CED VideoDisc and Player Discussion

[ketonic_dude]

So I have some dealer information and they used to order the discs by program number. So for RCA that would be the 2nd half of the UPC, the UPC was broken up into two parts the first half indicated the studio and the second half was the individual program number. So on the order form for say "Christine" it would list 13098. So if the dealer wanted to order it they would use 13090.

Now it's different for different studios, MCA for example used a number like MCA45-12021 for Nighthawks. The second half of the UPC was 12021, but if the dealer wanted to order it they used the 45-12021 or MCA45-12021, for whatever reason.

CBS/FOX releases used 1130-90 for Star Wars. The UPC ended with 1130-9, again, not sure why.

Vestron used VC4159 for RSVP, and MGM used MD100155 for The Phantom Tollbooth. The UPC for RSVP ended with 04159, and The Phantom Tollbooth was broken up even more strange, 7464-38176-2, which doesn't make a lot of sense since 74643 would be the studio and 81762 would be the program number.

But my question is this. The RCA/Columbia Pictures titles have another number on the spine, Christine for example says CS11E-V105705. What is this number for? I've googled it and it doesn't come up with anything. It wasn't used for dealers or ordering. Was this some kind of internal sorting code. Most Columbia/RCA titles have the same letters, just the last 4 or 5 numbers are different. Any ideas?

[lynx]

After I read this message, I spent this last week trying to research what the codes on the spines could possibly designate. I was also unable to find any information about it online anywhere. There seems to be no conclusive facts about what these combinations of letters & numbers mean, but they seem to indicate specifications of each title, and I can share the patterns that I was able to deduce while fastidiously reading and studying the spines in my CED collection with a combination of deductive & inductive reasoning, and also taking notes.



I should warn that this message is lengthy and intricate, but I hope it's interesting to CED collectors.



The codes begin fairly straightforward, but then the last four numbers are more confusing.




Besides the title, partial UPC, and the studio which released the title on CED, most of the CED titles released on two discs have the dots indicating one dot for the first disc, and two dots on the second disc. Something that I noticed is that the titles on two discs which were released on CED in 1981 & 1982 by RCA and MGM/CBS Home Video don't have any indications on the spine which disc is first or second, but the titles released by CBS/Fox Video and Twentieth Century Fox Video wrote out which part of the movie each disc is. In 1983, CED titles on two discs began using the dots on the spines, although CBS/Fox Video and MGM/UA Home Video wrote it out instead of using the dots.



Getting back to the letters and numbers codes on the spine, the pattern that I have noticed on the RCA CED releases is two letters, then two numbers, then the letter "E", then a hyphen, then the letter "V", and finally, six more numbers.



The first letter is "C" on all the colour titles, "W" on all the black and white titles, and "M" on the titles which have some scenes in colour and other scenes in B&W.



The second letter is "M" on all the monaural titles, and "S" on all the stereophonic titles.



The third symbol, or the first number, is a one on every title. On single disc titles, it's always one, but on the two-disc titles, the second number is a one on the first disc, and a two on the second disc, so my guess is that this number indicated one disc on single disc titles, and part one of two on the two disc titles.



The fourth symbol, or the second number, has a similar pattern. It has a one on all the single disc titles, and a two on all of RCA's two disc titles. These two numbers, when combined, could have possibly represented a "fraction" for their time length, meaning 1/1 for single disc titles, 1/2 for part one of two disc titles, and 2/2 for part two of double disc titles.



The fifth symbol is the letter "E" on every title, which I can't find any difference or variation on, so I can't tell what it represents, and I can't think of any word pertaining to CED that begins with "E".



After the hyphen, the letter is "V" for every title, which could have stood for "video disc", but that's just my conjecture. Just like the other symbols, after the "V", there is a one on all the single disc titles, and a two on all the dual disc titles. The next two numbers are a zero and then a five on every title, without any difference on any other title, so its meaning is another mystery to me.



The final four numbers are different for every title, so I can't figure out what they represent. I tried to find some potential meaning, but there is no consistent pattern for them, with every title having zero thru nine as its last four numbers.



The closest thing I found is that all of the titles released in 1981 have either a zero or a one as its eleventh symbol, maybe representing either 1980 or 1981 as the year when the title was licenced from the studio to RCA for a CED release?



