Any Laserdisc fans/experts (yes, old format style, not DVD) in our membership?
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It's addictive. A well kept LD may have analog picture, but its WONDERFUL. And, what a GREAT way to collect movies that either are not on DVD, or...
that you want with less compression and artifacts.
that you want with less compression and artifacts.
I have so many hobbies now, and stuff but I will do it one day soon and I will report. I am following everything that you are figuring out and the other comments here, so I will hopefully know what player not to buy.
The Ebay seller of the BASIC laservision, CLD-42400 was VERY helpful, delivered the item to a record store in Grandville, where we picked it up today. Also got two "parts" units cheap of different models.
The CLD-42400 renders a nice, bright picture with good color, not a "technicolor" look, a very natural rendition. Extremely basic, no on-screen prompts, and it even came with "bar code" sheets which were at one time used for jumping the unit from chapter to chapter, etc. (probably for teaching.) As an inexpensive way to restore my latest hobby, this unit is HIGHLY recommended. Seems durable, too! Remote not with it, but probably can download to a HARMONY unit. We'll see! Recommended for very BASIC player, and for just enjoying a disc collection!
Not sure what the RS232 and dip switches in the back were intended-for, and it came with a plug-in onboard RF modulator for channel 3/4. This unit was retired from school use. I figure it either got LOTS of use which kept it in good shape, or very LITTLE use, same notation. It's nice to have an LD in full function again....but I intend to find more!
The CLD-42400 renders a nice, bright picture with good color, not a "technicolor" look, a very natural rendition. Extremely basic, no on-screen prompts, and it even came with "bar code" sheets which were at one time used for jumping the unit from chapter to chapter, etc. (probably for teaching.) As an inexpensive way to restore my latest hobby, this unit is HIGHLY recommended. Seems durable, too! Remote not with it, but probably can download to a HARMONY unit. We'll see! Recommended for very BASIC player, and for just enjoying a disc collection!
Not sure what the RS232 and dip switches in the back were intended-for, and it came with a plug-in onboard RF modulator for channel 3/4. This unit was retired from school use. I figure it either got LOTS of use which kept it in good shape, or very LITTLE use, same notation. It's nice to have an LD in full function again....but I intend to find more!
I have two Pioneer units. One plays both sides and the other is an industrial model with a serial port (RS422?) for computer control. Commodore bundled a program with mid-term Amiga computers, Amigavision, that would drive the industrial unit. I don't remember the model numbers of either.
I have several discs kicking around and the player is the reason I still look for AVRs and TVs that still feature S-VHS ports.
I have several discs kicking around and the player is the reason I still look for AVRs and TVs that still feature S-VHS ports.
The "amiga" information is new to me, but makes sense. When I was in college, I think it was an "Amiga" program that ran part of the local cable access.
I could see how this would fit in nicely, given some of the non-commercial discs that are out there, and were available back then!
I could see how this would fit in nicely, given some of the non-commercial discs that are out there, and were available back then!
There were also some interesting educational discs. One that I saw demoed on a Mac was the Louvre collection in still frame. You could jump around and view each piece in the collection with a serial controlled unit. I think there may have been some Hypercard stacks set up around these discs. Many of the industrial units were controlled using RS-422 which was a nice match for the Macintosh's variant of the RS-422 serial port. It was a very handy way to bring color video to a fundamentally B/W computer.
AmigaVision was Commodore's answer to Apple's HyperCard; a system supporting hyperlinked documents well before widespread use of HTML.
The other fun application was some of the Don Bluth video games (Dragon's Lair and Space Ace) that ran on dual LD video game consoles.
Was combing the web today, and saw lots of "training" videos for automobile service departments, too! Not of interest to me, but interesting to SEE how this format really penetrated into more than just the consumer market!
One of the fun things to do in the early days was to look for "dead sides" on the original discovision titles. The Discovision titles are the ones that are silver with the title in a cut out "V". If they had an odd number of sides, they would fill the last side with a random side. They sprayed a lacquer on the disc to make the side unplayable, but early adopters quickly discovered it could be removed with rubbing alcohol.
About half of the dead sides I had turned out to be the GM training videos, but sometimes you would get a gem. One disc had side 1 of Deliverance. That title had been announced as part of the original batch, but never released. It turned out to be a CLV disc at a time where everything was CAV. As an added bonus, it included the Dueling Banjo sequence.
Interesting! And, I think part of why this fits so well here on this board, is that collecting Laserdiscs is, like FTA the fun of the "hunt." I'm continually finding in both local and 'net searches things that were put on laser format that are not DVD'd, only found on old VHS tape, (or so I thought) but also on laserdisc, still relatively inexpensive. The Laser collection is growing, and it DIFFERS from the DVD's in my collection. Only a few duplicates!
Was surprised the other day to find that PBS in 1989 put some of their "American Playhouse" (live theatre series) on Laser. A local store had one live play still sealed in plastic from that series in their rack. My kingdom for "A walk in the woods" with Robert Prosky and Sam Waterston. It's from the same year.....Same series.....maybe it's out there....somewhere! The fact PBS had put the other play I found on disc surprised me, considering I can't find any reference to "Walk in the Woods" by PBS on physical media anywhere! This gives me hope. I think I have what seems to be the last remaining VHS hi-fi version of it, taped from a C-band PBS feed. (and recently had the pleasure of sending a copy to the author.)
Was surprised the other day to find that PBS in 1989 put some of their "American Playhouse" (live theatre series) on Laser. A local store had one live play still sealed in plastic from that series in their rack. My kingdom for "A walk in the woods" with Robert Prosky and Sam Waterston. It's from the same year.....Same series.....maybe it's out there....somewhere! The fact PBS had put the other play I found on disc surprised me, considering I can't find any reference to "Walk in the Woods" by PBS on physical media anywhere! This gives me hope. I think I have what seems to be the last remaining VHS hi-fi version of it, taped from a C-band PBS feed. (and recently had the pleasure of sending a copy to the author.)
A lil off topic but I too have a DEEP love for laserdisc, my parents would never buy me a player (i was a total AV nerd kid), it is disappointing to got from blu to LD now tho, i always hold the quality of LD high in my mind and then when i see it from time to time i always say, damn i thought that would be clearer, oh well, im my Dojo aka media room. check out the pics... i found a creative use for LDs as memorabilia. I do still have a player that works and a lot of the classics from the LD era on the shelf.
Amazing that you have "A Walk in the Woods". I have no idea why PBS has not put this out on DVD. I had the extreme pleasure of seeing the original Broadway cast (Robert Prosky and Sam Waterson) as well as the only time it was broadcast on PBS. What a treasure.
Cool! Is it an Apple Macintosh under the table?!!
Posted Using The New SatelliteGuys Reader App!
Cool! Is it an Apple Macintosh under the table?!!
Posted Using The New SatelliteGuys Reader App!
I saw that too. I think I may do the same thing with framing my Star Wars laserdisc's. I have a couple of others also. My Sony laserdisc player quit playing 8-9 yrs ago, just been sitting in dead equipment closet. I kept thinking I would take it apart and see if anything obvious was wrong and never got to it.
