In a world of digital downloads and streaming, you might be forgiven if you think that storage mediums like the CD and DVD are starting to go the way of the dinosaur, and we suppose as far as watching movies and shows are concerned, you might be right. However it seems that the predecessors of the CD, the VHS tapes, are still alive and well, at least for a little while more.Funai Electric has recently announced that they will be officially ceasing the manufacturing of VCRs this month. For those too young to remember or to know, the VCR is a tape player which plays VHS tapes, and this is what movies used to come in way before CDs were around. You would think that VCRs and VHS tapes would be extinct by now, but for the longest time ever Funai Electric has been chugging along and producing units in China.
In fact they have continued to be sold under brands like Sanyo and in markets like North America. Last year it was estimated that 750,000 units were sold worldwide which is admittedly rather little, but a lot for a format that many would have thought had died out. According to Funai, the company claims that the difficulty of trying to get parts and the declining sales was what led to their decision.
Just like vinyl, it seems that there are those who love the VHS format due to its grittiness, in which some enthusiasts believe is lost in formats like DVD and Blu-ray which feel too “clean”. To each their own, we suppose.
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