The titles released in 1982 is the toughest symbol to decipher, since they vary widely, having any number one thru four as its eleventh symbol, which doesn't make any sense as far as being a date code, so I don't understand what it means.



I was able to determine a pattern for the titles released in 1983 by comparing it to the CED Timeline here on cedmagic.com, with the eleventh symbol seemingly increasing with each title released throughout the year. The titles released in January 1983 have a three as its eleventh symbol, February 1983 have either a three or a four, March 1983 and April have either a three or a four, May thru July have a four, August thru October have a five, November titles have either a five or a six, and December have a six. The actual meaning of each number is unknown to me.



Finally, the last two numbers are different for every title, but I think they may represent the sequence of when the title was approved for production by RCA, since I noticed the first CED title, Race For Your Life, Charlie Brown!, begins with 01.



I couldn't determine any pattern for any CED titles released in 1984, 1985, or 1986, since they don't have these letters or numbers on the spine; they just have the title, the studio which released it, and part of its UPC. I don't own any CED titles released by Family Home Entertainment, Pacific Arts Video Records, or RCA/Columbia Pictures International Video, so I don't know what the spine labels on any of their titles look like.



Finally, I want to share another observation which is slightly off-topic, but it also relates to the letter and number codes. All of the RCA CED players have model numbers which represent the production year, represented by the second letter in the model, and then the features, represented by the numbers in the model, with each of them increasing. What I have noticed is that RCA's Selectavision VHS VCRs have similar designations, with the second letter representing the production year, and the numbers representing the features, with "V" likely meaning VHS, then the date code, and either "P" meaning "portable" or "T" standing for "table,", and then the numbers.



If CED had been introduced in either 1976 or 1977, like originally planned, then the players theoretically may have had the "SAT" code in 1976 or or the "SBT" code for 1977. If it came out in 1978, then the code would have been "SCT", 1979 would have been "SDT", or 1980 would have been "SET". If production of players would have continued after 1984, then 1985 players would have been "SLT", 1986 players would have been "SMT", 1987 players would have been "SPT", and so on.



From this logic, the CED player models have models designation codes maybe meaning "S" for "Selectavision", then the date code, and finally "T" standing for "table." If there was ever a "portable" CED player, then the third letter may have been "P", just like RCA's portable VCRs.



This information has all been a lot of fun to research, and it was a pleasure to write & share with the CED community!
_________________
Let RCA turn your television into Selectavision!

[ketonic_dude]

I just wanted to note that when it comes to the player models I was told the J/K and F/G did not represent a year but a model line. So for example the SJT400 and SKT400 are identical but they upgraded some of the hardware and so had to release it as a K400 to designate a new model line with the upgraded hardware. The F100 and the G100 are identical except the G100 has a different faceplate and I think some upgraded internal features, like Page mode or something, I can't recall exactly off hand. But they were both being built and released at the same time. There is a member on the Facebook page who used to work at the Bloomington plant where players were built. I will have to ask him and see what he says.

Also good work on decoding the spine numbers. I will have to do some more research on this and see if I can build on that. I'll be sure and post what I find out here. Thanks.

[ketonic_dude]

Ok lynx, I checked your information and you appear to be pretty spot on. First let me mention this information about decoding the serial number on the players. This information was provided by John Steven's on the CEDatum website.

DECODING THE RCA 9 DIGIT SERIAL NUMBER ON CED PLAYERS

The 9 digit number is found on the serial number label on the back panel of the player and also inside on the front or side of the chassis.

X X X X X X X X X

The first digit is the year. 1980- 1984. Example a 2 is 1982.

The second and third digits are the week. Example 14 - a week in March

The fourth digit is the day of the week - Sunday = 1

The fifth digit is the player production line - a 1 or 2 or 3.

The remaining 4 digits are the player ID number


Serial number example: 213231905 This player was made in 1982, 13th week on a Monday on line 3 and the ID is 1905.

So I wanted to post that in response to your query about the F/G and J/K designation representing the year. I have seen F series players made as early as 1980, and as late as 1982. I have seen G series players as early as 1981 and as late as 1983. The J line started around 1983 and continued into 1984 and the K line around 1984 as well. I don't think I've seen any players dated into 1985. I'm not sure when the last one rolled off the line. So the middle letter designation represents a change in a production model and not an indicator of the year it was produced. Coincidentally there are pre=production models like the SDT200 of which they made around 400 of them for internal use and testing prior to the SFT100W's release.

