Thread 724017310

>Can theoretically store up to 2GB of data; more than twice as much as CDs
>Theoretically could have a transfer speed of 150KB per second (on par with CD drives at the time)
Why didn't 5th generation game consoles use VHS tapes?

>>724017310 (OP)
Clunky.
Not as hardy as discs.
Analog was only appreciated by hipsters at the time.
Some asshole could just run a magnet over all the tapes and Gamestop would be fucked.

>>724017310 (OP)
Because we already used tapes and it fucking sucked.

>>724017479
>Some asshole could just run a magnet over all the tapes and Gamestop would be fucked.

>>724017310 (OP)
The PSX had a 2X drive, which meant 300k/s. The missing link in tape access is that it's sequential, not random. Want a byte from one location on the disc, and a byte on another (like, say, streaming music and game data at the same time)? Seek time is 100ms or so (back then).
Want data in 2 different locations on a tape? It has to rewind and fast forward, taking seconds to minutes.
On top of that, tapes degrade with each use, and the mechanism to read them can chew them up.

>>724017310 (OP)
And your parents will know that you sneaked in to watch their hidden copy of Tracy I love you because you panicked return the tapes without rewinding. No tnx

>>724017691
Is that the *forbidden* Lords video?

>>724017657
They do it in Fight Club and Be Kind Rewind.
In fact that's literally the plot of Be Kind Rewind, one of the dudes gets electrocuted and it magnetizes him, and he goes to his friends video rental place and accidentally wipes all the tapes so they have to remake all of them home movie style.

>>724017310 (OP)
tapes are linear, and to go back and forth to different sections of data, you need to physically rewind/fast-forward the spool. Magnetic tape is still used for large scale data archives, but that's just the thing; it makes for an efficient way to archive lots of data, but not for quick access.

>>724017310 (OP)
would have made those consoles triple in size and also more costly. also piracy.

>>724017747
it is the only legal one

Because it has to be read sequentially and you probably didn't have enough memory to hold the whole program.

>>724017310 (OP)
it's not about the size of storage, it's about the speed. there were actually games on casettes, but the downside of tapes is that the random access speed is terrible, since the tape has to be read sequentially until it gets to the information you need - very fucking awful. CDs let you practically jump to that point by moving the laser head and are far better for this. This is why modern day backup solutions involve tape storages that backup data on tapes as a final resting point

>pull tape out of player
>ribbon got caught in it somehow, whole thing is ruined
I'm glad I'm not in that freak alternate universe where games ever had to experience this

way more expensive to manufacture than CDs

>>724017976
You could rewind the tape if you were careful.

>>724017892
I thought most were legal and it was just one or two that weren't.

>>724017310 (OP)
What >>724017667 said.
Seek time on tape is godawful, so random read is godawful. It would have required a LOT more RAM to be usable for games, because you just could do non-sequential reads in anything that would be approachable for games.
By the way, we still use a lot of tape for cold storage. Even after all these years, it's the most economical by some distance for data that is written once and read almost never.

>>724017976
I actually plan on becoming an autist VHS collector for older movies I like and worry this will happen.

>>724017976
that probably happened to someone at least once during the casette era

>>724017310 (OP)
I imagine the seek times would be slightly problematic, unless the entire game is loaded into ram.

>>724018113
the people involved only got away with it because her using fake documents gave plausible deniability

>>724018240
it happened to me like twice as a kid, but as a result of rewinding it by hand lol

>>724017976
>I'm glad I'm not in that freak alternate universe where games ever had to experience this

>>724018232
admittedly it wasn't super common but I recall it happening to me a few times, might have even lost a 3 stooges tape that way
>>724018534
oh god

>>724018534
I'm a zoomer so I thankfully grew up with DVDs and shit, but I imagine this shit would be Gen X's worst nightmare