Glad to see that this machine went to a good home. I sold another one just like it to The Media Hoarder who lives about 45 minutes away from me. I decided to include a videotape with these machines because I want the buyers to be certain that I maintained these machines to the best of my ability. Have fun recording with this machine. I own about 200 of the 2 hour videotapes, 20 of the 100 minute, four of the 1 hour and two of the 30 minute.
By any chance, would any of those tapes be junkers (blank, no commercials, no ephemera, etc.)? I'm looking for at least one to record on and one to open up and examine.
Must have been made in Japan or Germany. Things don't have to break.. it's called planned obsolescence my friend.. and for 30 years that concept has gone into hyper-over-drive. Garbage is very profitable industry - especially when it's designed to be constant. Don't believe the hype that you should feel guilty about being a consumer.. they want you to be one.
@@SPINNINGMYWHEELS777 These were made in Japan. They guy who sold these did a bit of work on them. This beats my 1982 RCA Videodisc player (made in the US) as oldest working electronic component now. If Ben opens this one up hope he can see when exactly it was manufactured. Mine was made in March 1977.
@@rjonzun5828 Oh yeah I'm well awares of that whole crap show now they embed a microcontroller inside them for more things to go wrong with a light bulb.
Oooohhhh, awesome find! Can't wait for more! You're complementing Techmoan here... I may be wrong, but I'm thinking this format was NTSC-only, and I think the Philips Video2000 he covered was PAL-only. Of course, for formats that did both standards, I'd eagerly watch every video either of you made about them, and Databits as well. All 3 of you are top-notch content creators, and I can't get enough about obsolete/obscure formats.
Do pop in and see me too, I cover lots of obscure formats like N1500, N1700, SVC, CVC and studio decks. I would love a VX machine, even though they are NTSC only.
That tape was on the table when I picked my machine up, curious where it was recorded from. There may be some HBO stuff at the end. The take up reel is on top, for reference. My machine locked up once when trying to rewind but it worked after a few pushes.
@@MitchellHang They were, I live 2 hours from the seller so I picked mine up myself. The seller knows quite a bit about these and did prior work on them. I have 2 more of these I may bring him to look at.
@@TheMediaHoarder I did also find a few auctions for the Japanese equivalent, the National VX-2000, in which I found the resale value to be around $100 (import/handling fees not included).
@@TheMediaHoarder I sold these at a fair price. I have seen these machines priced above $1,000 in non operating condition. That's not right. I would love to work on a fifth and even a sixth Quasar VR-1000 VCR. I still think it is something anyone with basic knowledge of a VHS VCR can do themselves. The machine may be big and intimidating but simple maintenance will get them up and running.
Awesome, never thought I would see one of these again as a well off neighbor who lived next door to my grandmother in the 80's and 90s had one, along with VHS, Beta Max, and Laser Disc all hooked to a big projector TV, and Pioneer HiFi, as he worked for the US government DOE(Department of Energy)(I own my grandmother's house now, and it's about a mile outside of a US government Nuclear waste processing, and storage site that use to make warheads for nuke missiles, and bombs well into the late 80's), so when he would travel on business I would be tasked to go feed his birds, and cat, and one of my rewards besides use of his pool in the summer(long as I kept it clean) was access to his video collection on the various formats. So again i'm really excited to see more of this again. 👍
@@jasonhaman4670 Yeah can't say I ever came across that format outside of maybe seeing it at a store, but my sister who is 5 years older than myself, in the early 00's did get into the latter years of VHS-C having got a camera on discount, and then SONY mini DVD-R cameras recording my nieces, and nephews when they where really young, so I got to play with those formats a bit as well, and just a few years ago I learned the joys of having one of my Emerson VHS/DVD combo units eat a VHS-C tape inside of a motorized adapter, and having to fish it out, as I was converting all my sister's home movies to Mpeg4 burned on dual layer DVD-R disc. The one format for some strange reason I've always wanted to get my hands on, but I never remember seeing in stores, or even out in the wild of all my years of thrifting except at inflated Flea Bay prices I refuse to pay has been CED.