But anyways, reguarding the spine numbers, you did an excellent job lynx, in decoding them. I believe you are 100 percent correct, but there are some more that need to be solved. So what we know so far.

The spine number on RCA releases seem to be 8 sections. A spine number for example would be CM11E-V105582.

Section one is C. C=Color W=B&W M=Both
Section two is M. M=Mono S=Stereo
Section three is 11. 11=1 of 1 disc, 12=1 of 2 discs, & 22=2 of 2 discs
Section four is E. E=? (Could mean CED?)

Then a dash separated the next segment.

Section five is V. V=? (Could mean Videodisc?)
Section six is 1. 1=Single disc title, 2=Two disc title
Section seven is 05. 05=? (Not sure on this one)
Section eight is 582. 582 seems to be the title number or the number in which it was released. The RCA release of Planet of the Apes is 002, Adam's Rib is 006, Race for Your Life Charlie Brown was 101 just for example. I have not noticed if any of them get into four digit numbers but I think they stopped using this spine code before that happened.

Planet of the Apes being 002 or only the 2nd release would explain it has the different/seemingly older RCA fanfare at the beginning. If you have this title and want to compare the older logo is not centered on the screen, the colors seem more vibrant, and the 4 tones at the end are spaced further apart. Now I'm curious what title is 001?

I was going to look and see if RCA used any similar codes on their VHS releases, maybe we can determine what section 4 and 5 mean compared to another format? Well anyways, great detective work again lynx and if you figure anything else out just let us know. Thanks.

[ketonic_dude]

Hold up a sec, I just noticed Planet of the Apes is CM11EE-V105002.

It has 2 E's in section four. I'm curious why now.

I also just remembered that John had given me some decoding information for the numbers pressed into the disc itself. Maybe these might help decode the spine number.

So first we must know how the disc is made. Starting with step 1.

1. Aluminum Blank - the plate which is coated with copper.
2. Copper substrate - the copper coated plate into which the grooves are cut.
3. Recorded substrate - the copper coated plate after the grooves are cut.
4. Master - a negative replica of the final disc surface electroformed from nickel to a thickness of 0.015-inch.
5. Mold - or Mother, - a positive replica of the final disc surface electroformed from nickel to a thickness of 0.015-inch. A number of molds are made in the videodisc manufacturing process.
6. Stamper - a negative replica of the final disc surface electroformed from nickel to a thickness of 0.0075-inch. A number of stampers are made from each mold, and the stampers are used to compression mold the final disc.

So that said the numbers stamped on the disc would be as follows.

60=60 cycle (US NTSC)
50=50 cycle (European PAL)
B=Bilingual or dual audio channels
M=Monaural (1 channel) audio
S=Stereo audio
C=Closed Captioned
61=60 cycle + "banded"
62=60 cycle + "interactive"

John also noted that on a pressed disc, the scratched markings usually indicate the number of molds and stampers that might be made from a master or recorded substrate. Stamper life varied, but usually at least 500 to 1,000 discs could be produced from a single stamper.

Pam, another former RCA employee, has also told me "open the caddy and look on the inner circle, no grooves, you will see some numbers....example...Urban Cowboy...00639-1A... the first number is assigned to movie, the 1 is side 1, and letter tells you what substrate it was or how many times they had to make a new substrate. All the way through the alphabet. A few times we would use up the alphabet and start over...1AB, etc.

Now when she says substrate she must mean stamper or maybe the mother or even the master. I spoke with one of the employees who actually cut the discs from the studio tape to the copper substrate and he said that one substrate was used to press all the discs of that title.

Hopefully this information helps.

[SelectaVision420]

good stuff man!
_________________
(2)Sears 274 & 934(80150,10&11350), sft100, sgt250, sjt 090-400, vp550, VDR3000, VP2000 & 4000
complete '84 Dimensia Owner

[lynx]

While trying to surmise what the numbers & letters could mean, I tried my best to be accurate & factual, but I had a hunch that I could have made a mistake or overlooked something, which actually happened!



Just now, I looked at my CED of Planet Of The Apes, and it also has the same code on the spine, CM11EE-V105002, so I missed the two Es in section four. I also found these same two Es in the fourth section on two other CED titles, Laura, and The French Connection.



