Three speed wonder. The first model had only a single speed, soon to be called Bx1. It was enough of a success to encourage Sony to shift into high gear and throw all their marketing and manufacturing power behind it. Designated as the Sony model number SL-7200A it was a recorder/player with a built-in tuner for capturing off-the-air TV reception. By setting the optional timer it would record a single program to be watched later. A K-30 cassette was included for archiving thirty minutes of video and for playing with the machine. It soon wasn't enough, more time was needed. For those that wanted more an optional K-60 cassette was available that would record up to an hour. A new model followed this the SL-7200A that had two speeds. The new slower speed was called Bx2 or Beta times two. This doubled the recording time. Sony felt at this juncture that this numbering system needed an immediate overhaul. It was still early and the actual emblems and symbols that would soon be used hadn't taken shape. So the speeds were renamed and would be designated using the Greek letter β, for Beta. The icon was formed from this and it would forever designate the Beta format. Roman numerals were added to the to indicate the speeds. Beta x1 became and Beta x2 was identified as . The main reason this was done was to avoid confusion. There were new Beta VCRs coming out later that would have a feature called x2 or x3 playback (times two or three). This allowed the tape to be played back at a faster speed while still showing a picture. So the "x" (times) now had a different meaning. It no longer applied to recording, only to playback viewing speed. In the new slower recording speed it was now possible to capture two hours using the K-60 cassette. Tape designations were changed too because a new longer cassette was coming that had more tape inside. This would allow even more recording time on a single cassette. Calling it the K-90 for three hours in would have been confusing with two speeds. So the second speed would have clouded the "x" times issue even more. To get out of this mess the K-60 became the L-500, the seldom used K-30 the L-250 and the new longer tape the L-750 (no K). These numbers coincidentally coincided with the amount in feet of tape inside the cassette. The L-750 increased the max recording time to three hours. (This time thing was going to become a big sore spot later.) But wait, soon after all this an even slower speed was introduced. Called it extended the recording times even more. Now the maximum for the L-500 in became 3 hours, the L-750, was 4½ hours and a new even longer L-830 cassette extended it to 5 hours in . (This was as close to the 6 hours that VHS bragged about as Sony dared to go.) In the L-830 is 3 hours 20 minutes. Recording in was not recommended for the L-830. It was too thin to withstand the faster speed. That was it for the recording speeds and cassettes lengths. No other additions or changes were made. Most home recording was done in or using L-750 tapes. The speed was mostly abandoned. It returned near the end and was reserved only for making super high quality recordings cherished only by the most demanding videophiles. There were some important performance and picture quality enhancements made to the Beta format during its lifespan and I'm going to cover those next.

Your going to like what happens next. The first to the new video party were the playback features. Since the Beta format pampered the tape it was able to pull off some interesting maneuvers that VHS had great difficulty matching or even performing. I already mentioned the x2 and x3 playback but a high speed picture search feature was available almost from the start. That was an in-your-face to VHS because high speed playback would shred the tape in their machine (more on this later as we go along). Fast-search in both directions (BetaScan as it was named by Sony) is great for finding locations on a tape. The picture goes by fast but it is watchable. All but the earliest Betas can do this (called cue and review by the other Betamakers: Aiwa, NEC, Sanyo and Toshiba). Another added feature was slow motion (or more correctly step-motion). This is a function available on many models, along with clear picture pause and single frame advance. These refinements added more versatility along with more electronics and value to the VCR. It also increased the desire to own one. The price went up but Beta was crushing the competition in the innovation department. Including a remote control for all these goodies was just a downright necessary and another nice added convenience. VHS could match most of these features at a lower price. Never mind that they were substandard to Beta. So the fight went on between the two formats and it went viral. Next came Betahi-fi stereo. Sound like no one ever heard before coming from a VCR! Before this revolution the sound that came from any VCR was lame. The slow tape speeds simply couldn't produce the high frequencies necessary to generate good quality sound, and it was in monaural. That all changed when Sony engineers developed a way to insert stereo FM recording into the video signal. They were actually able to move the recording information around so that four FM carrier signals could be inserted inside it. Now it became a compound signal that had two totally different identities in a single video footprint. It works because FM recording is in made using a different frequency from the analog video signal. The system behaves great, stays consistent and the picture processing never sees it. And as long as it remains in the same place all the time (after all, precision is Betas middle name) Betahi-fi is perfect for recording stellar audio. VHS could not duplicate this marvel because they were married to a small video drum that didn't write a large enough envelope to allow FM carriers to be inserted. Using four carriers for Betahigh two channel stereo (two for each) was done so the sound would be solid and resistant to dropouts because the left and right channels are duplicated. This recording technique revolutionized stereo audio. It was so good that it was almost perfect. No wow, no flutter, no distortion, period. Better yet it was fully compatible with all the Beta recordings and Beta models that came before it. Older tapes still played fine (although they would play the regular monaural track). So now that Sony had the audio perfected what would be next for Beta? Sony engineers went after the only thing left. They went to work on improving the picture. This was another area that VHS couldn't match because of that darn smaller video drum. Sony was able to push up the luminance part of the video signal so it would deliver more detail. They called it SuperBeta and they bragged that it improved the picture 20%, or more. And yes, you could really see the difference. Now, by combining a great picture with awesome stereo, one could finally immerse themselves totally into their home video viewing experience. There was one small glitch to SuperBeta. Its recordings when played back on older standard Beta models could exhibit some picture noise from the boosted luminance signal. Called sparkles they showed up around the edges of bright areas. Severity depended on the machine used. This was basically ignored and it never was much of an issue.

That's basically it. Not too bad. Fifteen years of improvements while marketing something totally new to an unsuspecting public. Near the close of Beta there were some interesting enhancements to the picture and sound quality but this is all you need to know to understand the Beta format. You have all you need to be to navigate through the many makes and models available from my Website. Now is the time to mention that there were some pretty famous nameplates that teamed up with Sony to sell their own Beta format VCRs. Here is the full line up: Aiwa, Magnasonic, Marantz, NEC, Pioneer, Radio Shack, Sanyo, Sears, Toshiba and Zenith. Good companies every one. But it was Sony, with the introduction of their Betamax, that paved the way for recording video. Which eventually lead to DVRs and DVDs

*For the complete lowdown of the features or specs for a particular model open its description in the "BETAS FOR PURCHASE" section.