No way! I’ve been looking for a player for quite sometime. I have a dozen or so of those tapes on standby for when I did find a working player. I can send you a couple your way if needed
Good find. Back in the day, I had a media dubbing business. I must've had a dozen or more video tape formats besides the ones that were popular at the time. We used to dub them to VHS which was what folks were using at the time. We had half inch EIAJ open reel, 1 inch type B, a strange 3/4 inch cassette similar to what you showed, only I think it was specially designed for the military. The machine we used came from a base auction.We had Cartrivision and 1/4 inch Technicolor cassette.
I can't wait to see the video on this! Rene Gonzalez here on UA-cam has SEVERAL videos on this format (and TONS of tapes)...if you have any questions, i'm sure he could give you some answers
What about the capacitors? Better peek in there before it starts to smoke. Had a GE boom box that sat for 20 + years and worked fine until it started to smoke and there it went.
@@VectraQS Yes, the age warrants a recap and would hate to damage such a beautiful piece. A variac or at least make a dim bulb tester is good to have. I learned the hard way.
Aww. drat... We had one of these when I was growing up (or a Quasar like it from around1974). My dad passed away last October and I - unfortunately for you, perhaps - tossed all his old tapes from that machine (about 50 give or take). They were mostly of "The Tonight Show" with Johnny Carson...
I'm sure you've seen it, but Databits put out a video about these machines a few months ago. He shows how to disassemble and reassemble the tapes which you may need to do to remove some foam sponges inside that are now turning into dust or to splice out bad spots on the tape (he said the player is very intolerant of bad tape).
It’s likely from cable, and wondering if it has any channel promos before or after. I need to get some more tapes from this guy, at least borrow them to check for stuff. I know he has a few that are either unused or junk recorded much later that would be suitable sacrifices. Wondering about the history of this format. There were no pre-recorded tapes that anyone knows of.
WoW! That's some picture. Perhaps the previous owner did some proper routine maintenance. I was expecting garbled garbage from a deck that old. This is a great museum piece. I have NEVER seen a cassette like that one. I thought it was going to be a Umatic machine.
Wow!! I've never seen the inside of these! And it works! Give it a look-over to check for anything that's going to kill it right away. Put a watt/amp meter on it as you play with it, like a killawatt to check for unusual rises in power consumption.
I must admit that I'm not familiar with VX VCR format. First time seeing it. The fact that it's actually working is amazing. The first consumer level VCR system that I know of is Video Cassette Recording (yes, that's it's official designation) from Phillips (1971). Don't know where you'll find the tapes for either of these beasts. I would certainly like to get my hands on U-Matic!
You should make a shirt . With a cartoon version of dressed as Mr good wrench but your caring a vcr and on the it says mr. VCR keeping the past in working order or at least he’s trying to .
Isn't it so satisfying to turn on an electronic device nearing 50 years old and not have any issues with it? That speaks volumes over today's electronics' lack of quality and reliability.
This machine is built like a battle tank. Everything is oversized and overpowered. The main motor is the size of a tub of wheel bearing grease. The belts are huge and are the original ones and have no signs of cracking or softening. The capacitors are all the original 1977 Nichicon branded ones. These machines work within a wide range of voltage tolerances. Changing capacitors is not 100 percent necessary. I can't state that enough on my channel.
My dad had one of these. He might still have tapes. These produced a really good picture, but the format was doomed from the start. The weakest point is a clutch that tends to fail causing the take up reel to stop turning.
Do you have an adaptor for that video input on the back? I don’t know what it’s called. Playing one of my tapes right now and seems to be completely blank, want to do a test recording but will need to find the right adaptor, or could use my RF modulator.
Glad to see that this machine went to a good home. I sold another one just like it to The Media Hoarder who lives about 45 minutes away from me. I decided to include a videotape with these machines because I want the buyers to be certain that I maintained these machines to the best of my ability. Have fun recording with this machine. I own about 200 of the 2 hour videotapes, 20 of the 100 minute, four of the 1 hour and two of the 30 minute.