I just played these three titles, and they also have that variant with the RCA fanfare & logo at the very beginning of side one, with the off-centre logo animation, brighter colours, and the Pictures At An Exhibition fanfare with the slower tempo, with the 20th thru 23rd musical notes, at the ending, spaced in longer intervals than the more common CED fanfare.



It's hard to say exactly what the two Es in the spine number & the fanfare variation represent; the only three factors that I noticed all three titles have in common is that they are on the list of the first 102 CED titles released by RCA for CED's introduction to the public on Sunday, 22 March, 1981, they are all Fox movies, and they were all originally released on CED by RCA, and then later released on CED again in December 1982.



The French Connection has the spine number CM11EE-V105001, so it's the CED title ending with 001 that ketonic_dude was curious about. Planet of the Apes has 002, and Laura has 003, so they must have been the first, second, and third releases, respectively. What's strange about these number codes is that they all contradict the well-documented fact that Race For Your Life, Charlie Brown! was the first production title, but its spine number ends in 101, and it has the usual RCA/Mussorgsky Promenade fanfare & logo at its start instead of the brighter & slower version of the fanfare & logo.



The different fanfare was first documented on here by Jesse Skeen in a 1998 message in CED Digest Vol. 3 No.31, where he wrote that The French Connection has it, and then I discovered it years later on the other two early titles.



There are a few other subjects that I forgot to write on here.



I don't own any CED titles in grey caddies, so I don't know what they look like, or have any knowledge or information about any of them. I have some of the Disney cartoon titles which were released in 1984 in the black caddies, and they have the title, partial UPC, and three digits on the right side of the spine, either starting with "19" or "20" and then one more number. I couldn't figure out what that code represents.



Another different spine number I found is on two rare discs that I own which were only sent out to the dealers, instead of sold to consumers.



One of them is a promotional CED which has a demonstration of RCA's then-new lineup of TVs, VCRs, CED players, and the Digital Command Centre remote control. Strangely, it has a picture of a video camera on the obverse side of the caddy label, but there is no demonstration of a camera in the actual video content at all. It has the UPC number 7647607019, but its spine number on the right end reads "Form HB7807". I don't see any similar code on the spine label on any other CED title, so I don't know what it means.



The other rare dealer disc I own is an industrial service disc, which was used by the repair technicians to service the CED players, which I've never used before. It's spine label reads "Stock No. 153394." Once again, this designation is not on any other CED titles, and it has no UPC or bar code on the caddy.



My hypothesis is that since they were non-consumer titles, maybe RCA decided to use a different numbering series than the standard retail consumer CED titles.



There is something else that I've noticed, which I compared to the CED Timeline. On the labels, but not on the spines, is that most, but not all, of the first 102 CED titles, released on Sunday, 22 March, 1981, don't have an RCA copyright notice in lower right-hand corner of the reverse side of the label, but all of the CED titles released later that year read "© 1981 RCA Corporation". The titles released by RCA in 1982 & 1983 also have an identical copyright notice in the same spot.



About the players, most likely, the the players manufactured in 1980 would have zero as its first digit. I've never seen on of them, but I suppose they exist. Something else I remember reading that Tom Howe wrote is that RCA produced some SFT 100 W players with a transparent clear top in 1980, which I've also never seen before either.



One more variant that I've seen some pictures of online, but I can't find documented anywhere here on CED Magic, is that the RCA SGT 100 players have different front face plates. Some of them have face plates which are identical to the SFT 100 W, with the Nipper logo, and other G 100 players have a different face plate without a Nipper logo, and different lights for the side one & side two indicators. Has any one else ever seen these two different SGT 100 players before? The F & G 100s must be the only CED players with variations on their physical appearances.



Finally, I've noticed that the serial numbers in RCA CED players are very similar to RCA televisions and VCRs produced during the same years. I own some small 5" and 9" RCA TVs and one Selectavision VHS VCR produced in the same era as CED players, which also have nine digits, so I wonder if maybe they also have the same meaning as CED player serial numbers.



If I discover any more information about codes related to CED, then I will post them on here, and hopefully, someone else can add more knowledge to them!
_________________
Let RCA turn your television into Selectavision!

