhart]

[DiscLord]

The Magnavox Magnavision Model 8000 used in Airport 77' was Lew Wassermans personal player - the crew borrowed it from his office along with a single disc from the film "AIRPORT" which is what Monica Lewis places on the turntable - she dosen't even shut the lid properly! I have some of the single-sided MCA Disco-Vision test pressings, and they still play fine on 'modern' LD players. The reason the player in the film has a clear top and the production models don't is that Philips lawyers became concerned about lawsuits due to new radiation laws being written at the time - they felt eliminating the clear top was the best option.

The 8000 introduced in Atlanta was made in the Netherlands and then shipped, in kit form, to Knoxville, for final assembly, alignment and conversion to CLV capability. Kit-based players continued for almost a year until Philips re-engineered the optical assembly and made the player compatible with the discs MCA was pressing - MCA had neglected to tell Philips, for a whole year, that they had relaxed the quality standards on discs. Pioneer, due to thier Universal-Pioneer relationship with MCA, knew about the 'new' disc standards and thus the VP-1000 and PR-7820 were fully compatible with MCA discs. The stories that MCA and Magnavox engineers have relayed to me are sometimes hard to believe, but true - it's amazing that the system worked and had the success that it did.

And no, RCA would not have been able to add PCM sound to CED discs - at least not with video also present. The slow, 450 RPM, speed meant that RCA was doing well to get 2.5 MHz of luma and .5 MHz of chroma bandwidth - and that was pushing it - the opinion at the time among engineers was that "RCA started with an inferior system and then worked backwards." Not to take anything away from what they DID achieve, but the system, as RCA designed it, just wasn't capable of more. That's why JVC made the choices they did with VHD-AHD. Heck, JVC even developed a High Definition version of VHD - it used the Hi-Vision MUSE-E compression system.

Cheers!
Ty C.

[Dude111]

[kitchensynch]

Did you try You Tube?

Of course, any material owned by Universal (MCA) is going to be swarmed over like flies on stinky. If the audio is disabled it's probably due to the will of Universal.

You can search You Tube and you will probably see pulldowns and terminations or disabled content or MAYBE the original if anyone is foolhardy to keep reposting and face termination for multiple compyright complaints.
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A New Vista of RCA Victor COLOR!

[kitchensynch]

I tried to play the clip using Media Player Classic-Home Cinema and it brought up the message that the player needs to close each time I tried.
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A New Vista of RCA Victor COLOR!

[SelectaVision420]

bummer i wanna see this clip!
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(2)Sears 274 & 934(80150,10&11350), sft100, sgt250, sjt 090-400, vp550, VDR3000, VP2000 & 4000
complete '84 Dimensia Owner

[Dude111]

It played for me with Realplayer,im not sure if any other players recognise that format.... (.rm .ram) -- Maybe VLC does?? (Sometimes WMP will play .RM clips i try I noticed (Not all of them though))

[kitchensynch]

I can try associating the files with VLC...I gon't even bother to DL Real when K-Lite Mega Download Pack has virtually everything I need in the first place (and my player DOES play everything except for the Airplane file, which eitheR suggests an old version of Real was employed not fully supported or some settings are not right.

I've seen it numerous times over the years though...those who were unaware might like to see it.

The file size doesn't seem to look right compared to the bumpers...137 kb?
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A New Vista of RCA Victor COLOR!

[kitchensynch]

I tried all the players I have and it encounteresd an exception in every instanceand Windows asked to close it., except for VLC which won't even play Real Media.

I have no problems with Quicktime files.
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A New Vista of RCA Victor COLOR!

[Dude111]

Hmmmm I suppose you can goto www.mediaconverter.org and have it converted to WMV (Which will play in WMP (Or should))


Good luck!

[SelectaVision420]

i have VLC, this wont work on it? it plays just about everything else!
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(2)Sears 274 & 934(80150,10&11350), sft100, sgt250, sjt 090-400, vp550, VDR3000, VP2000 & 4000
complete '84 Dimensia Owner

[kitchensynch]

iIf you can view it watching with Real then perhaps it's some kind of setting meant to keep it from being copied (hence the player errors causing closedown)?

I still think the size may not be reported correctly.
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A New Vista of RCA Victor COLOR!

[Dude111]

I just downloaded it again,IT IS 137KB (I would love finding Toms clip)

[kitchensynch]

So far no hits that lead to it elsewhere...will look later.
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A New Vista of RCA Victor COLOR!

[Dude111]

I emailed the guy and asked him why he removed Toms clip and replaced it with a piece of crap (I was nice about it) but the guy didnt reply! (No surprise.... No one bothers to reply to anyone anymore hardily...its sickening as hell!!)

[kitchensynch]

Many of these sites are essentially MATURE and not monitored a lot, probably haven't been updated in a few YEARS.

This can be typical for earlier sites like that. If there is not a lot of new subject, no new products (in the case of sites about obsolete products) then there really isn't much need.
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A New Vista of RCA Victor COLOR!

[Beetlescott]

Hey Tom, Thanks for sharing! That's pretty cool. I just can't imagine a "floppy" laser disc!
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SGT-250
SGT-200
SFT-100
SKT-100

[blam1]

DiscLord and I actually have some of those "floppy" LaserDiscs!

[SelectaVision420]

[Dude111]

[kitchensynch]

So why won't the file open in anything but Real apparently?

I can still open Quicktime (qt and mov) files with ease with my viewers, as evdenced by the clips of the guy with the KARD? and King of the Road sites, an old TV cameraman/engineer guy...been a while but I remember linking to a lot of things via Jeff Miller's site.
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A New Vista of RCA Victor COLOR!

[blam1]

I (stupidly) replaced the .MOV files on my web site with RealPlayer video files, because they were so much smaller. I should really go back and remake these files in something more up to date, for both download size and image resolution.

[blam1]

[Dude111]

You have quite a collection my friend!

What one is your favourite?

[SelectaVision420]

[kitchensynch]

[Dude111]

I have 4 players and between them all I can usually play what I like

1) VLC - Version 0.7 (www.videolan.org/vlc) -- A nice player
2) Realplayer 8 - LAST GOOD VERSION OF REALPLAYER! (AOL joined the team after this and the next release was ugly/pure trash)
3) Screamer player version 3.8 - A nice player! (www.screamer-radio.com)
4) WMP 9 - Best version of WMP (Goes downhill drasticly after this version)