By any chance, would any of those tapes be junkers (blank, no commercials, no ephemera, etc.)? I'm looking for at least one to record on and one to open up and examine.
Amazing!! That’s close to 50 years old and fired up just like that. Meanwhile you’re lucky to get 5 years out of electronics today.
Must have been made in Japan or Germany. Things don't have to break.. it's called planned obsolescence my friend.. and for 30 years that concept has gone into hyper-over-drive. Garbage is very profitable industry - especially when it's designed to be constant. Don't believe the hype that you should feel guilty about being a consumer.. they want you to be one.
@@SPINNINGMYWHEELS777 Yep. Check out the history of the lightbulb. We should beat their a$$e$.
@@SPINNINGMYWHEELS777 These were made in Japan. They guy who sold these did a bit of work on them. This beats my 1982 RCA Videodisc player (made in the US) as oldest working electronic component now. If Ben opens this one up hope he can see when exactly it was manufactured. Mine was made in March 1977.
@@SPINNINGMYWHEELS777 A lot of things are sold broken from the factory, especially chinese no-name brands do produce what's basically just waste.
@@rjonzun5828 Oh yeah I'm well awares of that whole crap show now they embed a microcontroller inside them for more things to go wrong with a light bulb.
Oooohhhh, awesome find! Can't wait for more! You're complementing Techmoan here... I may be wrong, but I'm thinking this format was NTSC-only, and I think the Philips Video2000 he covered was PAL-only. Of course, for formats that did both standards, I'd eagerly watch every video either of you made about them, and Databits as well. All 3 of you are top-notch content creators, and I can't get enough about obsolete/obscure formats.
Do pop in and see me too, I cover lots of obscure formats like N1500, N1700, SVC, CVC and studio decks. I would love a VX machine, even though they are NTSC only.
Wow that is a beast . I never knew anyone that owned one of these. Very cool to see it still works.
That tape was on the table when I picked my machine up, curious where it was recorded from. There may be some HBO stuff at the end.
The take up reel is on top, for reference. My machine locked up once when trying to rewind but it worked after a few pushes.
I think both you and Ben may have gotten your units from the same seller, considering the relative timing between your videos.
@@MitchellHang They were, I live 2 hours from the seller so I picked mine up myself. The seller knows quite a bit about these and did prior work on them. I have 2 more of these I may bring him to look at.
@@TheMediaHoarder I did also find a few auctions for the Japanese equivalent, the National VX-2000, in which I found the resale value to be around $100 (import/handling fees not included).
@@TheMediaHoarder I sold these at a fair price. I have seen these machines priced above $1,000 in non operating condition. That's not right. I would love to work on a fifth and even a sixth Quasar VR-1000 VCR. I still think it is something anyone with basic knowledge of a VHS VCR can do themselves. The machine may be big and intimidating but simple maintenance will get them up and running.
Surprisingly decent video quality on that!
Holy cow! What an amazing find you got! I'll love to see more action from that beast!
That was a great find. Can’t wait to see how this goes.
That looks amazing, looking forward to seeing more.
Happy Tuesday morning for this awesome video. :)
The Quasar VCR looks pretty cool!
I'm a video geek. You, sir, have my full attention!
Love it! Can’t wait to see more!
Great find! Can't wait to see more of this.
I'm surprised this machine still fired up with how old it is, and considering that the top popped off during transit!
Awesome, never thought I would see one of these again as a well off neighbor who lived next door to my grandmother in the 80's and 90s had one, along with VHS, Beta Max, and Laser Disc all hooked to a big projector TV, and Pioneer HiFi, as he worked for the US government DOE(Department of Energy)(I own my grandmother's house now, and it's about a mile outside of a US government Nuclear waste processing, and storage site that use to make warheads for nuke missiles, and bombs well into the late 80's), so when he would travel on business I would be tasked to go feed his birds, and cat, and one of my rewards besides use of his pool in the summer(long as I kept it clean) was access to his video collection on the various formats. So again i'm really excited to see more of this again. 👍
Sounds like you lived the life. The only thing you didn't tick off my childhood fantasy video system is Hi8.
