The Philips Video Compact Cassette (VCC) was the first practical home video cassette recorder system. The format appeared at around the same time as the Sony U-matic. Although at first glance the two may have appeared to be competing formats, they were aimed at very different markets. U-matic was introduced as a professional format, while the VCC was targeted at domestic users.

Although home video systems had existed prior to this, they were based on open reel systems and were extremely expensive to both buy and operate. The VCC system was still expensive by today's standards: the N1500 VCC recorder cost nearly £600 in the United Kingdom when it was introduced in 1973 - that's the equivalent of more than £4500 today.

The system used large cassettes with 2 co-axial reels, one on top of the other, containing half inch wide chrome dioxide tape. Three playing times were available: 30, 45 and 60 minutes. The 60-minute cassettes proved very unreliable, suffering numerous snags and breakages due to the very thin tape.

The system predated the development of the slant azimuth technique to prevent crosstalk between adjacent video tracks, so had to use an unrecorded guard band between tracks. This gave the system a comparatively high tape speed of around 11.5 inches per second.

The recorders themselves were mechanically very complicated and proved somewhat unreliable. The VCC system was rapidly superseded by the superior VHS and Betamax systems, which offered longer playing times, slightly better resolution and greater reliability.

However, the VCC system brought together many advances in video recording technology to produce the first truly practical home video cassette system, and led directly to the development of the systems that ultimately replaced it.

External links

• Total Rewind - the Virtual Museum of Vintage VCRs