Shown above is the connection panel on a Beta that has S-Video connectors in addition to the common phono plugs. Examine the picture and let's take a minute to familiarize ourselves with each type of connector. Starting on the left is the RF in and out. This is the oldest method of getting signals to and from a Beta VCR. Here is where you would attach the antenna (RF in) to pick up stations off the air (you could also send the RF out signal from another VCR here too but as we'll find out later this is not the preferred method). Also this is where you send a signal out from the VCR to the antenna connector on your television. The switch below is to set the signal coming out for channel three or four, depending which channel was not active in your area. (Not active, as to keep down interference from a strong local station.) Soon after the introduction of the very first betas the video and audio phone plug inputs were added. You can see these in the lower right in the photo. As things became more sophisticated S-Video appeared, their sockets are above the plugs. The control connectors are used to gain remote operation of the Beta and don't play a part in this discussion. Now if you click the picture you will see a flow chart that will explain why S-Video produces the better picture. Starting at the bottom left and right in the graph you see arrows going out and coming in to the video processing circuits. You'll also notice they are marked chroma and luminance. Video signals can't be recorded directly onto video tape because the mechanics of magnetic technology is different than the RF coming in over the airwaves. In order to record video onto magnetic tape the electronics must convert the signal from RF to magnetic energy. Part of the process involves separating the picture into chroma (color clarity) and luminance (brightness and sharpness). Once recorded the process is reversed and everything is combined back together and sent out as RF which your television sees just like a incoming off-the-air broadcast. Now armed with this information let's see why it is best to use S-Video for picture quality. As stated earlier two arrows representing chroma and luminance out signals are from the processing section in the lower left. As they travel along thought the circuit you can see they join to form the combined video out. Doing this adds electronics to the circuit to perform this function. Follow the circuit and you see it also goes to the RF connector out where it is combined with the audio to form a composite signal to be reproduced on either channel three or four. This adds another step and more electronics. To get the signal back to where it can be recorded on the receiving Beta involves going through much the same components only in reverse, so now we've added more electronics. Now let's step back and look at the process in overview. The best recording would be if we could somehow take the magnetic information directly from the playback tape and have it print to the other tape directly. Since this is not possible it only makes since that getting as close to the recording medium (tape) as possible with the least amount of processing to interfere with the signal information is going to give us the best picture. Looking at the chart and you will see this is the very advantage of S-Video. It directly links the chroma and luminance together, without the additional circuits to combine and then separate the information. The put it another way you wouldn't record you audio tapes using a microphone when you can hook two recorders together with dubbing cables. It's the same principle. ©Misterßetamax go to homepage