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Comment by XorNot

3 days ago

Beta was not the superior technology, and it lost for very good reasons.

Beta was superior in everything but run length, and it lost because it was more expensive than VHS without being sufficiently superior to justify the cost.

  • Yes but that's not a minor issue: Beta's run length was so limited that it couldn't record or hold a full length movie or even a long TV show.

    • Only for the first year or two of release. Early VHS capacities were better, but by the late 70s or early 80s there wasn't a meaningful difference.