[ketonic_dude]

Wow Lynx, that's a lot to unpack. But here we go.

Thanks for finding title 001 for me. I do not own French Connection. I don't know if you have noticed on those early release discs the caddy has a recess for the the label so the label is flush with the exposed face of the caddy edges. So far I have only found a dozen like this so I don't know if all 100 of the first releases had it. But from what I understand RCA only had about half of those 100 titles available upon the formats release. I mean if you really think about it they had to have players and discs available at thousands of retail locations all across the country. So it seems like a pretty daunting task to have 100 titles available at every location on day one. But anyways, that's neither here nor there. I will be compiling a list of all the titles that have this RCA spine code and we will see when they switched from the old fanfare to the new fanfare.

I don't know if you have seen this prototype label of Laura that Tom has posted.

http://www.cedmagic.com/featured/laura/laura.html

I also have a prototype label of Race for Your Life Charlie Brown but it's different than the Laura one. It's weird that they say it was the first title because it's actually title number 00630. I don't know if they listed title numbers by release date or by pressing order or how they did it but the earliest one is actually Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid at 00101 and then Fantastic Voyage is 00102 and The French Connection is 00103. Laura is 00106, so this order does not correspond to the spine number order.

Grey caddies where only for internal use. I think they had white and blue and then got grey for use at the factory and for testing but once they started to get a buildup of caddies with crooked labels or whatever they were not passed QC for, they just used those for internal discs instead of continuing to use grey caddies. I have had several.

You would be correct on the black caddy Disney discs, they were released April 1984. The 3 digit numbers on the spine 198 to 204 were some kind of Disney number because the VHS and Betamax versions both have the same numbers on the spine.

The 1984 Video Systems Disc you speak of with Form HB7807 on the spine. This must have been something special for dealer discs as the RCA Video Communications '83 disc has PV0001, Edition 3 has PA3050, and the Video Monitors disc has PC0019. All very strange, what could it mean?

The service disc lists Stock Number 153394 because in the service manuals it lists all parts required for service including the tools and the Service Disc is listed as a tool required for the service of players so it was available to order through the RCA parts and support division. I can't remember the actually name of the group but you could use this part number to order the disc through them instead of having to purchase it through a disc sales distributor, they probably didn't even have them actually.

So yes a player built in 1980 would have a zero. Since you haven't seen one here is one someone shared on Facebook.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/36668183795/permalink/10159952604668796

It's actually a pilot player built at Rockville Road. Pilot players where built so that they could be tested and used by employees to evaluate any positive or negative aspects of the player before main production began. Once it was evaluated consumer production began at the Bloomington facility. TV's and VCR's were also made in Bloomington so I would assume the serial number would decode the same way for all appliances.

When you mentioned face plates being different you'll also notice this pre-production player has a different faceplate as well when compared to the F and G models. The SFT100 had a nipper on the faceplate while the SGT100 did not. All the player models had differences in their appearance. Even the J/K players. The 090 is a darker shade, the 100 is silver with white letters, the 200 is silver with like burnt orange letters, the 300 adds the words remote control and the back case is black instead of silver, the 400 says random access and the back cover changes back to silver. The SGT200, and 250 are substantially different looking, even the seldom seen SGT075 is all black.

Well I think that about wraps it up. That's a lot to unpack too. This stuff is just so cool and mesmerizing I could talk about it forever. lol

[lynx]

I finally got some time to read thru this topic again, and I just want to finish with some final remarks about the spine labels.



I feel lucky that I own The French Connection on CED, and that I was able to find the CED title with the spine number ending in 001. This movie won the Academy Award for Best Picture for 1971. I hadn't really noticed the recess for the label, but ketonic_dude is correct about them! I also understand why RCA may not have had all 100 CED titles available for sale at every RCA dealer throughout the United States, since it must have been a big logistical burden. I don't own every CED title ever released, so I wouldn't be able to figure out when RCA switched their opening fanfares.



I've never seen those prototype labels for Laura or Race For Your Life, Charlie Brown! before; I wonder if any CEDs with that blue RCA Nipper logo still exist today. My CEDs of both titles just have the outline logo with the rainbow background. It's hard to say how the numbers compare with the production order.



