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The Video Home System, better known by its acronym VHS, is the recording and playing
standard for video cassette recorders (VCRs),
developed by JVC and launched in 1976.
It became a standard format for consumer recording and viewing in the 1980s after
competing in a fierce format war with Sony's Betamax and, to a lesser extent, Philips's Video 2000.
A VHS cassette contains a 1/2-inch wide magnetic tape which is wound from one of two spools to the other, allowing it to slowly pass by the reader head of the video cassette recorder.
Several improved versions of VHS exist, most notably S-VHS, an improved analog
standard, and D-VHS, which records digital video onto a VHS form factor tape.
VHS-C tapes (C for compact) are used in some camcorders, and can be
played back in standard VHS players with an adapter. Its development hampered the sales of the Betamax system somewhat, because
the Betamax cassette geometry prevented a similar development.
VHS tapes have approximately 3 MHz of bandwidth, and about 240 lines of resolution.[1]
Although VHS officially stands for Video Home System, it initially stood for Vertical Helical Scan, after the
relative head/tape scan technique. Some early reports claimed that the initials originally stood for Victor (Company) Helical Scan system.
VCR's were taken to court and found legal in the case of Sony vs. Universal Studios however under a proposed law "Induce" the
VHS system would become illegal.
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