@@jasonhaman4670 Yeah can't say I ever came across that format outside of maybe seeing it at a store, but my sister who is 5 years older than myself, in the early 00's did get into the latter years of VHS-C having got a camera on discount, and then SONY mini DVD-R cameras recording my nieces, and nephews when they where really young, so I got to play with those formats a bit as well, and just a few years ago I learned the joys of having one of my Emerson VHS/DVD combo units eat a VHS-C tape inside of a motorized adapter, and having to fish it out, as I was converting all my sister's home movies to Mpeg4 burned on dual layer DVD-R disc.
The one format for some strange reason I've always wanted to get my hands on, but I never remember seeing in stores, or even out in the wild of all my years of thrifting except at inflated Flea Bay prices I refuse to pay has been CED.
This behemoth should pay you rent.
No way! I’ve been looking for a player for quite sometime. I have a dozen or so of those tapes on standby for when I did find a working player. I can send you a couple your way if needed
Feel free to E-Mail me at oddityarchive@gmail.com. Maybe we can work something out.
Good find. Back in the day, I had a media dubbing business. I must've had a dozen or more video tape formats besides the ones that were popular at the time. We used to dub them to VHS which was what folks were using at the time. We had half inch EIAJ open reel, 1 inch type B, a strange 3/4 inch cassette similar to what you showed, only I think it was specially designed for the military. The machine we used came from a base auction.We had Cartrivision and 1/4 inch Technicolor cassette.
I've heard of these but never actually seen one. Love the aesthetic of the whole thing. And chunky is an understatement for that tape!
When vcr's where called "time machines" a great way to hype up your product.
1:33 - Is there anything more satisfying than that great *CHULUNK* sound?
Wow pretty good quality for how old & rare this particular machine & tapes are.
Officially jealous. Nice.
I hardly ever comment, but I have to say that Quasar is absolutely beautiful 😍😍😍!!!
Also, wow I’ve never heard of this format 😮
It's okay if you can do an installment series on this machine because of the rarity of format and system. Keep up the good work.
Never seen this format of tape before! Nice find!
Excuse me while I pick my jaw up off the floor.
Very cool machine!!
I can't wait to see the video on this! Rene Gonzalez here on UA-cam has SEVERAL videos on this format (and TONS of tapes)...if you have any questions, i'm sure he could give you some answers
...and that's exactly who I bought it off of.
@@OddityArchive Which country is he in?
Here in the States.
@@OddityArchive Must have be en RARE. Anything Analog pre 1977 Non Umatic is pretty rare and expensive.
Wow that's amazing. Never seen this format before.
Awesome!!! I’ve been waiting to see ANY video with a physical VX unit on YT, haven’t seen one yet
For what it's worth, Fuzzy Memories and The Media Hoarder have some transfers from this format on their channels.
A victim of the mid-70s VCR format war.
That video tape is a joke how big it is haha. I do find novelty in such ridiculous things.
Cool machine !
What about the capacitors? Better peek in there before it starts to smoke. Had a GE boom box that sat for 20 + years and worked fine until it started to smoke and there it went.
You tend to see the exploding RIFA caps in computers more than VCRs. However, this thing is almost certainly full of leaky Matushita caps.
@@VectraQS Yes, the age warrants a recap and would hate to damage such a beautiful piece. A variac or at least make a dim bulb tester is good to have. I learned the hard way.
Aww. drat... We had one of these when I was growing up (or a Quasar like it from around1974). My dad passed away last October and I - unfortunately for you, perhaps - tossed all his old tapes from that machine (about 50 give or take). They were mostly of "The Tonight Show" with Johnny Carson...
I'm sure you've seen it, but Databits put out a video about these machines a few months ago. He shows how to disassemble and reassemble the tapes which you may need to do to remove some foam sponges inside that are now turning into dust or to splice out bad spots on the tape (he said the player is very intolerant of bad tape).