Finally, I want to mention that I own the original RCA Red Seal Modest Petrovich Moussorgsky Pictures At An Exhibition vinyl album by the late Isao Tomita from 1975, and the Promenade at the beginning of the album sounds exactly like the fanfare at the beginning of CEDs, except the original recording is the slower version of the recording, which I've only seen on The French Connection, Planet Of The Apes, and Laura. The more common CED fanfare is the recording with the faster tempo at the end of the opening. It seems like, for some reason, RCA wanted to use the faster, and therefore, shorter opening fanfare for most CED titles with this introduction.



I think that is everything that we know about the numbers and letters on the CED spine labels. It's all very intriguing, and I could also talk about it forever!
_________________
Let RCA turn your television into Selectavision!

[ketonic_dude]

Regarding the topic of, not all 100 titles available at every dealer, I just stumbled upon this on Tom's timeline.

RCA Press Release for March 16, 1981

RCA to Launch Its VideoDisc System with Approximately 500,000 Albums
HOLLYWOOD, Fla., March 16 -- RCA has pressed some 500,000 video disc albums to support the launch of its "SelectaVision" VideoDisc system, Herbert S. Schlosser, executive vice president of RCA announced today.

In a speech before the 11th Annual Seminar of the ITA, Mr. Schlosser said RCA began pressing discs last summer and began making video disc players in October in anticipation of the launch.

Noting that many of the albums have been shipped to distributor locations, he said "in effect, we are establishing an inventory base in 70 different locations. This will be the first line of supply for those titles stocked at retail."

Mr. Schlosser said the first group of 15,000 video disc players currently is being delivered to some 5,000 dealers in 50 states. "Additional players are in the pipeline and we expect an equal amount of about 15,000 to arrive by the end of this month," he added.

RCA dealers are expected to stock anywhere from 15 to 60 of the 100 titles available in the initial catalog, Mr. Schlosser said, adding that the balance of the opening titles will be held in central inventory.

"If the dealer does not have a title in stock, the consumer can place an order with the dealer for Quick Delivery Service (QDS). Under the QDS system, the dealer can accept an order and payment from the consumer and we will deliver the title by UPS either to the dealer for customer pick-up or directly to the customer's home," he explained.

Mr. Schlosser said RCA's advertising -- which uses the theme: "Bring the Magic Home" -- will begin the week of March 16 with three "teaser" ads in newspapers in 115 major markets. Network television advertising will start Sunday, March 22, with commercials on all three networks between 9 and 10 p.m.

"This is the highest sets-in-use time period in television, and we estimate that the commercials on ABC, CBS and NBC combined next Sunday will reach 46 million homes and 90 million people," he added. RCA also will have four one-minute commercials on ABC's upcoming mini series, "Masada."

The company's print advertising will include newspapers in 115 markets and such national magazines as Newsweek, Time, Panorama, Playboy, Sports Illustrated, People and American Film.

As previously reported, RCA expects to sell 200,000 players and two million discs under its own label in 1981.

The opening catalog of 100 titles includes recent hit movies as well as the classics, children's programs, music, best of television, sports, award-winning documentaries, art, ballet, and instructional discs.

"We will release 25 additional titles to our distributors in May, and 25 more in August, and another batch in the fall. We expect to follow with continuing releases in 1982 and thereafter at the rate of 120 titles, or more, per year," he said.



So now it makes a little more sense.

[ketonic_dude]

Regarding the topic of, not all 100 titles available at every dealer, I just stumbled upon this on Tom's timeline.

RCA Press Release for March 16, 1981

RCA to Launch Its VideoDisc System with Approximately 500,000 Albums
HOLLYWOOD, Fla., March 16 -- RCA has pressed some 500,000 video disc albums to support the launch of its "SelectaVision" VideoDisc system, Herbert S. Schlosser, executive vice president of RCA announced today.

In a speech before the 11th Annual Seminar of the ITA, Mr. Schlosser said RCA began pressing discs last summer and began making video disc players in October in anticipation of the launch.

Noting that many of the albums have been shipped to distributor locations, he said "in effect, we are establishing an inventory base in 70 different locations. This will be the first line of supply for those titles stocked at retail."

Mr. Schlosser said the first group of 15,000 video disc players currently is being delivered to some 5,000 dealers in 50 states. "Additional players are in the pipeline and we expect an equal amount of about 15,000 to arrive by the end of this month," he added.

