Date   : Tue, 18 Aug 2009 23:24:47 +0200
From   : rick@... (Rick Murray)
Subject: Floppy drive cleaner

Alex Taylor wrote:

> So if I've understood this correctly, the 4-head single-speed
> Panasonic NV366 I mentioned earlier uses two of the heads for normal
> playback, and only brings the extra heads into play for the perfect
> still frame and single frame advance modes?

Evidently. It sounds odd, but if you think about it, you can't switch in 
a head 90 degrees out of phase. Well, you *could*, but such tapes would 
only be compatible with like players.

On the other hand, you might be mistaking video heads for audio heads. 
HiFi audio lays down a track "below" the video signal (don't ask, it's 
complicated but sort-of like a magnetic equivalent of a dual-layer DVD). 
I think my machine is six head, 2xSP, 2xLP, 2xHiFi.

My video camera was the same, but with a seventh "flying erase" head.


 > They're huge, crammed full of circuit boards and weigh about 8 tons.

Like any decent Betamax deck. I think an engineer could have fun in one 
of those. My Daewoo? Big sparse circuit board with maybe two ICs on it...



Best wishes,

Rick.

-- 
Rick Murray, eeePC901 & ADSL WiFI'd into it, all ETLAs!
BBC B: DNFS, 2 x 5.25" floppies, EPROM prog, Acorn TTX
E01S FileStore, A3000/A5000/RiscPC/various PCs/blahblah...