I’m wondering what exactly is meant by that. I played a tape with mold which you can see uploaded here, it was too good and rare not to play.
My parents purchased a VR1000 when they were first released. Being a tech kid, I was in heaven!
Awesome you got one!
I think the 8 bit guy has one of these tapes. No clue if it was anything recorded on it though
What a chonky boy.
but benny boy, did walking tall have commercials?!
I'll find out in time. Part of me is kinda hoping not--I could really use a junker to do recording tests on and/or dismantle to check out.
It’s likely from cable, and wondering if it has any channel promos before or after. I need to get some more tapes from this guy, at least borrow them to check for stuff. I know he has a few that are either unused or junk recorded much later that would be suitable sacrifices. Wondering about the history of this format. There were no pre-recorded tapes that anyone knows of.
WoW! That's some picture. Perhaps the previous owner did some proper routine maintenance. I was expecting garbled garbage from a deck that old. This is a great museum piece. I have NEVER seen a cassette like that one. I thought it was going to be a Umatic machine.
Ben like em 'Chunky' and he's out for more!
X^P
Wow!! I've never seen the inside of these! And it works! Give it a look-over to check for anything that's going to kill it right away. Put a watt/amp meter on it as you play with it, like a killawatt to check for unusual rises in power consumption.
I saw one of these on Databits' channel not too long ago. Does the dehumidifier work? Anyway, can't wait to see the long video on this.
The dehumidifier makes plenty of racket when I switch it on. No idea if it's effective or not.
Two days in, I bet its big honkin' power transformer will help warm it up a bit.
I must admit that I'm not familiar with VX VCR format. First time seeing it. The fact that it's actually working is amazing.
The first consumer level VCR system that I know of is Video Cassette Recording (yes, that's it's official designation) from Phillips (1971). Don't know where you'll find the tapes for either of these beasts.
I would certainly like to get my hands on U-Matic!
I’ve honestly never seen one of these before. I can only assume that it’s as heavy as it looks.
@2:22 holy cow that guy looks like Steven Buschemi
Wood paneling improves just about any piece of tech. Isn’t that right, LGR?
VCR in 1975 looks good. 😀👍📼
You should make a shirt .
With a cartoon version of dressed as Mr good wrench but your caring a vcr and on the it says mr. VCR keeping the past in working order or at least he’s trying to .
Wish I had that kind of talent.
Isn't it so satisfying to turn on an electronic device nearing 50 years old and not have any issues with it? That speaks volumes over today's electronics' lack of quality and reliability.
This machine is built like a battle tank. Everything is oversized and overpowered. The main motor is the size of a tub of wheel bearing grease. The belts are huge and are the original ones and have no signs of cracking or softening. The capacitors are all the original 1977 Nichicon branded ones. These machines work within a wide range of voltage tolerances. Changing capacitors is not 100 percent necessary. I can't state that enough on my channel.
You gave it 2 days to thaw out 😂
My dad had one of these. He might still have tapes. These produced a really good picture, but the format was doomed from the start. The weakest point is a clutch that tends to fail causing the take up reel to stop turning.
This looks like the player we had as kids
Wow Ben! Where did you purchase it?(Rather,Which Country?)
That is one thicc cassette.
Chunky? As long as it works !!!! No micro controllers to go tits up.
never heard of this format
Do you have an adaptor for that video input on the back? I don’t know what it’s called. Playing one of my tapes right now and seems to be completely blank, want to do a test recording but will need to find the right adaptor, or could use my RF modulator.
A PL-259 to RCA Composite adapter fits, though admittedly, I haven't tried to run anything into it yet.
ka-chunk-a-chunk!
This is one of those formats I'll be skipping...
if only it was an actual time machine
Wow! It's like someone invented a cinder-block with magnetic tape inside. Get enough of those things, and I bet you can build a freaking bomb shelter.
When this baby hits 88 fps
...you're gonna see some serious oxide.
Old stuff is better. I saw that I'd buy one and watch movies on it just to play with it and look at it. New stuff all looks like a tube of lipstick.
Moist