RCA dealers are expected to stock anywhere from 15 to 60 of the 100 titles available in the initial catalog, Mr. Schlosser said, adding that the balance of the opening titles will be held in central inventory.

"If the dealer does not have a title in stock, the consumer can place an order with the dealer for Quick Delivery Service (QDS). Under the QDS system, the dealer can accept an order and payment from the consumer and we will deliver the title by UPS either to the dealer for customer pick-up or directly to the customer's home," he explained.

Mr. Schlosser said RCA's advertising -- which uses the theme: "Bring the Magic Home" -- will begin the week of March 16 with three "teaser" ads in newspapers in 115 major markets. Network television advertising will start Sunday, March 22, with commercials on all three networks between 9 and 10 p.m.

"This is the highest sets-in-use time period in television, and we estimate that the commercials on ABC, CBS and NBC combined next Sunday will reach 46 million homes and 90 million people," he added. RCA also will have four one-minute commercials on ABC's upcoming mini series, "Masada."

The company's print advertising will include newspapers in 115 markets and such national magazines as Newsweek, Time, Panorama, Playboy, Sports Illustrated, People and American Film.

As previously reported, RCA expects to sell 200,000 players and two million discs under its own label in 1981.

The opening catalog of 100 titles includes recent hit movies as well as the classics, children's programs, music, best of television, sports, award-winning documentaries, art, ballet, and instructional discs.

"We will release 25 additional titles to our distributors in May, and 25 more in August, and another batch in the fall. We expect to follow with continuing releases in 1982 and thereafter at the rate of 120 titles, or more, per year," he said.



So now it makes a little more sense.

[SelectaVision420]

this is such a great topic! this is an aspect of the hobby i never really understood until now...
_________________
(2)Sears 274 & 934(80150,10&11350), sft100, sgt250, sjt 090-400, vp550, VDR3000, VP2000 & 4000
complete '84 Dimensia Owner

[lynx]

I promised that if I discovered something new regarding the spine numbers on the CED caddy labels that I would post it on here, which just happened.



I just went to a gentleman’s house to buy a box full of CEDs that were advertised in the local newspaper, and two of the titles included are Murder, Anyone?, UPC number {7647620041}, from 1982, and A Week At The Races, UPC number {76476250010}, from 1983. They are both in black caddies, and the CED title database lists both of them as “rare.” They have one different letter in the spine codes which is different than any other RCA CED titles.



Murder, Anyone? has the code CN11E-V105606, and A Week At The Races has the code CN11E-V105576.



Both of them are color titles, and they both obviously have sound, but I can’t understand what the letter “N” designates. Last year, I was able to conclude that the second letter specifies the soundtrack, with the letter “M” on monophonic titles & the letter “S” for stereo titles. Looking thru the rest of my CED collection, they are the only titles I own which have an “N” as their second letter. The rest of the letters & numbers are typical to all the rest of the RCA CED titles.



“Noise reduction” is the only term I can think of which relates to a media soundtrack or sound recording beginning with the letter “N”, and I can’t think of any word pertaining to CED beginning with “N”. Neither one of them say they are in stereo anywhere on the caddies, so I’m guessing they’re both mono titles. This letter is a mystery to me, so what could it possibly mean?



Quick side note: A Week At The Races has only ever been released on CED, and Murder, Anyone? was released both on CED and laser disc.
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[ketonic_dude]

I got your email, thanks. So both of those titles are interactive titles. Meaning they are banded for use on a J/K 400 CED player. They would play a short video clip and then display options (bands you could jump to) and you would select one and be taken to a clip on that band, this would continue as you played the game. Picking different sequences of bands would result in different endings to the game. There are other discs that are banded as well, mostly stereo music titles, so that you could jump to a certain song.

So N would have to mean something to do with Interactive Title, Game Disc, etc.

I checked all the interactive discs that I have and they all have the same N except for The Disney Disc of Mystery and Magic which has 42-227BS00

But this was also the very first Interactive title that was released so it may have been different for whatever reason.

Here is Tom's information on the Interactive titles released,
http://www.cedmagic.com/featured/universe.html

A Walk Through the Universe has spine number 74643-16490 which is just the UPC number.

Thanks for sharing and hopefully this information helps.

[Jesse Skeen]

[lynx]